“I Don’t Have White Guilt!”
How to get around the “white guilt” morality termination cliché
White Guilt
“I don’t have white guilt!” ~ American conservative white people
Hello there everyone.
Some of y’all know me, and I imagine a lot of y’all don’t, so here goes:
I’m Johnny, and I have been writing and speaking against white supremacy and racism for nearly a decade now by the time of publishing this (started in 2012). The most significant part of my effort is getting more white people to “get it,” and from there, arm those white folks with the knowledge and conversational techniques to become assets. Not just white allies, white assets. You know, like a bunch of Tim Wises and John Browns who don’t over-step. You know what I mean.
The intent is to have white assets engage with the more pathologically racist white folks devoid of Black eyes watching. The purpose is to have anti-racist white folk dismantle white supremacist rhetoric and mechanisms in white places; those places where whiteness rangers feel safe because no black folks are around.
In all my years assisting white people in deprogramming white supremacy out of white people, one thing I never understood, nor had an answer for, was white guilt.
I really didn’t have an answer to the “white guilt” thing. Not until now.
Two Sides to the White Guilt Mess
White guilt is your conscience speaking.
In my experience, I’ve witnessed two sides to the white guilt rhetorical device.
- “I don’t have white guilt!”
- “I hate white people/I feel bad for being white.”
For the first one [1], this is going to be your white American conservative.
This is your Trump supporter.
This is your Americanized Nazi, your white supremacy propagandist, your Steven Crowder, your Richard Spencer, your Ben Shapiro, your Jordan Peterson.
Your Fox News host.
This would also be your Candace Owens, if she were actually white. I bet she wanna say this so bad.
And Kanye. Kanye really wants to say it.
For the second one, this is your hyper-exaggerated white liberal. This is actually the toxic white liberal. This is the white person who thinks they are an ally; many Black folks (without the analytical eye to assess this nuance) would agree they are one. This toxic white liberal is the reverse of the sociopathic white conservative — they have a lot of white guilt. They are controlled by it. A toxic measure of white guilt guides these white allies.
These are the white allies that over-exaggerates racism apologies in awkward situations. It is very performative. White people should not be groveling in restaurants and airports, apologizing for historical occurrences at the feet of Black folk. The conduct is worthless. This is not activism; it’s performative, not reparative. We need reparative activism, not mopey clown shows.
I hate to say these hyper-white-guilt white allies — are kinda like how simps are in the dating world. These toxic white allies feel bad for existing as a white person, which is not the aim of anti-racism work. You’re not supposed to feel bad for merely existing as a white person. That part is important.
Let me add that it gets worse.
You see, the white conservative sees the anti-racism simp mentality. They see these “I hate white people” white people. They see the “I feel bad for being white” white people.
Aside from being made into memes and mockeries, these sorry mopes are providing white supremacy propaganda fodder. When the “white ally” toxic white liberal announces “I hate white people,” White conservatives see this, and faster than you can say COINTELPRO, they weaponize and propagandize it with the disinformation-campaigning intent to communicate: “You see? They want you to hate being white. Anti-racism equals anti-white!”
“It’s okay to be white!” ~ White supremacy slogan
^That slogan is built on the backs of mopey whites thinking that hating themselves is how anti-racism works. Stop giving white supremacy agents ammo.
These sorry mopes are observed and are seen as something to duck and dodge, not to become. The weaponization of mopey, white-folk-hating whites is real. These mopes are the reason why white conservatives announce that they don’t have white guilt. They don’t want it. The #1 thing they are sold on, is the notion that anti-racism work and knowledge makes white people feel bad, feel messed up for existing as a white person.
Quickie on Intent:
Let’s also take the time right quick to explicitly point out that the intent of the anti-racism work, discussion, studies, and everything included is not to make white people feel bad for existing as a white person. While white folks should most certainly park their feelings and not center the discussion of anti-white supremacy around white feelings, it is also true that the discussion shouldn’t be about fucking up white people’s self-worth.
It’s kinda like teaching someone to ride a bike: the intent isn’t to make them fall a hundred times, but to make them ride the fucking bike. Without training wheels. Without your guiding hand on their back.
Not fall; ride.
What the Conservatives Really are Saying
At its base, white guilt is white morality.
When a white person speak about white guilt, as if it’s something they don’t have, what they are doing is suppressing their morality concerning racism and white supremacy in America. White conservatives are practically suspending their conscience.
If a white person replied “I don’t have white guilt,” after watching Derek Chauvin murder George Floyd in broad daylight in front of children for nine minutes for example (even though no one asked them a question of guilt), that person is communicating that they are actively suppressing their morality and conscience in the face of naked racism and white supremacy. Millions of white people in America do this.
(If a white person did say this in this exact scenario in your real life by the way, don’t turn your back on that person. Walk backwards to the door and get out.)
White people saying they don’t have white guilt is not just a thought-termination cliche — it’s a morality-termination cliche. It’s selective sociopathy.
So, um, What’s Good then?
There are two types of guilt:
- Positive guilt.
- Negative guilt.
Positive guilt is the type of guilt that is tied to behavior or action; the negative type of guilt is tied to the person. For example, if you, a random white person, said some racist shit and your Black friend tries to correct you, the positive guilt would be feelings of guilt based on what you have done.
In positive guilt, you know you engaged in racist behavior/action. Still, you also operate with an intrinsic understanding that you can divorce yourself from the behavior/action to effectively not do it again. You’re actively, effectively listening to that Black friend of yours, not giving them headaches due to your white fragility. In positive guilt, you do not define your self-esteem by the actions you can remove yourself from. You feel bad because you have done something terrible, not because you feel that you’re a terrible person.
In negative guilt, any and everything is tied to your self-esteem; your residual image. In negative guilt, you’re going to act like your sociologically intelligent Black friend is calling you a bad person even though he or she isn’t. Negative guilt-minded people make a mass catastrophe out of these corrections and call-outs. They over-exaggerate, and routinely think you’re calling them names (e.g., white people acting like “racist” is a slur when it isn’t {it describes a behavior, function or effect). Because they have negative guilt, they protect their fragile racial egos by announcing they don’t have white guilt at all. They lash out. White fragility becomes white flammability. These white people operate as if any and all call-outs on racism and white supremacy are assaults on them merely existing as a white person.
White conservatives are deeply driven by negative guilt in regards to the white guilt discussion. This concept becomes something to duck and dodge, to not have. So, as a result, white conservatives suppress their morality concerning racism and white supremacy, to the point at which it can drive a whole nation into fascism, lynching thousands of black people (and other nonwhites) in the process.
White conservatives are actively trying to create an ethnostate out of America just to dodge the concept of feeling negative guilt. There efforts must be stopped, and navigating white guilt is the key to all of this.
In Conclusion
What you can do in the future when a white person arrogantly announces that they don’t have white guilt is point to the fact that you are approaching the situation based on the action, behavior, conduct, or effect — NOT the person.
You know how you can tell a 4 year old that {playing with knives} is bad, but that doesn’t mean that the {child} is bad? Yeah, that is the way this works. That is exactly how you handle this.
Negative guilt breeds resentment; positive guilt breeds accountability.
Suppose you’re dealing with the mopey toxic white liberal who declares they hate white people or over-exaggerates racism apologies in awkward situations and stuff. In this case, the remedy is a lot more complex. The starting point would be to point out how those things they like to do aren’t helpful. You can point out how declaring hate for white people — serious, joke; it doesn’t matter — is propaganda food for white supremacy defenders. That mess gets weaponized by fascists looking to create a white ethnostate out of America.
It’s not a good look.
Not only that, but white assets cannot be doormats. As emotionally mature Black activists, we should prefer white people with a HEALTHY racial identity to be working beside us. Identity health isn’t just for Black people. Identity health isn’t just for nonwhites; one can argue that white people having a healthy, nontoxic white identity is of the utmost importance. White self-hate concerning anti-racism work is a myth that needs to be dispelled and eradicated. White anti-racism assets need to be, to an extent, positive model-citizens for their explicitly racist uncles and cousins to emulate.
White “allies” with a poor racial self-esteem might be amusing to the young, sociologically immature Killmonger wannabes. But not with the more strategically-thinking mature activists. That shit is weaponized by conservatives. Go away and fix that before anything else. You hating yourself isn’t solving problems concerning racism and white supremacy.
Stress that having a healthy relationship with their own white skin is important. Identify the type of guilt as negative guilt in these folks, and continue to point them into the direction of positive guilt.
Negative guilt breeds resentment; positive guilt breeds accountability. Remember that.
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