blogging against racism

[redbird]

I hadn't planned to post as part of the International Blog Against Racism Week, because I didn't think I had anything insightful to say. Then I was reading comments to elisem's IBARW post about jokes, and the ways she tensed up at some kinds of introductions, and the occasional joke that turns the assumptions on their head. And shadowhwk's comment led me to say this:

Doing the right thing from inferior motives is still doing the right thing.

Someone who doesn't steal because she believes it is inherently wrong, or thinks about the potential victim, may be a better person than someone who doesn't steal because she's worried about being sent to jail. But either is better than someone who figures what the hell, he'll steal because it's what he wants to do and there's no point suppressing his impulses.

The point of challenging racism isn't that it makes me a better person. It's that racism is evil and destructive and should be challenged, whether I do it from compassion, abstract belief in justice, or even guilt. It's not as though feeling guilty and not challenging racism helps anything.

Comments

[shadowhwk.livejournal.com]

My apologies if my comment lent itself to your annoyance. I meant no offense, nor any personal slight.

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

When I read that comment, before I looked at the name to see who wrote it, my first thought was to wonder if it was someone with a Jewish background, because the idea that actions matter more thanmotivation is very much a Jewish teaching. I think that the more Christian idea that intentions matter more than actions has brought us a lot of problems - it may be true in our dealings with God for all I know, but in our dealings with each other often all we can see is the action. And I do think the way we act often changes the way we think over time.

[wild-irises.livejournal.com]

I thought that was a major Christian division--faith and works. You write about it as if it was a Christian universal.

To me, though I am from a Jewish background, it's not as much a religious issue as it is a practical one. I'm with redbird: if I cause less pain from shitty motivations, I'm still causing less pain.

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

I think you're right about the division, but I get the impression that the "works" side still has some concern with the intent behind the works. (I could be wrong though.)

And yes, it's a practical issue. Even if you take look at it from the religious side (and I mostly don't) I think the old rabbis taught that way *because* of the practical side of it. (Judaism is pretty big on dealing with life in this world instead of focusing on whatever is to come.) And if you're living in this world, you have to deal with people here as they are and what they see is what you do. Better to do right from wrong motives than to do wrong (or not do at all) from good ones - because it's what you do that imapcts others.