DYSAETHESIA AETHIOPICA

bankuei:

Spent some time yesterday at the local cafe.   Figured I’d give it a few chances, but sitting in there, and it’s 90% white folks in the middle of downtown Oakland, and you look out the window and it’s 90% Black people, you know that wasn’t an accident.

And I find myself thinking this a lot about places, spaces, groups, that drastically differ from their local demographics - why is this, how did this get this way?

This cafe sits next to two Black owned businesses, yet it’s 90% white every time I’ve come in.  You know that’s not an accident.

And that’s something I’m applying everywhere - “This movie is all straight white men.  That’s not an accident.” etc.

No one needs to put up signs saying, “Whites only”, you just need folks making normalized decisions and microaggressions and the spaces build themselves.   And suddenly it’s a nearly all-white space in fully Black neighborhood.