The ABCs of Oppression

I want to talk about what I’d like to call “the ABCs of oppression.”

This is my own personal model of explaining and understanding deputization of oppressed groups, to “do the dirty work” for further oppressed groups (usually subgroups.)

How this story goes: you have Group B, that is oppressed by Group A.  Group B has every right to fight against Group A in hopes of stopping its tyranny.  But then, a phenomenon occurs: Group A offers Group B a consolation prize.  To quell Group B’s need to revolt against Group A, Group A will offer immunities and privileges for doing its “dirty work,” upon a subgroup or neighboring group, Group C.  And Group B bites.

Group C is essentially assigned character flaws that are analogous to Group A.  Anybody who defends Group C, and/or stops Group B from their consolation prize of total dominance over Group C, is likened to Group A.  Think “you divestors are just like the KKK.”

In addition to that, Group B is given nominal acceptance into Group A for what they do to Group C.  Notice how Israel has gained this nominal acceptance into the rest of whiteness throughout the time it has enacted genocide against Palestine.

So, let’s talk the diagram a bit. It’s meant to be analogous to the dependency theory model of economic underdevelopment for peripheral i.e. “third world” countries.  Flowing toward the main group, Group A, is “labor.”  Flowing outwards is “narrative. (Yeah I know, it’s clunky). But basically, gone unchecked, the labor of achieving being, or merely a taste of life outside of oppression, flows toward the oppressor. It’s essentially all being done to prop the oppressor up.  In turn, the oppressor gets to tell us what we are.  It gets to evaluate us , measure us, award us, deprive us, and determine the significance of, basically, our every move....**as long as group B is complicit in that.**. There’s a dependency to it.

Should Group B wake up to the fact that what they do to Group C, is letting Group A off the hook, the model collapses.

I think it’s important to use a tiered system as opposed to a lateral one when we talk about the way groups are weaponized against each other. The institutionally sanctioned subordination of group “C”, by group “B,” in my view, is fundamental to all oppression. It tacitly takes the onus of contemplation off of group B and offloads it onto the group that’s always doing the labor of repair, exposure, etc. in oppressive structures: group C. It also suggests that the sole solution is “unity” and when tiered privilege is involved, such a solution would be incomplete.  Lastly, it gives a convenient way to take anyone in Group C wanting this degradation to stop, and brand them as “divisive”. 

A tiered model challenges the age ol okey-doke: “We’re all oppressed by the white man, stop your yapping about queer/trans rights or women’s rights or workers’ rights or outright genocide, we need to be united right now.”  By taking this on, we ensure the labor of liberation is going toward the right direction, instead of what it tends to do, start feeding the egos and the glory of a deputized Group B.

Let’s look at some examples of how this model can help us discover new modalities for our less-than-ideal systemic experiences :

1. Your sadistic teacher was attracted to you . Yeah cw here, technically this is about minors, but I want primarily to adults to reflect on times in their past schooling where they felt unfairly and unnecessarily singled out and targeted by a teacher. It’s an unspoken thing. Personally I hear teachers these days go “ugh kids these days are out of control!” And it’s important to not let teachers experience mistreatment. But I think about the more sadistic ones from my past, who enjoyed humiliating, who took satisfaction from punishment, who would triangulate students or encourage bullying of particular students. So, in this instance, the teacher is group B. In my case, it was usually a white or off-white woman, so I’m going off of that. and the student would be group C. Now, this group usually answers to 2 sets of white men—1) the administrators, principal or vice principal and all that, and 2) her husband. Think about either you, or another student, where it just seemed like an example always had to be made out of this student. Seemed like any time this particular student was harshly disciplined, the teacher would face no repercussions at all. Now, how is this student framed to justify that? Oh yeah. Manipulative and narcissistic. Using weaponized incompetence. All of that. One time (of more-than-one), I experienced something like this. It was only later that I realized: this woman was just replaying the fight she had with her husband that morning! And what do most cishet married women have the most trouble with about with their husbands? Oh bingo. Manipulative and narcissistic. Using weaponized incompetence.  All of that, you get me? Same with asking the administrators and the school board for help or simply having to submit to what they say. A cishet white woman teacher is basically feeling unheard because in her life she is subject to these other mostly patriarchal forces (group A) that represent an oppressor for her. But instead of maybe quitting or divorcing, you know, taking steps to set herself free, she takes the consolation prize (group C): a kid or two, to take the whole thing out on. She assigns qualities of Group A to them essentially creating a straw man, and she says all the things to them that she is too afraid to say to her husband or her boss. When she reaches the classroom and she says 123 eyes on me and nobody listens? Now’s her chance. She’s gonna punish the student(s) to get all the power “back” from where she lost it from those guys. If students are forced to submit to her, then she can enjoy the same feelings her oppressors felt by subduing her. This is how it works. Now why do I say “attracted”? Friends, if Group B the teacher, is projecting Group A, her man, onto Group C, her student, guess what that means? Ding ding. My hot take is that the only way for the target to actually happen is for the teacher to be having feelings they should, once again probably make somebody else’s problem, but that’s neither here nor there at this point. It’s a “he only hits you cause he likes you” dynamic. Still highly abusive, but illuminates some of the inner workings of what may be happening with the person who is doing this, so that WE can release the shame that was offloaded to us.

2. Patriarchy is a driving force of gentrification.

   Do you know how many ex wives left behind horrors in New York? Rats and unpleasant smells weren’t the only thing going on in the birthplace of hiphop. Because when those impoverished nonwhite men (Group B) got home from taking all that mistreatment from their often-white , often-richer bosses (Group A) all day long, guess who they could get away with taking all of that out on? Ding ding. Under such a structure, a man might have been lowly and invisible to society, but in the house? He was the king. Yup, this happened despite all those Moynihanian “welfare queen” narratives trying to repaint the story (denoted by the narrative arrow). And , it was very brutal. Fast forward to today, yes there is widespread economic displacement in places that were once black and brown. But there are also people who have decades of terrible memories that completely destroy the desire to fight to keep it. Who would want to keep the washer and dryer they saw their mother being bashed between? Who would want to save the floors torn up by broken dishes and the patchy fist-textured walls? Many people that try to preserve culture, and art, and heritage, and protect the story of a people from the sanitization of gentrification, soon woefully realize that they are truly only maintaining, and even enabling, the true ills of patriarchy (denoted by the “labor” arrow pointing toward the center, the flow of work that is put in, often on an exploitative basis, to uphold these structures), which is the one place black and brown men could, and can experience white supremacist levels of impunity. Tough one.

3. Imma add more examples.

   
   

What else does this model imply for our lived experience ? Well, my theory: every person that is cruel to you in your life, answers to a group A.

That’s all I have on that for now.

So, this is just the beginning. I want to do a video on it. But I wanted to start here with getting the gumption to talk about this.  To more!