So many thoughts here, including some about Devin’s concerns and ways we can communicate better around issues surrounding impression, exploitation and abuse of power structures. Not going to try tonight on my phone to put much out here but keep writing and thinking, brother. This is good stuff we need to strive together as the Church over.
Short thought added this morning: I’m reading a book of made up words called The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows. Here’s one of the “words” this morning: “vulture shock n.
the nagging sense that no matter how many days you spend exploring a foreign country, you never quite manage to step foot in it—instead floating high above the culture like a diver over a reef, too dazzled by its exotic quirks to notice its problems and complexities and banalities, while drawing from the heavy tank of assumptions that you carry on your back wherever you go.
From vulture, an animal that hovers high over its prey + culture shock, the confusion of having to adjust to a culture different than the one you’re used to.”
It occurred to me that is how many of us engage with the city, especially areas like you have chosen to invest your life’s work in, and where we never fully engage enough to understand, appreciate and eventually belong and be received as belonging.
It is certainly the Christian's duty to combat racism, but I'm honestly concerned with how much we associate it with "whiteness." I'm aware that this might be an oversimplification of the broader issue, but the definition that we get for "white supremacy", in my opinion, is ambiguous at best. I think it still feeds into the whole "white people bad" narrative. I'm a third generation Asian-American whose grandparents immigrated here as refugees during the Vietnam War—my family has experienced some of the same "struggle" that many white families in rural areas of America have experienced for generations. I'm definitely in the minority here (no pun intended. I'm a Chinese kid in the PCA lol), but I really wonder if there is a better way to describe what's going on here than just slapping the word "white" on the front of it.
Hey Devin - I understand the concern. In fact, I share it. However, I am skeptical that terms that dominate public discourse can easily be changed. I want to approach these conversations using dominant language and show other Christians how to do so faithfully as well.
In both this essay and the previous one, I tried to push back on the "white people bad" narrative by demonstrating how White people suffer under dynamics of Whiteness and White supremacy. These terms do not simply imply all White people benefit more than all minorities. Those who use them to such effect are mistaken.
Regardless of the terminology we use, we need to have some way of acknowledging that these dynamics historically emerged from government-sanctioned and socially accepted standards of who is "White" and who is not.
Ben, thank you for your response. I've really enjoyed reading through many of your essays! I've also appreciated how winsome you are in approaching some of these topics, as seen with this essay on white supremacy. Why do you think it's difficult to change terms to begin with? Is there a way to acknowledge historic dynamics while also using better terms?
Thanks for the encouragement, Devin! It is good to know people are reading and benefiting from the content, even if I don't know it's happening.
Changing terms takes a group of individuals with far more influence than I have. I haven't studied how language develops, but I imagine changing key terms involves influence at every level of society (education, pop-culture, etc.).
Consider "evangelical" or "evangelicalism" as an example. I think it has come to predominantly mean a social and political reality, not a religious or theological one. Some prominent evangelical leaders are trying to change that perception (think Russell Moore). But even with all of Moore's influence, he's not going to change the dominant social perception of the word. My take is you just have to deal with evangelical/ism as it is. You're not going to change it. If you need a word to describe your theology, it's time to find something else.
So many thoughts here, including some about Devin’s concerns and ways we can communicate better around issues surrounding impression, exploitation and abuse of power structures. Not going to try tonight on my phone to put much out here but keep writing and thinking, brother. This is good stuff we need to strive together as the Church over.
Short thought added this morning: I’m reading a book of made up words called The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows. Here’s one of the “words” this morning: “vulture shock n.
the nagging sense that no matter how many days you spend exploring a foreign country, you never quite manage to step foot in it—instead floating high above the culture like a diver over a reef, too dazzled by its exotic quirks to notice its problems and complexities and banalities, while drawing from the heavy tank of assumptions that you carry on your back wherever you go.
From vulture, an animal that hovers high over its prey + culture shock, the confusion of having to adjust to a culture different than the one you’re used to.”
It occurred to me that is how many of us engage with the city, especially areas like you have chosen to invest your life’s work in, and where we never fully engage enough to understand, appreciate and eventually belong and be received as belonging.
It is certainly the Christian's duty to combat racism, but I'm honestly concerned with how much we associate it with "whiteness." I'm aware that this might be an oversimplification of the broader issue, but the definition that we get for "white supremacy", in my opinion, is ambiguous at best. I think it still feeds into the whole "white people bad" narrative. I'm a third generation Asian-American whose grandparents immigrated here as refugees during the Vietnam War—my family has experienced some of the same "struggle" that many white families in rural areas of America have experienced for generations. I'm definitely in the minority here (no pun intended. I'm a Chinese kid in the PCA lol), but I really wonder if there is a better way to describe what's going on here than just slapping the word "white" on the front of it.
Hey Devin - I understand the concern. In fact, I share it. However, I am skeptical that terms that dominate public discourse can easily be changed. I want to approach these conversations using dominant language and show other Christians how to do so faithfully as well.
In both this essay and the previous one, I tried to push back on the "white people bad" narrative by demonstrating how White people suffer under dynamics of Whiteness and White supremacy. These terms do not simply imply all White people benefit more than all minorities. Those who use them to such effect are mistaken.
Regardless of the terminology we use, we need to have some way of acknowledging that these dynamics historically emerged from government-sanctioned and socially accepted standards of who is "White" and who is not.
Ben, thank you for your response. I've really enjoyed reading through many of your essays! I've also appreciated how winsome you are in approaching some of these topics, as seen with this essay on white supremacy. Why do you think it's difficult to change terms to begin with? Is there a way to acknowledge historic dynamics while also using better terms?
Thanks for the encouragement, Devin! It is good to know people are reading and benefiting from the content, even if I don't know it's happening.
Changing terms takes a group of individuals with far more influence than I have. I haven't studied how language develops, but I imagine changing key terms involves influence at every level of society (education, pop-culture, etc.).
Consider "evangelical" or "evangelicalism" as an example. I think it has come to predominantly mean a social and political reality, not a religious or theological one. Some prominent evangelical leaders are trying to change that perception (think Russell Moore). But even with all of Moore's influence, he's not going to change the dominant social perception of the word. My take is you just have to deal with evangelical/ism as it is. You're not going to change it. If you need a word to describe your theology, it's time to find something else.