so, I have this friend from my Army days. he's Italian-American from Charlestown, MA. often, when I talk about racism, he replies with his "I don't see race" racism. but, he also has this wrinkle on that theme that is particularly wretched.
- he starts talking about how race is just melanin
- that he's Sicilian and that he has melanin
- so, he's just as black as anyone else
- and that he has been discriminated against by Irish-Americans because he is Italian-American
- and that he might have a Jewish ancestor or something
- so, therefore race doesn't exist
- and I shouldn't say that white people are racist
- especially since I'm white and I don't know what it's like to have white people being racist to me
- he usually closes the whole thing out with a reference to MLK or Gandhi
now, we can basically agree that the whole line is horse shit, except that I am white.
what's particularly insidious about this is that he spins it so that:
- he is not white because Sicilian
- and I am
- and what needs to stop is me calling white people racist
I've heard the melanin theory, but not this particular tripe before. has anyone else heard of this fuckery?