Re: Sad to read this
Whites are by no means the only group which spreads racism. They're probably among the worst, but they're not the only ones.
Trump's ban on this theory is for the American federal government, and in America, I think it's safe to say that whites are dominant. Their ideology is dominant, their demographics are dominant, their interests are dominant. I'm not saying that's how it should be, only that that's how it is.
When I say that we need to treat white people about their racial privilege, it's because whites in America have historically held advantages that they didn't earn, advantages other races often don't have, or don't have to the same extent. This doesn't make it something to feel horribly guilty about (it's not my fault, for instance, that I don't get racially profiled, I shouldn't apologize for that), but it does mean that when I hear of a person with a different ethnic background talking about the bad experiences they've had, I would do well to listen, not speak. It doesn't matter that I've never been profiled; of course I haven't, because I'm white.
Whites in the west have historically dictated the narrative. Racism is not a big deal anymore because we say it isn't. Outrage from people of colour is going too far, because we say so, damn it. And on, and on. The sort of training Trump has put a stop to has been a huge tool in getting people to become more racially conscious.
The point here is that while racism happens with other demographics, by and large it appears to be something visited upon non-whites by whites. To remove training to make said white folks more aware of their cultural impact is just another form of apologism. It says, "No, of course you're not racist. Just claim that you mean well, even while you continue to make laws that indirectly target black people, or continue to misrepresent blacks in the penal system, or continue to persecute Japanese-Americans for the supposed sins of their grandfathers. It's okay; you're a good Christian American, you can't possibly be racist".
The fact is, there are a lot of busted systems in America, and one of the reasons (not the only one, by any means) that they're busted is systemic racism. The sooner we unwind that particular taint from the systems we rely on, the better off everyone will be. And you simply can't do that without accepting, all the way down, the complicitude of most whites in a system which supports them over others. I guess you could put it this way. What Trump has done is, in essence, to say that we don't really have to rebuild the foundation of a building that is still creaking and groaning and shifting under its own weight. You don't make that building stronger by making it taller; you make it stronger by fixing whatever is making it unstable. Banning this training is tantamount to saying that the building is as steady as it needs to be, and also tantamount to saying that anyone with the ability to oversee construction who thinks they hear creaking and groaning from this building should really listen again, because those noises are fake news, not really happening. Surely, everything will be f---*crash*
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