The White Line

To what extent do you follow the white line?

“I was taught to see racism only in individual acts of meanness, not in invisible systems conferring dominance of my group”

“[W]hites are taught to think of their lives as morally neutral, normative, and average, and also ideal, so that when we work to benefit others, this is seen as work that will allow “them” to be more like “us”.” (McIntosh).  Whoa.  I am reluctant to even THINK about the aplicability of this concept to my own life; however, I know I would be remiss in dismissing it.  How much philanthropy in the area of equal rights is geared toward making the minority power group more like the majority power group?

Essential Questions of Fate, Truth, and Knowledge

How do we find our way in a world that frequently works in ways are in direct opposition to our own desires and aspirations?  How much control do we really have?  Is it our character that determines our fate?  If character does determine fate, then how do we explain innocents’ suffering?  To what extent do we create and control our own destiny?  To what extent are we truly free?  We speak of freedom as a gift, as though freedom is liberation; however, Dostoyvesky would argue that freedom is terrifying because in it exists nothing but possibility–an equal measure of possibility for success and failure, joy and sorrow, life and death…Is not then freedom a curse?  Further, if it is the truth that sets us free and freedom is a curse, does it not follow that truth (or knowledge)  is a curse?  What then of seeking truth at all costs?  Of KNOWING?  Which brings up an interesting dilemma:  What then of knowing one’s self?  Is that knowledge also detrimental or is it the lack of that knowledge that brings about our suffering?  It has been said that we see things not as they are but as we are.  If the self is so infused in perspective, isn’t it then a duty of anyone seeking truth to know herself because without it one will never see the world truly?  Perhaps blindness to truth (even of ourselves) then is preferable to a knowledge that is too painful to accept.