#heirachy

[lucylegan]

Repost from @sustain_table #ethical #heirachy of #gift #purchasing #christmas #sustainable #gifting https://www.instagram.com/p/BquCyYRBQnP/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=sgh0r19jv1j1

[vculavpal-blog]

"There is no Hierarchy of Oppressions"

By Audre Lorde

I was born Black and a woman. I am trying to become the strongest person I can become to live the life I have been given and to help effect change toward a livable future for this earth and for my children. As a Black, lesbian, feminist, socialist, poet, mother of two including one boy and member of an interracial couple, I usually find myself part of some group in which the majority defines me as deviant, difficult, inferior or just plain "wrong".

From my membership in all of these groups I have learned that oppression and the intolerance of difference come in all shapes and sizes and colors and sexualities; and that among those of us who share the goals of liberation and a workable future for our children, there can be no hierarchies of oppression. I have learned that sexism (a belief in the inherent superiority of one sex over all others and thereby its right to dominance) and heterosexism (a belief in the inherent superiority of one pattern of loving over all others and thereby its right to dominance) both arise from the same source as racism - a belief in the inherent superiority of one race over all others and thereby its right to dominance.

“Oh,” says a voice from the Black community, “but being Black is normal!”  Well, I and many Black people of my age can remember grimly the days when it didn't used to be!

I simply do not believe that one aspect of myself can possibly profit from the oppression of my other part of my identity.  I know that my people cannot possibly profit from the oppression of any other group which seeks the right to peaceful existence. Rather, we diminish ourselves by denying to others what we have shed blood to obtain for our children. And those children need to learn that they do not have to become like each other in order to work together for a future they will all share.

The increasing attacks upon lesbians and gay men are only an introduction to the increasing attacks upon all Black people, for wherever oppression manifests itself in this country, Black people are potential victims. And it is a standard of right-wing cynicism to encourage members of oppressed groups to act against each other, and so long as we are divided because of our particular identities we cannot join together in effective political action.

Within the lesbian community I am Black, and within the Black community I am a lesbian.  Any attack against Black people is a lesbian and gay issue, because I and thousands of other Black women are part of the lesbian community. Any attack against lesbians and gays is a Black issue, because thousands of lesbians and gay men are Black.  There is no hierarchy of oppression.

It is not accidental that the Family Protection Act, which is virulently anti-woman and anti-Black, is also anti-gay. As a Black person, I know who my enemies are, and when the Ku Klux Klan goes to court in Detroit to try and force the Board of Education to remove books the Klan believes "hint at homosexuality," then I know I cannot afford the luxury of fighting one form of oppression only. I cannot afford to believe that freedom from intolerance is the right of only one particular group. And I cannot afford to choose between the fronts upon which I must battle these forces of discrimination, wherever they appear to destroy me. And when they appear to destroy me, it will not be long before they appear to destroy you.

[iammarkjmason]

[as-told-by-laura]

Life at the bottom of the social chain

Allow me to just take you back to 2007 with a chubby fringed me starting high school for the first time. At some point in that day the year was split, between us and them and I didn’t make the cut onto the ‘popular’ side of the year. Then both halves were split until we gained a hierarchy which was stuck to ,unconsciously, throughout the five years I spent there. Why or how this hierarchy became I don’t know but somehow it was just there and I was at the near the bottom if not at the actual bottom. I’ve had discussions lately because currently we are in our second and final year of college and despite my friends and I growing up those people who were ‘popular’ seem to still believe they are gods gift to earth. Theses people tend to be the people that just straight up bully you/ annoy you or are nice to your face and then awful behind your back aka the worst kind of person. I am in a lesson with a two girls who were ‘popular’ in high school and I watch them every lesson mock a girl who actually has the confidence to answer questions in lesson (I’ve met her and she’s lovely) and it bothers the hell out of me, as I’ve grown up I seem to have managed to gain enough confidence to give them the ‘I really wish you didn’t exist’ eyes and they look at me funny. I will stick up for myself and my friends now because I don’t have enough energy to bother being all nice around people I don’t like anymore. Today for example one of the ‘popular’ girls decided that stopping and blocking the way to flip her hair was a good idea, this blocked my way and I was very annoyed and my friend had to stop me from telling her where to go. I wouldn’t normally act out in this way but after years of being walked all over and ‘bullied’ I can’t stand it anymore. We aren’t in high school anymore and its about time they removed their heads from where the sun doesn’t shine and got over themselves.

I don’t understand how they even became ‘popular’ in the first place, they aren’t better then us they just act as though they are. How does that even work? Quite frankly I can’t decide if college made it better or worse because I don’t really see them unless their in my lessons or in the common room but they have joined with ‘popular’ people from other schools and created one large ‘popular’ group made up of all the people the rest of us couldn’t stand.  

The way they treat us is ridiculous. God forbid they have to stand or sit near us and they catch our leprosy. They act like we aren’t worthy to be in their presence, like everything we do/wear isn’t good enough for them. Its ridiculous, they dress like their going on a runway to college (and high school) taking up the sinks to reapply the fifty layers of make up already caked on their face so those of us who actually need to use the sinks can’t and when you ask them to move they look at you as though you’ve asked them to remove their liver and eat it.

Have you ever tried to treat them  like that the way that they treat you? I wouldn’t recommend it unless you want to be banished to hell for all eternity. Its sad that they can’t take what they give out and when you look at them annoyed for how they treat you they act ignorant and look at you like your two centimetres tall and don’t deserve to breath their air.

You literally cannot win and according to my parents I won’t  ever be able to escape people like them but I can surround myself by people that are also at the bottom of the social hierarchy aka the weirdo’s/rejects, the geeks, the misfits ( My friends and I), the goths, the emos and many many more brilliant people. Where ever you are on the hierarchy do your best not to make anyone feel lesser than you and if you can help it then get rid of the hierarchy for good, I think if we can do that then the whole world would be a better place.

[inducium]

I swear that adults have a more unrealistic view of love than teenagers do. My love is almost always unrequited but my mum still insists on telling me "he's bound to like you really".

She clearly has no comprehension that he is higher up in the college's social heirachy than me, and will hence never talk to me. ever.

[sidewaez]

is it a horrible feeling or an incredible relief when you realize that every cycle of life is exactly the same?

Now that I am an adult I feel as though juvenile things like acceptance of people unimportant to you would have diminished. Obviously that never really goes away, but when you think about how fucking relevant it ALWAYS is, and always will be, I cant tell whether to laugh or cry. This is something that irritates me on a daily basis. It happens at my job a lot, people around me are always talking about how they have these cool opportunities where their "artistic talents" were recognized, or how they know so much about fashion, or they have this cool "title" attached to their name, and I have come to the point where I just roll my eyes and shut my mouth, because I just don't want to play that game. That "look how cool I am game", it is childish and not worth the energy. Why should  I go out of my way to brag about how much I know, and how I'm just as good if not better than that person who got that great opportunity, or that person who dresses so well. Today I saw someone post a screen cap of how Marc Jacobs mentioned their blog in a twitter post, and I just sighed because, cool, that is great, that is awesome, but who cares? I am not jealous. Yes it would be cool if Marc Jacobs mentioned me in a post, but why? Because you'll get recognition? Because someone who is higher up in the fashion world approves of your taste? Why kneel down to popularity, I just don't understand why the entire world is based off of selling yourself, gaining approval from people you don't even know, and constantly having to prove what you've got.