White guilt

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White guilt refers to the concept of individual or collective guilt often said to be felt by some white people for the racist treatment of people of color by whites both historically and presently.[1] The term is generally used in pejorative way, usually by those who criticize efforts to assist non-whites, particularly with policies or decisions the critics believe give advantages or benefits to them unfair to whites.[citation needed] Many on the left have rejected the idea that guilt is the motivating factor for these efforts.[citation needed]

The term is often applied to white Americans regarding the history of enslavement of African Americans, and colonization and displacement of Native Americans and Native Hawaiians.[citation needed] In addition, white guilt may be experienced by citizens of European countries whose nations participated in the slave trade and/or colonized portions of Asia and South Asia, Sub Saharan Africa and the Americas.[citation needed] White guilt has been described as one of several psychosocial costs of racism for White individuals along with the ability to have empathic reactions towards racism, and fear of non-whites.[2]

According to Shelby Steele, white guilt is "a form of self-congratulation, where whites initiate 'compassionate policies' toward people of color, to showcase their innocence to racism."[3] Steele has put the term in the context of American history and society in his book White Guilt: How Blacks and Whites Together Destroyed the Promise of the Civil Rights Era (2006):

"Whites (and American institutions) must acknowledge historical racism to show themselves redeemed by it, but once they acknowledge it, they lose moral authority over everything having to do with race, equality, social justice, poverty and so on. [...] The authority they lose transfers to the 'victims' of historical racism and becomes their great power in society. This is why white guilt is quite literally the same thing as black power."[4]

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[edit] Criticism of the concept

Sunny Hundal, writing in The Guardian in September 2007, asserted that "Not much annoys me more than the stereotype that to be liberal is to be full of guilt. To be socially liberal, in my view, is to be more mindful of compassion and empathy for others." Hundal wrote that motivations for political opinions that are based on collective guilt create a "reductionist", simplistic view of the world that few people on the left actually hold.[5]

[edit] Use of the concept outside of politics

Judith Katz author of White Awareness: Handbook for Anti-Racism Training is highly critical of what she calls self-indulgent white guilt fixations. Her concerns about white guilt led her to move from black-white group encounters to all-white groups in her anti-racism training. She also avoided using non-white people to reeducate whites, she said, because she found that this led whites to focus on getting acceptance and forgiveness rather than changing their own actions or beliefs.[6] Statements about racial inequality may be framed as either White privileges or Black disadvantages, when framed as White privileges a 2005 study found that the statements resulted in greater collective guilt and lower racism compared to a Black disadvantage framing. The findings suggest that representing inequality in terms of outgroup disadvantage allows privileged group members to avoid the negative psychological implications of inequality and supports prejudicial attitudes.[7]

Con artists have been accused of using white guilt: "Telephone and mail solicitors, trading on "white guilt" and on government pressure to advertise in minority-oriented publications, are inducing thousands of businessmen to buy ads in phony publications", according to a 1978 Washington Post article.[8]

Stand up comedians of various ethnic backgrounds have often accused white people of being "ashamed" to laugh at their race-oriented material.[citation needed]

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ Shelby Steele. A World of Difference: White Guilt. internet: WPSU-FM. Retrieved on 2007-09-30.
  2. ^ Psychosocial Costs of Racism to Whites Scale (PCRW): Construction and Initial Validation Spanierman, Lisa B.; Heppner, Mary J. Journal of Counseling Psychology, v51 n2 p249-262 Apr 2004
  3. ^ Will, George F.. "White Guilt, Deciphered", MSNBC, June 5, 2006. Retrieved on 2007-09-30. 
  4. ^ [1] Google books excerpt from Steele, Shelby, White Guilt: How Blacks and Whites Together Destroyed the Promise of the Civil Rights Era Chapter 4: Certain Knowledge, p 24, HarperCollins: 2006, accessed September 30, 2007
  5. ^ [2]Hundal, Sunny, "The guilt-free liberal", The Guardian Web site, September 3, 2007, accessed September 30, 2007
  6. ^ What Should White People Do? Hypatia Volume 13, Number 3
  7. ^ Inequality as Ingroup Privilege or Outgroup Disadvantage: The Impact of Group Focus on Collective Guilt and Interracial Attitudes Adam A. Powell, Nyla R. Branscombe and Michael T. Schmitt. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 31, No. 4, 508-521 (2005)
  8. ^ [3]Archives search result page, The Washington Post Web site: Cannon, Lou, "Phony Ad Salesmen Prey on 'White Guilt'", news article in The Washington Post, January 16, 1978, accessed September 30, 2007

[edit] External links