What is a "White Person"
Recently, video essayist F. D. Signifier released a short film on the paid streaming platform Nebula called Talking to "White" People which I highly recommend. In it, he interviews a variety of "white" mostly male mostly youtubers. Notably, he at no point actually tells us who anyone is beyond their racial identity, a cheeky parody of how often Black academics when interviewed about race are reduced to being nothing more than "A Black person."
Also notable is that all of the "white" people interviewed have some other identity other than "white" which they could take. They are Ashkenazi Jewish, Arab, Mixed-Thai, Italian, Polish, etc. and F. D. pushes each of them on their white identity, telling some of them explicitly "you are not white" which none of them are comfortable agreeing with. Regarding a man who identifies as a "European Mutt," F. D. Signifier is only willing to label the English contribution to his heritage "white" while declaring every other heritage "not white a hundred years ago."
The hesitancy to identify as something besides white comes with the fact that the alternative to white in our vernacular is "person of color" which certainly none of the interviewees are, except perhaps the olive-toned Italian, a darker shade within the bounds of what can be perceived as "white.' They all experience white privilege in most scenarios, and feel it would be unfair, stolen valor, or a lack of accountability to not own their whiteness as a major contributing factor to their life experiences.
Near the end, the question of "what do we replace whiteness with" is brought up. If whiteness itself is an inherently toxic identity, what should one identify as instead? What fills the "hole" left behind by that identity? F. D. Signifier's answer is that whiteness is already a hole, a lack of culture, a void filled by other cultures which are not white.
Most of American pop culture is distinctly AfroAmerican in origin, that is to say, the distinct African diaspora culture among Black people in North America, an admixture of a variety of West and Central African cultures with certain European and Native American cultures. Despite making up less than 20% of the American population, Black people have created 90% of America's musical styles. One might think of drinking tea as distinctly Anglo-American, but tea comes from China and India. Many popular patterns among white people, such as paisley, originate in India and China. Your white grandmother's rug is an "oriental carpet" and her favorite plates are "fine China."
Much of the works of art of European origin beloved by white people were created by people who, at the time, would not have identified as white. William Shakespeare did not identify as white, nor Leonardo da Vinci . "White" as an identity is only a few hundred years old, and distinctly "New World" in its prominence. Even in modern Europe, people identify more strongly with their nationality than with a shared whiteness with other European nations. Ludwig van Beethoven identified chiefly as German. It is only in America where so many people would rather identify as "white" or "white American" than as English or German, the groups which make up the vast majority of white people in America.
I think F. D.'s characterization of White American culture as completely empty of original creations is a bit extreme, but mostly accurate. Bluegrass music was invented by white people, though modern Bluegrass is influenced by Blues and Jazz. Hamburgers, french fries, and pizza may be German, Belgian, and Italian, but only in the way that General Tso's Chicken is Cantonese. It would be false to say that General Tso's Chicken is not Chinese in origin, but it's also American in origin. It's a diaspora cuisine, which took a dish and adapted it to regional ingredients, cooking implements, and marketability. American Pizzas are very different from the Italian dish it originated from, due to not just different ingredients but also the types of ovens available. Much of Jamaican cuisine can be traced to the Akan people of West Africa, but also to England, India, and the indigenous Taino. Like languages or animals, cuisines evolve from branching family trees and the mating of flavors. So, too, do cultures and ethnicities.
It's strange to see hot dogs and hamburgers as distinctly ethnic, but they really are Germanic Foodstuffs. Most English or German descended foods in America feel quite boring, but that is only because whiteness is centered as the default, and because Germanic cultures generally value utilitarianism and practicality. Yes, pretzels and hot dogs are boring. Germanic cultures kinda like boring things. There's nothing wrong with that, and our love for flat-packed IKEA furniture and simplified shopping at ALDI demonstrate that there are many positives to this part of Germanic cultures. Yet this is a cultural distinction. It is not the default for humanity, it is a specific cultural value. Sometimes it's good and we get cheap furniture, and sometimes it leads to flavorless casseroles, and that's fine. A culture is not good or bad, it just is.
Ethnicity: American
In 1995, the US Census bureau asked white people what they prefer to be called. 61.66% just preferred to be called white. 16.53% preferred to be called Caucasian. 16.53% didn't care. Only 2.35% preferred to be called European-American, the term which would follow the conventional naming scheme used by the government for other groups such as Asian-Americans, Latin-Americans, and African-Americans. The 2020 census for the first time asked white people to specify an ancestry of origin from a list, such as "English" or "German." Before the 2020 census, these groups were under-counted, because many Anglo-Americans, nearly 8%, insisted on only identifying as "American."
Reddit's geography nerds constantly rehash the same conversation on why there are many counties in America where the majority of people identify as "American" and not any specific European nationality. The most common answer is that most white people have a mixed heritage to multiple European countries, they are "European Mutts," and that there have been enough generations since immigration that nobody feels a strong attachment to the 4-8 different nationalities they originate from. Assimilation into whiteness erased the notability of eating cheese with crackers, to value not causing a fuss and a utilitarian work ethic, or drinking beer. The modern Irish person cannot recognize much—if anything—held in common with the modern Irish-American.
I used to have a job doing data entry for an afterschool program in a very predominantly Puerto Rican city, where Spanish was the dominant language. A part of my job was to create bilingual intake paperwork for families registering their children for the program. I was not usually creating it from scratch, just modifying existing paperwork. One day, I was asked to create a distinct racial category on the paperwork for Latino people, rather than asking for race and "are you Hispanic or Latino" separately. The development department had decided it was better for fundraising if we re-categorized all the white-identified Hispanic people as people of color, which arguably is more accurate to their racialized experiences in New England. Even if some of these Puerto Rican families were more Taino and Akan than Spanish, the mixed-heritage gestalt identity had been getting categorized as white, and they were not seeing themselves as Mixed Taino-Akan-Spanish. They identified as Puerto Rican, a cultural identity descended from Spanish, Akan, and Taino.
When I updated the question on the intake paperwork, it looked like this.
Are you (select all that apply):Asian, or Asian-AmericanBlack, or African-AmericanIndigenous, or Native AmericanLatino, or Latin AmericanWhiteSome other race
I thought, that's strange. Isn't it? Every group was phrased as having a hyphenated version, except for white people. The asymmetry bothered me, so I changed it. I wasn't asked to, and it shouldn't have changed the data I collected at all, but I wanted it to be balanced—entirely for aesthetic reasons. I changed "white" to "White, or European-American."
It was fascinating to see how people responded to this phrasing of their identity. White people filling out the paperwork were now being directly labeled not as white, or American, but specifically as being European in origin, just as Hyphen American as every other group. No single group being given any default claim to American over any other group. But less than 3% of white people identify as European-American. When you say European, white Americans think "foreign."
Every other group would simply check off the box next to their own categories, or multiple if they were mixed-race. White people would not check the box. White people would very carefully circle only the word "white" or only the word "American" but actively avoided the word European. To be labeled European is to be labeled as foreign, an immigrant, a colonizer. Perhaps some of these families were Arab, which despite being a group that inhabits West Asia and North Africa, felt more like they are white, due to skin color. It's true that some groups which are historically considered white by the census are not European groups. The Caucuses are not in Europe, nor the Arabian peninsula, nor the Levant. The "Middle Eastern and North African" group was only added to the census in 2020, years after this paperwork experiment. Arguably, these groups have not been racialized as white since at least 2001, though some, like streamer Hasan who was interviewed by F. D. Signifier, can pass as white in context.
But, this was western New England. There was not a large Arab or Azerbaijani community in this city. It was Puerto Ricans, Black people, English people, Irish people, a few Asian families, and Ashkenazi Jews. I could tell by the names that most of these Not-European Americans were English or Irish. Maybe they don't consider the British Isles to be a part of Europe. It was clear, however, that they did not identify with Europe, they identified with America.
Ask white people where they come from, and they will name a US state or city. Ask them for their ancestry, and they won't know, or will name multiple different ancestries. I am Ashkenazi-Irish, though genetically I doubt that's all of it. People intermixed in Europe too. We know that the Ashkenazi Jews of Eastern Europe definitely intermixed with Europeans more than we will acknowledge, otherwise we wouldn't be so light skinned.
Just as how most AfroAmericans cannot be traced directly to only being Yoruba, Akan, or Congolese, most EuroAmericans cannot be traced directly to only being English, German, or French. We associate the word Diaspora with people who have been scattered by circumstance, the African diaspora, the Asian diaspora, the Jewish diaspora—and so we don't usually speak of a European Diaspora. Yet when you look at the history of colonialism, not all the colonists were signing up to cross the ocean out of patriotic fervor for Mother England, many were poor, drafted by the military, or of an ethnic or religious minority. Especially in the 19th century, the European immigrants were not too dissimilar from the Chinese immigrants. It was American racism that privileged them over the Chinese, not socioeconomic class. It would be accurate to say that there is a European Diaspora, with diaspora cuisine and gestalt cultures. EuroAmericans are, arguably, a distinct cultural group, and they identify with "white."
But "white" is still not real. It's still a homogenizing social force, and not a singular culture. Perhaps European immigrants assimilate into EuroAmerican identity, but is that distinct from saying they assimilated into whiteness? Some calls for the dismantling of whiteness ask white people to instead identify with their specific national ancestries, but if you don't know your origin, or if you know it's eighty different places you know nothing about and don't identify with at all, then that's not a natural or easy thing for someone to do.
It's not any more easy than for AfroAmericans to all identify as Swahili or Yoruba, knowing that their cultural ties to these groups are not well documented or linguistically preserved. This severing from one's ancestry any earlier than slavery is why there are so many New Religious movements among AfroAmericans which provide an identity as an Israelite, Moor, or Muslim. In the 20th century, AfroAmericans through Pan-Africanism and AfroCentricity reclaimed an African origin, pride, and culture, as part of their empowerment. White people, also cut off from ancestry in many cases, just identify as white instead, an identity always associated with power, it is an identification with power, with a place in a hierarchy.
White is a Relationship to Power
Perhaps this is why in F. D. Signifier's film, the "white" people are not comfortable identifying as Thai, Arab, Jewish, or Italian without also identifying as white, because they recognize their place in a hierarchy, a place which white individuals do not actually have the power to give up even if we want to. To be seen as white affords you white privilege even when you're Arianna Grande or Rachel Dolezal cosplaying as Black. White privilege also is the generational wealth and circumstance which set you up for your current life. Even if you wish to disown whiteness, you must recognize that whiteness set you up for more success in your youth.
F. D. Signifier is right that there is no ethnic group called "white." It is a place in a hierarchy. There are EuroAmerican Mutts, but that is not the same thing as "white" because not everyone who is racialized as "white" is a EuroAmerican Mutt in the same way that not everyone who is racialized as Black is an AfroAmerican. The historic gestalt ethnic group is one thing, and how it has been placed into the country's racial caste system is another.
Trying To Not Be White
Sometimes, white people over-identify with a part of their ancestry in a way that seems odd. Irish-Americans, who have nearly nothing in common with Irish people in Ireland, will cosplay as leprechauns on St. Patrick's Day, despite that being an anti-Irish caricature in the British Isles where anti-Irish sentiment actually matters. Italian-Americans, who might not even know what part of Italy they're from, are obsessed with Columbus Day. The Irish and Italians were once seen as not quite white, pseudo-white, the lesser-whites, but not so much so in the 21st century, where assimilation has consumed most distinguishing features of the "ethnic whites."
In the alternative or left-leaning crowds, you see Neo-Pagans practicing a version of Celtic or Norse paganism invented whole cloth from Roman-authored historical accounts with no connection to anyone living in Ireland or Scandinavia and no connection to any lineage of practice. You see Ashkenazi Jews who, while benefiting entirely from white privilege, will insist that Jewish people are not white, and will remind you of their Jewishness every chance they get. You see young white progressive Jews who live by strict Orthodox halacha that bewilders their Reform parents. Some of these practices, I think, are the same phenomena as the Nation of Islam, or the invention of Kwanzaa, just situated at a different level of the social hierarchy. People severed from their cultural heritage looking for something to identify with. Assimilation into whiteness provides a beneficial relationship to power, but identification with whiteness does not provide a cultural identity or meaningful heritage.
Among the alternative, progressive, or left-leaning white person, it becomes not just an attempt at finding identity and culture in the hole that is whiteness, but also an attempt to flee and disassociate oneself from the shame of whiteness and the history of colonialism. White people who definitely do have English ancestry, possibly even to the Mayflower, will emphasize their low-class 19th century ancestors. I even do this myself, always emphasizing that 25% of me came over from Minsk, and not that I have some evidence suggesting that one distant ancestor may have been an early Massachusetts Bay colonist before Independence from the British.
I've written about this before, but White Guilt and White Shame are not productive. At best, they are a nuisance to people of color in activist spaces. These feelings can lead to poor mental health, driving usually Autistic or Moral OCD white people to burn themselves out trying to martyr themselves atoning for the sings of their ancestors. At its worst, these feelings can drive white people to over-correct into full on fascism and conspiracy thinking. Unable to accept the negative feelings associated with being the beneficiary of historic atrocities, white people construct a phantasm of the evil Jews funding Black Lives Matter and putting Black History Month in schools in order to destroy the white race (because there's no way Black people could have ever self-organized apparently.)
Yet when we discuss whiteness and racial hierarchy, the call to action is often to leave whiteness, to disown it, dis-identify with it. This message, of course, is contradictory only when we view these calls to action as having the same origin, by homogenizing Black people into an ideological monolith. Yet, I think both calls to action have value, despite their contradictions. White people should recognize our privilege and history which has advantaged us at the cost of others—whiteness as a relationship to power—and white is not a cultural identity that one should be identifying with when looking for meaningful heritage or an ethnic group.
White people need to stop viewing ourselves as an empty default, or as all sharing the same heritage. The cultural void of whiteness often leads us to reactionary and fringe ideologies, such as White Nationalism, or syncretic obsession with European cultures we have no ties to. Neo-Paganism can sometimes become a gateway to fascism. Identifying with whiteness despite our personal origins makes us identify with wealthy billionaires and political dynasties we truly have nothing in common with. The working-class Irish-American has nothing in common with a Kennedy. The working-class Jewish-American has nothing in common with Michael Bloomberg. Collective liberation requires us to identify with our fellow workers of color more than we identify with bourgeois white people.
To be White, or Not to be White
We have identified a contradiction: the need to recognize oneself as white and as not white. So, we must apply a dialectic. White people must learn to simultaneously recognize whiteness as a political structure we are situated within whether we want to be or not, but not identify with whiteness as a cultural identity.
So how do we do this?
When what we're talking about is privilege, and one's relationship to American's racial caste system, say "I'm white." When what we're talking about is heritage and culture, say "I'm Ashkenazi-Irish," "I'm Italian," or "I'm a EuroAmerican Mutt."
We can also recognize how a EuroAmerican background influences you. "Color in" the void with qualities that are not the "normal default" and not "white" but distinctly EuroAmerican. I speak English, and am heavily influenced by the Germanic-descended cultures that dominate America. I enjoy practical utilitarian things, and I prefer to opt-in to a noise than to have to opt-out of it.
But when I ask white people to consider identifying as "EuroAmerican," as a gestalt identity of the various European countries they're descended from, it may raise new alarm bells.
White people who identify very strongly as "Germanic" tend to be, well, Neo-Nazis. Someone who is way too into being a Viking or German is throwing red flags. Identifying as some sort of proud Pan-European is something that Richard Spencer does. Is this really an alternative to identifying with the power structure of whiteness? The void of whiteness? To identify with some disconnected European heritage to "RETVRN" to?
Whiteness is a Material Socioeconomic Structure
We have applied a dialectic, but what we need next is materialism. Whiteness is not just an identification with a power structure, but the material power structure itself. There is no meaningful effect of not identifying with whiteness when you continue to benefit from whiteness. A Pan-European pride errs fascist, and a dis-identification errs escapist and cowardly. To dismantle whiteness, one must dismantle the socioeconomic disparity that is systemic racism. White people will perpetually be stuck between shame or fascism until the actual historic wrongs have been righted.
It does not matter how white people identify until there are reparations. The only way to craft a new cultural narrative for white people to identify with that they can feel good about without getting all supremacist about it is to actually make history with something material and substantial.
Japanese-Americans were paid reparations for the Japanese internment camps during World War II and it made a substantial material economic impact. We no longer see the level of economic disparity between Japanese-Americans and white people that we still see with Black people.
It can be done. Substantial and impactful reparations to descendants of African slaves, improvement to historically red lined communities, material investment and land repatriation to sovereign Indigenous Nations, all of it is within the means of the United States to do and it would not only heal the historic wounds upon the people, but also solve a lot of the great systemic crises in many parts of the country. If Black people and white people actually had equal footing socioeconomically, it would dramatically change how we relate to racism. Racism is bias meets systemic power. If the socioeconomic hierarchy is leveled, then what we have is the bias of a majority group, but without socioeconomic power. It would be equivalent to how Christians feels about Jews, a meaningful bias but not devastating economically.
The EuroAmerican narrative would change. The history could be taught that centuries ago, European settlers did some crimes against humanity, and we are descended from those people, but later EuroAmericans willingly gave up material wealth to pay reparations on a massive scale and make things right for what their ancestors had done to the AfroAmericans, and we are descended from those generations too. A complex heritage, but one that carves a new path for an identity for the "cultureless" assimilated EuroAmerican Mutts.
What a wonderful thing to imagine, unfortunately the Federal government just removed the restriction against federal contractors building racially segregated facilities. We are not on the path to reparations at this time. I don't see it happening anytime in the next decade.
So what do we do in the meantime, when it comes to the paradox of white identity?
A Tangent on Bodies and Feminism
I couldn't find when or where it started, but a major element of Third Wave and 2010s-era Pop Feminism was Body Positivity. A reaction to what was labeled the predominant media culture's Body Negativity, feminists encouraged everyone to "love the skin you're in" and embrace every curve and blemish as something that makes you beautiful, even and especially if it went counter to dominant beauty norms.
At first, Body Positivity was a radical movement primarily centered on fat-acceptance and countering the "heroin chic" obsession with skinniness that had dominated the 2000s. It was however, very quickly co-opted by corporate marketers such as Dove Soap, Lush, and Sephora. The corporate Body Positivity shifted away from just feeling positive about yourself generally, to more patriarchal expectations like seeing yourself as valuable because you are sexy and desirable [to men]. People began to feel pressured to "be Body Positive" and would express feeling guilty or like a bad feminist if they still felt bad about their body. People with eating disorders sometimes struggled with this especially.
In response, Anne Poirier popularized Body Neutrality. Instead of focusing on loving your body and appreciating your body as sexy; the focus of Body Neutrality is on accepting your body and appreciating your body as functional. My curves don't need to be sexy—they are just curves. My freckles don't need to be beautiful or ugly, they're just a reaction to being in the sun. My body gets me where I need to go, and does what I need it to do, and if it isn't doing those things, the focus is not on meeting beauty norms, but on treating medical conditions and being healthy for functional reasons only. Exercise is good for your brain, even if your figure doesn't change at all.
I don't think Body Positivity needed to be toxic. I think the "pressure to be a good feminist by loving your body" was often in people's heads, and not something anyone would ever have truly criticized or judged anyone for failing to live up to. Body Neutrality is not really about fat-acceptance in society the way the original Body Positivity movement was. Still, neutrality is clearly a much calmer and healthier place to be for the majority of people. You cannot conjure love and positivity from where it is not, but you can focus on something that is much more feminist: not valuing yourself solely on appearances.
A Proposal: White Neutrality
When white people feel ashamed of being white, it leads to toxic behaviors and poor mental health. White Guilt is counterproductive and a nuisance to people of color in activist spaces. When white people are proud of being white, it leads to fascism. "White people" is not a culture or ethnicity, but a relationship to power and the economy, which is held whether you want it or not. To be proud of having power over an oppressed class is fascist. No matter how badly you wish you weren't white, you can't stop being white in your lifetime. The people who try not to be white through cultural appropriation and digital blackface are being racist. The people who lean into being white, or being "proud of European heritage" are generally fascists. So what are white people to do?
We can learn from Body Neutrality. You should not feel ashamed of being born white. You didn't ask for it, and you can't choose to stop, so you shouldn't feel ashamed of it. Accept that you have benefited from systemic oppression from the moment you were born. Accepting does not meaning liking it, or being proud of it, but just letting it be a true thing about yourself that you acknowledge and can think about without feeling huge emotions. Maybe a small amount of discomfort is healthy, but not overwhelming shame or anxiety.
At the same time, do not feel proud of it. You should not like that you benefit from systemic oppression or be comfortable with these systems remaining in place. You should want to be Anti-Racist out of caring for your fellow human beings and because ultimately it's in everyone's long-term best interests regardless of your current position on the ladder. Systemic racism may have enriched your country, but it does not enrich your soul. Nobody is truly happier because of racism. I simply can't believe it. Our communities are richer when everyone thrives. A hide ride raises all boats. I still believe in the 2010s-era Social Justice assertion that making society better for Black Women makes society better for everyone. Not just for a few lucky Black Women like Oprah or Cherelle Parker who act in the interests of the Bourgeoisie, but Black Women as a class. The dismantling of the racial caste system could only be a good thing for everyone. Reparations for Black communities would be good for everyone.
This is my proposal. Like how body neutrality encourages you to accept your body and focus on its functions, white neutrality encourages you to accept your position in society—to let yourself be a human being who did not choose this and does not need to feel guilty about things you didn't do—and instead to focus on how you can use the position in society you've been given to further the cause of dismantling White Supremacy.
You will never be a "Good White" because the position of "White" only exists as a position in an inherently evil caste system. People of racialized minority groups might never trust you, and might always resent you, no matter how much you try to be a "Good White." Do not motivate yourself by seeking forgiveness for your Original Sin by gaining acceptance from random people of color. Motivate yourself to combat White Supremacy through higher political philosophies.
It is only through uniting with our fellow workers, with workers of color, that we can take down the systems that oppress all of us, albeit unequally. It is only through solidarity with Black communities that we can liberate ourselves as well. It is only through successful Anti-Racist movements making material economic changes that we can ever be freed from the tyranny of Whiteness, all of us. Then, someday, the void will truly be filled, and we can see ourselves as more than a relationship to power, but as more colors in the rainbow of cultures in the world (albeit, less saturated colors.)