LOL, I’m in very low demand on OKCupid
Interesting study that okcupid did on the racial dynamics on the site.
http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/what-if-there-were-not-so-many-white-people/
According to OkCupid’s data research on race and dating. The cities with the most whites messaging whites exclusively per capita (more so than the normal ratio) are as follows.
Cities with the most white-loving white people
#1 Greenville, MS
#2 Jackson, MS
#3 Montgomery, AL
#4 Memphis, TN
#5 Atlanta, GA
MY HOMETOWN IS MONTGOMERY! This actually doesn’t surprise me at all. It is one of the most racially bizarre places in the country. A place where racial boundaries are crafted to appear as socioeconomic ones. One of the few larger cities in the country where a business will close a successful store if the racial makeup changes, and build a less successful one where there are more white people. The only place I know where making money isn’t as important as making it from the “right kind” of people.
TOKENISM IS RACISM’S NAIVE, WELL INTENTIONED COUSIN
I just came to the realization that during most of my college education, I have been a token, most transparently so here at Tyler. I got a fellowship based partially in Temple’s effort to boost diversity in terminal degree fields. In full disclosure, they do have a fellowship of the same amount thats for “regular people.” But since they have a fellowship program just for minorities, it turns the other fellowship into essentially a whites only water fountain.
The fellowship also has the effect of underlining just how white the MFA program is. It is not a fellowship one can apply for, you are nominated for it by the faculty or committee during your acceptance process. This implies that the university had to incentivize departments to accept a more diverse student population. Giving a fellowship to a student means that the department doesn’t have to shell out anything for that student, the university picks up the tab across the board. So essentially ethnic minorities are like tuition coupons if they meet the criteria for the fellowship. But it doesn’t guarantee a student population that reflects the country. I am the only black person in all of Tyler numerous MFA programs. There are 56 of us, and I don’t even statistically represent the population.
I am not saying I resent the fellowship, or that I am all that bothered by being the only black, since I was the only black in my undergrad BFA year. I am not saying that the policy isn’t well intentioned. I am not saying that it is not good to be providing greater opportunities to pursue terminal degree fields to groups underrepresented through historical disadvantage. It is just that the fellowship highlights that privilege still exists in America, and that its taking Tokenism to be the slapdash workaround to provide a semblance of equality. Even if the equality is a facade. The most successful living black painters still sell for less than a 10th of their white counterpart. So there is a ceiling, made of… watermelon? But then again a “black” guy is president, so who am I to say what isn’t possible.
I am tired of the race thing. Can I not deal with it? Oh yeah, I CANT.
I know this girl in my grad program who when she gets a little tispy, will try to start “deep” or “controversial” conversations about issues concerning my race, or sexual orientation. She will point out a comment I made on facebook about a girl wearing boat shoes and how I had something to say about boat shoes having a particular connotation where im from in the south. Instead of letting me say what the connotation is, she shushed me thinking I was going to get into an argument. She does this all the time instigating topics and then wanting to terminate it when people could potentially not see eye to eye.
I am able to conduct a conversation with tact. I am not a confrontational person, and she of all people should know that I among the grads am MOST capable of carrying on a conversation about a controversial subject in an intelligent manner.
What burns me up the most is that she often uses the fact that I am on a minority based fellowship as an argument to say I am spoiled or privileged over the white majority in the program, just because her former black boyfriend who also had the fellowship at one point was spoiled. She even thinks I am a special commodity, thats more desirable because of being a minority. First of all, I’m not her ex boyfriend, so just because we are both black has NO bearing on anything that we may have in common. Secondly without the fellowship I WOULD NOT BE IN GRAD SCHOOL AT ALL, where as the other white upper middle class students I am surrounded by are here in spite of having little aid. I wouldn’t be able to attend grad school at all if it weren’t for my fellowship which is part of the point of the award existing in the first place. Its there because when you get past undergrad, you are several times less likely to see people of color, especially African Americans, in graduate and terminal degree fields. And if it weren’t for this, I would be one less. Heck, even WITH the fellowship there are only 2 black people in a group of over 60 graduate students, and NONE in the over 50+ member art history graduate programs.
In essence, I am tired of people thinking they know my perspective due to some generalization about black people, or by some black guy they know. They don’t know shit about what MY situation is, and if they think getting a fellowship means I am privileged above them, they haven’t taken a hard look at their lives to know what real privilege is.
Real privilege is being able to paint whatever you want and not have it be politicized. Real privilege is doing something bad and having it only reflect on YOU, and not your entire race. Real privilege is being in an environment where your race never factors in as a negative. Real privilege is never being told you are doing something well in spite of who you are.
So in my most polite opinion, fuck her, and anyone who thinks I am spoiled or priveledged over white people. I am tired of people not being able to see things from anything other than their perspective. And what I have found is that the people who consider themselves open minded liberals are often just as bad at it as any other more predictable group.
No one is going to read this. It doesn’t matter, I don’t give a shit.
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So what's the reason behind painting only white subjects? Do you not want to be pigeon holed or do you just only have particular people to paint? The public wants to know :) That is the question I always want to answer! I think for me the reason I do it is because I am interested in analyzing canonized cultural ideals in western society, but short circuiting the normal expected manner for an artist of color to address these issues. I am interested in how the work I have is perceived to be about one set of issues when someone doesn’t know I made them, and how that read is changed once they do know a black person painted these images. I like to poke at the gap that is between these two receptions of the work, to and expose WHY there is a difference between them in the first place. I think there are many black artists who have done great things in terms of representation of black images, as well as pushing forward conceptually the territory of the black image. I however feel that the work I do is the most productive way I can think of to make strides conceptually in this territory, while not being a part of some pre-established and pre-ordained way of approaching issues of class and race in painting. I am wanting to show society its own ideals, and present a laser-like focus so that people see these values for the strangeness they posses. That these values aren’t normal or universal, but particular just as any “others” are. That society reinforces certain normative attitudes, and by just presenting them, I am exposing the fact that they are constructed, and perpetuated, but not innate. It is a conscious choice, not a lack of options, and its definitely not to just avoid being pigeon holed; although that may have some partial influence. It’s to have a conversation about these ideas in a way never fully considered. It’s about who controls what, and how cultural standards are reinforced by all of us everyday, even when we might personally disagree with them. |
