This week was pretty heavy. Lots of thoughts and things to sort
through and reconcile.
As for personal experiences with micro-aggressions I am sure I
have been both the perpetrator and receiver throughout my life. When you’re
doing it, there is a tiny nugget in the back of your head letting you know this
is wrong but you do it anyway to cave to the social pressure. Being the
receiver is awful because it hurts your feelings in a deep way but as Dr. Sue
says it puts you in a tough spot because you can’t react the way you want.
I’ve definitely been on hyper alert about what I say, hear,
read, etc. Allrighty lets lighten things
up a bit.
Ok so I don’t know if you can tell but I watch a fair amount of
television. And this week I was thinking about the shows I’ve seen that relate
to the various “isms” we’ve discussed this week. An episode of Go On features micro-aggressions
about Latin Americans being overly emotional thus making the white protagonist uncomfortable.
(it is never specified what country the characters are from so perhaps I
shouldn’t even be saying Latin Americans. The show shows the characters as
having accents and speaking Spanish and caring for the dead character. Hmm.) The New Normal is all about pointing out
culture clashes. This week related to the Margles’ article, interpersonal
oppression (Margles 2010) in that the characters realize they only have white
friends.
Lastly I will leave you with a clip from the 2004 Tony Award
Winner, Avenue Q. It is a little twisted – you may want to google the show
before you watch so you don’t think I’m bonkers.
References
Laureate Education Inc. (Producer). (2012). Microaggressions in everyday life.[video
podcast] Retrieved from: https://class.waldenu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_tab_group_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_1373729_1%26url%3D
Margles, S., & Margles, R. M. (2010). Inverting racism's
distortions. Our Schools/Our
Selves, 19(3), 137—149
Hello Koni I agree with you that it is very important to watch how you talk about someone's cultural characteristics because it mya be hurtful or offensive to someone. Noone deserves to to be a receiver of 'ism and anyone who gives microagressions to others should feel bad for doing so.
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