Our New Racial Conflict

‘White’ vs. ‘off white’

By MEGHAN DAUM

If you’re white and you like stuff, maybe you’ve bookmarked the Internet blog http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=3626. It’s an ever-growing list of the kind of privileged preoccupations that traditionally are coded “white.”

Examples include Not Having a TV (“the number one reason why white people like not having a TV is so that they can tell you that they don’t have a TV”), Indie Music (“being a fan of a band before they get popular is one of the most important things they can do with their life”) and, a bit abstrusely, http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=4658 (“White people … firmly believe that all of the world’s problems can be solved through ‘awareness'”).

To date, there are 100 items on Stuff White People Like. Barack Obama, at No. 8, was among the first entries. Guess who is not on the list? http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=4521.

The reason, of course, is the same reason clichés such as mayonnaise and square http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=3534.

http://www.modbee.com/opinion/national/story/308180.html

2008-06-03