Anonymous asked: I'm a white person. I have privilege, I realise that and I fight damned hard to make sure I'm not furthering the bullshit. But I'm planning on leaving the Western world soon and I was wondering; how do you feel about whites trying to assimilate into another, non-white culture?
White people can’t assimilate to non-white culture. They can become a part of it in a sense, participate or engage it to a degree, but they’re always going to be white people in brown/black country and given history, that has a context that can’t be ignored.
For one, I’d say you’d have to check yourself more, ESPECIALLY when you go to a country that has a history of white people treating it like their exotic get-away with the black/brown folk as their servants/tools for enlightenment and/or that have been undermined by Western/White involvement, which is most countries. Your experience will still be racialized and you will be privileged by it, whether it be being treated absolutely wonderfully or with scorn and suspicion.
That said, there are ways for white people to engage in culture in healthy, non-oppressive ways. It’s just really fucking hard, and it takes a lot of deprogramming and checking yourself for your white, Western privilege and bias and being open to other cultures. I’ve seen it done though, in non-douchey ways, and I personally appreciate white folk who truly try to immerse themselves in and appreciate other cultures without being dick-wads about it.
