For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

I thought this was a great article. One of the most interesting things to me was how the embarrassment/defensiveness of the white people involved was one of the biggest blocks to the black CEOs in their advancement, e.g. the VCs who "just wanted to get the hell out of there" after mistaking a white subordinate for the CEO.

I've recently been reading/watching some videos and writings by Robin Diangelo on systemic racism - here's a great starting point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7mzj0cVL0Q. She also wrote the book "White Fragility".

Thinking about that, I'm just wondering how different it would be if one of those people who mistook the employee for the CEO instead turned to the CEO and said "I'm sorry, please excuse me for the instance of racism I just perpetrated against you, I promise it won't happen again." I realize how outlandish that may sound writing that out, but I'd propose that the fact that it does sound outlandish is the main problem. Everyone in the US was raised in an environment that inculcated certain racial ideas, subconsciously or not. We can't address them if we're so embarrassed by their existence as to pretend they don't exist.

I think the trouble here is the double meaning of the word racist. When some people hear the word, they think of cross-burning fanatics and mass murderers. On the other hand, the current big conversation is about how everyone is racist and that society is rife with systemic racism.

That creates a catch-22 for anyone who commits a faux-pas (like mistaking the black CEO for a subordinate). Either admit to racism and cast oneself in with the cross-burners, or bail out of the situation ASAP.

We have the same kind of problem with the label of "sex offender." It's a category that runs the gamut from "guy who got arrested for public urination while walking home drunk from the bar one night" all the way to Jeffrey Dahmer.

Scott over at Slate Star Codex has a fantastic piece that covers this phenomenon [1]. The core idea has to do with the tension between central and non-central examples of a category:

Remember, people think in terms of categories with central and noncentral members – a sparrow is a central bird, an ostrich a noncentral one. But if you live on the Ostrich World, which is inhabited only by ostriches, emus, and cassowaries, then probably an ostrich seems like a pretty central example of ‘bird’ and the first sparrow you see will be fantastically strange.

I'm glad we're having this conversation in society. I honestly don't know what to do about it though.

[1] https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/05/12/weak-men-are-superweap...

Somehow you proposed a "double meaning" of racism and missed the actual meaning that's being addressed by our society. Racism isn't about personal prejudice, although it's certainly a participation trophy for them. Racism is not about who is burning crosses, or about who is born into privilege. Racism is a system, a set of rules, rites, privileges and laws that puts 100% of POC at a disadvantage, and 100% of white people at an advantage, regardless of the rest of their social status. The advantage can range from "more likely to be taken seriously in a board meeting" to "more likely to end up dead for no reason at all", with a ridiculous amount of "more likely to end up prison labor" in the middle. Not everyone experiences the system exactly the same way, but even the most privileged POC are likely to point it out, and even the most unprivileged white people are likely to dismiss it as nonexistent.

It doesn't take a single prejudiced person to enact it. It's built into the laws and the systems and considered "neutral".

What you write is generally true. You're taking it to an unjustified extreme, though, and glossing over the fact that the advantages diminish rapidly as one descends the socioeconomic ladder, to the point where the "white advantage" for impoverished folks looks more like regular fluctuations in the noise than it does a clear above-the-noise signal. That is to say: the poorest whites might on average have some advantage over their peers in some contexts, but as a matter of practice day-to-day living isn't that different.

I know there is a lot of well-deserved focus on the ways our racist systems do more damage to blacks. That doesn't mean we should exaggerate, simply because the ground truth is horrific enough.

Hi. My extremely poor white brother in Appalachia told me today about his most recent encounter with a cop. The scenario was disturbingly similar to scenarios where traffic stops have ended with black people dead. My brother got cut slack, allowed to leave with his car out of compliance with state law. Advised by the cop to take back roads to avoid further scrutiny.

YOU might not see white privilege, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. If my brother had been black, in his words... “I HOPE I would have been treated the same way”. But he knew that’s a false hope. If my brother had been black, would he be just one more statistic to debate here?

Your brother's anecdote doesn't erase my lived experience, okay? You have an extremely poor white brother; I grew up an extremely poor white guy in a mixed-race neighborhood. I know, better than most, what privilege being white buys me in this society. It exists. But existence is far from universal, or uniform.

You're off the mark. Way off.

My brother and I grew up in a world that sounds similar to yours. I’m not negating your experience. The fact that you and I have privilege doesn’t negate our own hardships.

You’re playing a bit loose, here. When you write that 100% of whites are advantaged, you are engaged in exaggeration that erases the practical reality. It is true that our system is structured to advantage whites. It does not necessarily follow that all whites are equally advantaged (other things being equal) or that all whites live a life in which they experience these advantages.

On the contrary, I'm choosing my words and considering their meaning very carefully. This topic is too important to "play loose".

100% of white people are advantaged by racism. I didn't claim that all experience that advantage equally, and I didn't claim that the advantage negates any other disadvantages each individual white person experiences due to the specifics of their lives, their class or social status, any number of other systems of identity-based power, or even countervailing individual prejudices.

You may find it hard to notice the advantage it gives you, but it certainly exists.

"100% of white people are advantaged by racism." No, this is an extraordinary claim without evidence that you are asserting.

"You may find it hard to notice the advantage it gives you, but it certainly exists," isn't carefully worded, and it's designed to effectively squash any sort of disagreement with the assertion in the first place.

> No, this is an extraordinary claim without evidence that you are asserting.

There are libraries worth of literature on the subject. I encourage you to spend some time seeking it out and understanding it better.

> isn't carefully worded, and it's designed to effectively squash any sort of disagreement with the assertion in the first place.

It was carefully worded, but you don't seem to be interested in coming to the discussion to understand. You seem determined to fight. The wording was intended to give you the grace that maybe other challenges in your life make it difficult to see this particular advantage. The words chosen were intentionally placed in the same comment with other words giving that grace explicitly.

Have you considered that you are making assumptions (e.g. that I have not done reading on this subject) or that you are making personal accusations (e.g. that I may not recognize advantages) based also on assumptions? That perhaps my interest isn’t in fighting but merely challenging your assertion and assumptions?

It appears to me you take the position that you are correct, and that any challenge is necessarily one coming from a position of ignorance or malice. I invite you to re-think your approach to this sort of conversation.