StreetcredMusic: Op/Ed .. Tessa Lena

Social theory and pain in the ass made simple, from 'Tessa Makes Love'

Tessa Lena

 "Since I feel very passionate about human ability to see beyond our differences, here is what occupies my mind. I have a very distinct feeling that somebody is hard at work directing the public conversation about racism and historical injustices toward a place that is both painful and not productive. People get to yell at each other and maybe vent and maybe hurt each other a little more but nothing gets fixed fundamentally. Who wins? Assholes."

 Fact: America has a long history of treating non-whites horrendously and building wealth on the backs of “the other.” To be fair, the practice was not started in America. It was started, as far as geography and known history go, in different places in Eurasia. A lot earlier, and with a lot less focus on skin color. By humans. There are many wonderful ways to dehumanize and consume “the other,” race is just one recent invention. Of humans.

Tessa Lena

 "I believe, also very passionately, that the decisive factor is not skin color or even culture (even though culture weighs a lot more in this case) but what’s in the head. If there is a bug in the head, one can lynch a slave, burn a witch, kill a Muslim, and go to bed with a smile. The “other” can be worth hating or disregarding for many reasons: gender, religion, and yes, skin color. As long as the eyes looking at you belong to a person with a dull soul, you are annoying, and you don’t count. And if you dare open your mouth... God."
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 Europeans (and Asians) were probably the first groups of people to enthusiastically embrace human alienation from nature and abandon “local” in favor of building massive empires. Europeans certainly popularized the idea and exported it world-wide, and it not surprising that “white people” are known for the brand. However, it is a trap.
I have a theory that as a species, we are simply not capable of maintaining balanced, non-abusive empires. It is beyond our mental ability, even if our minds want to own everything. Empires are too big and too abstract, it is impossible to love a hundred million people, while it is also impossible to treat people fairly without love. Theoretical morals don’t work, ever. They can’t work. I think that a couple thousand years will pass and this grand empire-building experiment will be over, but we are here now, obviously, and we can’t just console ourselves with theory, we still need to solve problems effectively.

 So yes, there is a problem of institutional racism in the U.S. and it’s ridiculous. I am convinced that fundamentally, it is rooted in centuries of misinterpreting the indigenous organization of life–but even though it is probably true, we can’t expect everybody to dig that deep, digging deep takes time and effort, and people are known for not trying to understand shit unless it hurts.

 Here’s where assholes come in, in a new role though. The phrase “white privilege” is, in my mind, a new weapon of an evil genius. By giving people this catch phrase, you don’t solve ANYTHING but direct the very real anger and hurt against a very broad category of people including people who are just minding their business without being particularly evil. That’s divide and conquer at its best. The evil ones, the ones who carry the most responsibility for today’s injustices, won’t care about the rhetoric and TED presentaions, and the non-evil ones will get hurt and snap back, as humans do. While people yell at each other on Facebook and perpetuate hurt feelings, assholes keep doing their thing.
>>>>>" That’s my feeling about it, anyway. I don’t think there is any other way besides Love. And solving concrete problems with minimal hate."
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Me, Pete Carma "how lucky I am to have a shared trust with the most talented creative women on the music scene, who also are out spoken about the issues of the day".

Have you seen Tessa's #Pianowomen Video, "Baby Robots"
 
In case you missed the previous Op/Ed pages they Are HERE: