O

n Sunday, June 7, nine members of the Minneapolis City Council acknowledged that the current system of policing is not working 
and that they intend to “defund and dismantle” the city police department. Council President Lisa Bender stated, “(We need) to 
listen, especially to our Black leaders, to our communities of color, for whom policing is not working and to really let the solutions 

lie in our community.” While still in the process of planning exactly what these new, transformative and community-based initiatives 
may look like, the goal is to implement a model of public safety that actually keeps each community safe. Conversations of defunding 
and dismantling police departments have popped up all over the country, and many are concerned about what exactly this means. 

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Michigan In Color
8 — Monday, August 31, 2020

At the turn of the 2010s, the 

ingenious use of social media 
by young activists during the 
Arab Spring set the world 
ablaze. In the blink of an eye, 
young 
people 
transformed 

social media from a prom pic-
ture party hub to an outlet of 
revolutionary information. Via 
fledgling platforms like Face-
book and Twitter, users shared 
demonstration sites, tear gas 
remedies and even tips to avoid 
identification by authorities 
should one choose to partici-
pate in civil disobedience. 

With 
its 
unprecedented 

ability to deliver not only cru-
cial information, but also the 
sights, sounds and unmistak-
able aura of social upheaval to 
the palm of any user’s hand, 
social media seemed to be the 
last missing link to achieving 
real global equality. 

In case you missed it, the 

2010s were not quite the pax 
romana we hoped they would 
be. 

Just shy of a decade after 

the events of the Arab Spring, 
social media’s stature as a 
beacon of hope, a catalyst of 
universal change has under-
gone quite the reversal. As 
Generation Z came of age over 
the course of the 2010s, we 
watched in real time as the 
sanctity of information found 
and distributed on social media 
was forever compromised. In 
addition to issues with misin-
formation, 
overwhelmingly, 

the outward facing nature of 
these platforms spawned a 
culture of normalized “slack-
tivism,” wherein the culti-
vation of the image of being 
“woke” by privileged groups 
has taken precedence over the 
actual substance of the soci-
etal issues which predicates 
such activism. The issues most 
often co-opted for social clout 
are related to the continued 
extrajudicial murder of count-
less Black Americans. But, this 
shouldn’t come as much of a 
surprise for a country which 
enjoys its temporary forays 
into Black culture more than 
Miley Cyrus. 

More so than any other 

instance of Black-led rebel-
lion seen in the previous 
decade, the most recent upris-
ings beginning on May 26 
have been characterized by a 
suspiciously high amount of 
white endorsement and par-
ticipation. But, these were not 
the usual white allies — these 
were white moderates. In the 
past week, my social media 
feeds have been flooded with 
the feverish reposting of art-
ist’s renditions of the deceased, 
text posts demanding account-
ability on the part of all non-
Black Americans and of course, 
the black tiles. Although an 
increased awareness of the 
horrors 
of 
police 
brutal-

ity appears, superficially, to be 
indicative of promising social 
progress, I cannot help but 
shake my suspicions that these 
displays — like most things on 
social media — are just a part 
of a facade. 

While my skepticism could 

be misconstrued as a selfish 
attempt to “gatekeep” who 
can and cannot be politically 
active, in reality, this cynicism 
is a byproduct of coming of 
age in the span of years sepa-
rating Trayvon Martin from 
George Floyd, Ferguson from 
Flint and Obama from Trump. 
Through these years, time and 
time again in school, and even 
in some social situations, I 
was looked to by my non-Black 
peers to rationalize why “all 
lives” and “blue lives” did not 
matter and why violence some-
times could be the only appro-
priate answer. And with each 
repetition of this cycle, with 
every new Black life taken pre-
maturely, the same peers still 
refused to educate themselves 
any further than the informa-
tion that was already labori-
ously spoon-fed to them by 
young Black people like myself, 

just clamoring to make their 
people’s humanity known. 

As I observed the same 

people who were once “so 
concerned” 
with 
educating 

themselves retreat back to the 
comfortability of their privi-
leged existences at their con-
venience, I began to see my 
efforts to inform had not just 
fallen on deaf ears, but actually 
replicated the existing system 
of Black subjugation to white-
ness — where still, Black labor 
is readily substituted in the 
place of white effort. 

Although many white Amer-

icans — particularly Gen Z’ers 
too self-righteous to recog-
nize their own similarities to 
their Boomer grandparents — 
are quick to ridicule the glar-
ing hypocrisies of attempts 
to appear “of the people” by a 
Kendall Jenner or Gal Gadot, 
significantly fewer conversa-
tions are being had regarding 
the abruptness with which 
they themselves hop on the 
bandwagon of social responsi-
bility, only to retreat back into 
the complicit silence of their 
“normal” existences once their 
friends stop posting Instagram 
stories, hashtags stop trending 
and the media moves on to the 
next Big Story™. It becomes 
difficult to read their mobili-
zation as anything but hollow 
box-checking, 
particularly 

when Black people watched the 
2010s close with no real prog-
ress made to the state of sanc-
tioned murder. Oh, and Donald 
Trump was elected president. 
So, there’s that. 

The desecration of social 

media from subversive outlet 
to vehicle of self-congratu-
latory displays is pretty well 
encapsulated with the trend 
that emerged earlier this week, 
#BlackoutTuesday. This phe-
nomenon, hauntingly similar 
to the promotional tactics used 
for Fyre Fest, involved non-
Black people posting an image 
of a black screen to their social 
media profiles. What was orig-
inally intended to be a mass 
silencing of the trivial uses of 
social media (e.g. beach selfies, 
Harry Styles fun facts) during 
a time of national protesting 
proved to be an all too easily 
accepted invitation for white 
people to engage in their favor-
ite political strategy: passive 
silence. Predictably, I awoke 
Tuesday morning from more 
participation than I had seen 
all week. My feed was now 
populated by more black tiles 
than a Home Depot, and not 
to my surprise, the majority 
of people posting these empty 
gestures had been relatively 
silent for the past week. 

In theory, this trend was 

intended 
to 
highlight 
the 

severity of the issue of police 
brutality and the importance 
of listening to Black voices. 
However, the eye-roll induc-
ing irony of this asinine trend 
is that it blatantly ignores the 
usefulness of privileged white 
voices to the movement. In 
civil rights history, substan-
tial change has only ever been 
achieved when those in privi-
leged positions finally feel 
compelled to stick their necks 
out for marginalized groups. 
When white people hold other 
white 
people 
accountable, 

magic happens. The only thing 
that has resulted from the 
proliferation of black squares 
has been a clogging of crucial 
hashtags with vacant displays 
of wokeness — a complete 180 
from the example set during 
the Arab Spring. 

But that’s the problem, isn’t 

it? The people who jump at 
the opportunity to conform 
to what they view as “trendy” 
give no credence to the his-
torical precedents of social 
protest. The same people vap-
idly posting the square because 
they saw someone cool do it 
have no discernible politi-
cal conscience beyond “I miss 
Obama” posts, and certainly 
have no grasp on Black his-
tory beyond what their APUSH 
teacher taught them. Posting 
a picture does not mean you 
have educated yourself on the 

complexities of systemic rac-
ism. Posting a picture does not 
mean you will diversify your 
social circle beyond who you 
went to high school with. Post-
ing a picture does not change 
the fact that your boyfriend 
voted for Trump. 

As our collective nostalgia 

for the socially transforma-
tive 1960s indicates, many 
young people have a desire to 
be swept up in a movement, to 
feel as though they are a part 
of something that will bring 
about positive change to their 
worlds. However, my burning 
(and 
unanswered) 
question 

for those suddenly compelled 
to channel Gloria Steniem is … 
where the fuck have you guys 
been? 

I acknowledge that, for those 

of us who have grown up Black 
and in America, the issue of 
police brutality is interwoven 
into the fabric of our existence. 
Whereas 
whiteness 
func-

tions to insulate people from 
the harsh realities of our rac-
ist country, Black people are 
met with constant reminders 
unmatched outside of our com-
munity. Despite this truth, so 
many white people’s collec-
tive realization of the urgency 
of these injustices smells a bit 
funky to me because … when 
have Black people ever been 
anything close to silent about 
our outrage with police brutal-
ity?

The maliciously fatal Min-

neapolis officer’s actions were, 
indeed, uniquely deplorable, 
but 
did 
mainstream 
white 

America forge a secret pact to 
just forget the Rodney King 
tapes? Were Philando Castille, 
Michael Brown, Eric Garner 
and Sandra Bland just figments 
of Black America’s imagina-
tion? George Floyd’s untimely 
death is nowhere close to being 
the first Black death at the 
hands of law enforcement, so 
why the shock? Why the refus-
al to look in the mirror when 
confronting how such a brutal 
system has been able to persist?

The amount of white Ameri-

cans shocked into action by the 
video is not indicative of prog-
ress, rather a pervasive culture 
of naivety. This newfound fer-
vor towards the Black cause 
only 
indicates 
a 
laughably 

obtuse ambivalence towards 
the last 10 years in America, 
let alone the last 400. As we 
find ourselves in week two of 
national protests and await the 
Moron-in-Chief’s 
legislative 

response. I have grown weary 
of social media’s role in the 
social revolution. I have grown 
weary of the cacophony of voic-
es repeating the same empty 
platitudes with no actual prog-
ress to match. 

A phrase which summates 

my frustration with America’s 
cyclical mishandling of police 
brutality is “History doesn’t 
repeat itself, but it rhymes.” 
While the issues being protest-
ed may not appear the exact 
same as the ones from 50 years 
ago, 
the 
principles 
under-

cutting each conflict remain 
unchanged. 
This 
phrase 

instantly comes to mind when-
ever I stumble across footage 
of elderly Black people march-
ing for similar, if not the same, 
causes they did when they 
were our age — revealing the 
depressing truth that they’ve 
spent an entire lifetime with-
out real rectification of soci-
etal issues. Band-Aid solution 
after Band-Aid solution. 

Regardless of the vogueish 

popularity 
of 
these 
social 

media trends in white spaces, it 
doesn’t appear as though any-
one is itching for the displays 
to end and the change to begin. 
Because if they did, I wouldn’t 
be writing this piece. So, white 
and non-Black America, if you 
want us to actually take your 
“activism” seriously, put your 
money where your mouth is. I 
would love to be proven wrong. 
As the privileged majority of 
the population, real change 
cannot happen without your 
efforts. So, let’s hope you’ve 
got something better dreamed 
up than Black tiles.

 ALEXANDRA OWENS

MiC Staff Writer

Ok, America. Prove me wrong.

The revolutionary nature of 

Glen Sean Coulthard’s book, “Red 
Skin, White Masks: Rejecting 
the Colonial Politics of Recogni-
tion,” serves as a salute to radical 
scholar Frantz Fanon’s postcolo-
nial work through its exposure of 
Canada’s systematic marginaliza-
tion of the Native population. In 
like manner, the piece introduces 
an uncomfortable notion of indoc-
trinated white values, instilled 
to naturalize the corruption of 
Indigenous culture and self-value 
which persist today in relation to 
the Aboriginals who suffer from 
psycho-affective attachments to 
colonialism and an internalized 
justification of their own subjuga-
tion. Coulthard proposes that this 
subconscious surrendering of the 
Aboriginal people creates a stable 
environment for the Canadians’ 
perpetual, yet subtle, reproduction 
of colonialism today. However, at 
some point, the colonized becomes 
“aware” of the colonizer, birthing 
resentment within the colonized, 
and forcing progress toward prop-
er recognition and reconciliation 
from the colonizer. 

Coulthard expresses modern 

society’s colonial persistence as 
straddled between the colonizer’s 
denial of the oppressive structure 
and the indoctrinated submission 
of the colonized. He does this by 
probing the non-Native’s refusal to 
decolonize through the implemen-
tation of “transitional justice” in a 
non-transitional structure and an 
ignorance regarding resentment’s 
political value. However, he goes 
on to challenge this “unchange-
able” system, making use of 
Fanon’s embracement of resent-
ment as an essential instrument in 
the resurgence of self and cultural 
affirmation. 

Attempts to reconcile injus-

tices against Canada’s Indigenous 
people have taken form of repara-
tive commissions and elaborate 
promises to rectify the unbalanced 
system, yet the implementation of 
these reparations have failed as a 
result of the non-Natives contra-
dictory denial of colonial history, 
and a palpable refusal to practice 
their own proposed processes. 

Meant to guide the Canadian 

State through a somewhat seam-
less process of reconciliation, the 
Royal Commission of Aboriginal 
Peoples details a productive prac-
tice of “transitional justice”: an 
approach to justice which must 
take place after the injustice has 
ceased and there is a clear distinc-
tion between the time of injustice 
and the time following. In Canada, 
society has perpetuated a “non-
transitional” loop that maintains 
the settler-colonial relationship 
and erases any distinction between 
that of the past, present and future. 
Coulthard explains that regard-
less, Canada wields the proposal 
of this transitional system to disas-
sociate past colonialism with their 
modern-day cultural hierarchy: 
“Where there is no period marking 
a clear or formal transition from 
an authoritarian past to a demo-
cratic present— state-sanctioned 
approaches 
must 
ideologically 

manufacture such a transition by 
allocating the abuses of settler 
colonisation to the dustbins of his-
tory.”

Canada relies on the internal-

ized system and manipulative 
policy enforcement which they 
exhaust to restrict the rights of 
Indigenous people. The enforce-
ment 
of 
extinguishment, 
the 

Modified Rights Approach, the 
non-assertion approach and the 
Jobs and Growth Bill Act all served 
as mediums of institutionalized 
outlets for Indigenous subjugation. 

Coulthard explains that decora-

tive language such as “restorative 
justice” creates an environment 
in which reconciliation becomes 
fixated on the “legacy of past 
abuse, not the abusive colonial 
structure itself.” When colonial 
corruption is categorized as his-
torical, it liberates the colonizer 
from responsibility in today’s 
disparate relationship, assuming 
blame to the colonized who must 
have an inability to move on. This 
way, the colonizer can maintain 

their systematic superiority by dis-
guising the current settler-colonial 
structure as an invalid, negative 
emotion harboured by the Natives 
toward the non-Natives which 
prevents the advancement of their 
mutual relationship. 

In embracing the standpoint of 

transitional justice, the colonizer 
assumes the Natives’ resentment 
to be irrational and it is framed 
as the primal perpetuator of the 
social and political instability at 
hand. This common misunder-
standing of resentment confuses 
the emotion for the subjectively 
less productive french term: res-
sentiment. Ressentiment is “por-
trayed as a reactive, backward, and 
passive orientation to the world;” 
under this definition, the once 
subjugated has been liberated in 
a literal sense but fosters this sub-
jugation in a conscious refusal to 
move on from the past, ultimately 
subjugating themselves. 

The difference between the 

two terms is resentment’s politi-
cized nature, making it a power-
ful foundation for reconciliation. 
Resentment is formed against 
a recognized “enemy of injus-
tice;” recognizing this “colonial 
enemy” frees the colonized from 
their internalized subjugation and 
compels them to revalidate their 
individual and cultural worth. 
Coulthard defines this Fanon-
inspired process as, “a purging, 
if you will, of the so-called ‘infe-
riority complex’ of the colonized 
subject … In such a context, the 
formation of a colonial ‘enemy’ … 
signifies a collapse of this internal-
ized psychic structure.” This lib-
eration starts with oneself, but the 
cultural validation also inspires a 
unified “us” that is now conscious 
enough to recognize specific injus-
tices and passionate enough to 
demand desired reparations. 

This is a necessary reallocation 

of the Indigenous peoples’ once 
internalized hatred and subju-
gation. Coulthard explains that 
this external reallocation creates 
an opportunity where “the colo-
nized begin to resent the assumed 
‘supremacy of white values’ that 
has served to ideologically justify 
their continued exploitation and 
domination.” Once these values 
are resented by the colonized, they 
realise that there is no justifying 
the long-indoctrinated exploita-
tion or domination of their cultural 
group, and therefore, there is no 
validation in colonialism or the 
persisting political structure. 

What makes resentment par-

ticularly powerful as a political 
tool, is the emotional passion. In 
numerous situations likening the 
colonial-settler relationship, the 
“inferior” is aware of their posi-
tion, but helpless or unmotivated 
in reversing the damage; resent-
ment instills the anger and pas-
sion that motivates action. In 
the summer of 1990, a political 
agreement that disregarded the 
rights of the Native peoples and a 
non-Native attempt to confiscate 
Native owned land inspired the 
unification of Indigenous people 
to protect and assert their inherent 
rights. This opposition energized a 
new movement for the Indigenous 
people in which they apply their 
resentment to action, rather than 
fostering it within; in the wake of 
this, the RCAP was created, rec-
ognizing the demands of the colo-
nized and responding respectively. 

“What originally began as an 

education campaign against a 
repugnant piece of federal legisla-
tion has since transformed into a 
grassroots struggle to transform 
the colonial relationship itself” 
(Coulthard 128). The proposal that 
an emotion serves as the founda-
tion for reconciling institutional 
colonialism sounds absurd. How-
ever, I assert that this is a nearly 
necessary step for the colonized 
to validate themselves and their 
culture, and vocalize the desire for 
legitimate reparation and revolu-
tion. 

In 
“Understanding 
Eth-

nic Violence: Fear, Hatred, and 
Resentment in Twentieth Cen-
tury Eastern Europe,” by Roger 
D. Peterson, and “On Resentment 
and Ressentiment: The Politics 
and Ethics of Moral Emotions,” 
by Didier Fassin, the two authors 
uncover 
an 
unacknowledged 

“victim” of some ambiguous sort, 
and debrief the instrumental role 
of these victims’ resentment in 
maintaining institutionalized dis-
crimination. Peterson interprets 
resentment as an emotion based 
on a nation or state’s structure, 
which when shifted or reversed 
hierarchically, angers the once 
ethnically-dominant, and if fea-
sible, leads to extreme ethnic vio-
lence. This interpretation strays 
from the notion that resentment 
follows a history of subjugation; 
However, what remains are clear 
distinctions between who causes 
the resentment, who possesses it 
and why. Despite the clarity of this 
approach, the manichean aspect 
removes the universality of such 
an emotion, almost restricting it 
to people who can directly credit 
their pain to a group, and restrict-
ing the “reaction” of resentment 
unto those who did the harm. Fas-
sin, however, recognizes the global 
accessibility of the emotion. 

Fassin 
specifically 
analyzes 

the French police force and their 
ambiguous resentment as a more 
societal and ideological position 
that they release unto a feasible 
target. This interpretation invites 
a more palpable understanding of 
resentment from the social and 
individual perspective. Both con-
cepts result in pragmatic institu-
tional discrimination: Peterson’s 
approach is rooted in a clear eth-
nic hierarchy that has been dis-
turbed and angers the formerly 
dominant to an extent of extreme 
violence, whereas Fassin’s concept 
accepts the obscurity of emotion 
and acknowledges the inaccurate 
direction of consequential emo-
tional expression.

In “Understanding Ethnic Vio-

lence,” Peterson delivers a concept 
of resentment that exists amongst 
the shattering of a distinguished 
ethnic structure, allocating blame 
to the oppressed who “wrongful-
ly” gained power and are resented 
by the “rightful” owners of said 
dominance who will eventually 
retaliate with role-establishing 
violence. This concept of resent-
ment relies on three necessities: 
a strongly established perception 
of ethnic hierarchy, the domi-
nant group amongst the hierarchy 
experience a role-reversal and this 
now subjugated group see correc-
tion through violence as a feasible 
option.

If a clear hierarchy is not estab-

lished, nor can be violence from 
resentment. This interpretation 
renders resentment similar to 
the emotions rooted in national-
ism which strive for an “ethnic 
homogenisation” where the “peas-
ant” and “imperial” populations 
are ruled out alongside resentment 
itself. Within these imagined and 
consequentially forced communi-
ties, there is no alien within the 
structure, nor is there any fear 
of role-reversal. Whether this 
approach to resentment remains at 
the large nation with a maintained 
hierarchical structure, or expands 
to the forced homogenized com-
munities, institutional discrimi-
nation is pursued at a structural 
level, rooted in the belief that the 
dominant deserves to be dominant 
at any justifiable means. 

Similarly pursuant of institu-

tionalised discrimination, Fassin 
explores resentment as it inhabits 
the French police force, the ambi-
guity of the emotion’s roots and the 
unfortunate misdirected reactivity 
on the “vulnerable.” Fassin claims 
the emotions felt by the police 
force are relational to the emo-
tions exhibited by the surrounding 
society: “the police are all the more 
aggressive since they view their 
public as hostile and through their 
aggressiveness render the public 
hostile.” This resentment against 
society, matched with the neces-
sity for efficacy leads to targeted 
brutality, and inherently perpetu-
ates the oppressive structure. 

This is not a justification of the 

cycle — rather a condemnation — 
but it is important to recognize the 
perspective that hierarchical roles 
possess in order to understand 
the process of one’s society on an 
ideological level. Assumption is 
political venom whether done by 
the subjugated or the subjugator, 
and equality can only see fruition 
alongside understanding.

 GABRIJELA SKOKO

MiC Summer Co-Managing Editor

Resentment: the politicization of 
emotion to liberate the colonized