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Have you ever been in a mostly white office and noticed how many reaction GIFs are of black people? The term to Google here is “digital blackface”. If you bri

Have you ever been in a mostly white office and noticed how many reaction GIFs are of black people? The term to Google here is “digital blackface”. If you bring this to more people’s attention my guess is that reaction GIFs will become less prevalent in your office.

monkeywork 6y ago
It is amazing the lengths people will go to find something to complain about.
- busterarm 6y ago
  We need a Godwin's law for things being described as "-ism".
  - wkearney99 6y ago
    or anything -esque.
- Volt 6y ago
  Like… "other people using reaction GIFs".
benignslime 6y ago
I think that's just some form of confirmation bias you've formed, as I've never noticed that. I will say most of my offices have been multi-cultural, but even then, I've been on and led teams of white-only males that never succumbed to even posting these gifs. I guess guilting people into censoring their choices is a point of action, but I think the entire process should just be faded out. Slack admins don't need to allow these plugins. Theres nothing stopping people from literally going to giphy.com or whatever, but that's not why it's popular -- and it's definitely not why FB is shelling 400 million for it.
- zachrose 6y ago
  Digital blackface is not my idea, nor is it something I noticed. (I am white.) Someone else explained it to me. I was probably a bit skeptical that a funny GIF of Oprah could be linked to Jim Crow, but in the historical context of blackface there are some unavoidable similarities.
J5892 6y ago
No, the term to Google here would be "misinterpreting inclusive cultural norms as appropriation".
- zachrose 6y ago
  One of these has 57,000 results and the other one has zero.
  - codemonkey-zeta 6y ago
    I'm confused by the plurality of this single overly-aggressive cultural perspective that any intercourse even vaguely race-related necessarily is a transgression against the minority race involved. Your analysis of the anecdote(!) that white offices seem to use people of color in gifs more often is concerning. It doesn't seem reasonable to think that working-class whites -- through meme communication at work -- oppress anybody in any meaningful way. Of course I understand _why_ someone would think that, and I largely agree with it. That is the theory that modern white culture consists of microaggressions which enforce a race-order in society while outwardly appearing "equal" and "inclusive". But the memes at work? Aren't there more important institutionalized racist policies to tackle? When you argue that the individual's choice to use memes with people of color is itself a problem worth addressing, we lose the more important issues that need to be fixed to the noise. If you really want to convince someone (or society) that something needs to change, you don't ask them to change a million things, you ask them for one thing. That's why we've been divided on race issues for so long, but it's even worse what's happening now. Now, the left (or those whites "in power" who say they are "woke" and want change) realizes it's easier to sit back and claim martyrdom for failing to convince the right (or those whites "in power" whose support is needed to make systematic racial change) because of some fundamental flaw in our opponent, rather than because of some flaw in the completely incoherent message of "change" that we are maintaining. And it's disgusting because the left revels in this self-righteousness while actively sabotaging our own "goals" in order to reserve for ourselves this position of universality. If we really want to make any change we would pick ONE policy. We would push and push until it HAD to become _law_. Then we would continue to push that program until that law HAD to become a _success_, and we would use that success to push ONE more policy. But we muddy the conversation with inane demands like "the (anecdotal!) tendency of white people to use people of color in gifs to communicate on Slack must be addressed," not so that we will actually _change_ that behavior, but once again to reserve the moral high-ground for, you guessed it, WHITES IN POWER (US). I think this is the most sinister and disgusting forms of racism, and it's being perpetuated by US! Most progressive whites I know really ARE good people, and really DO want social change, but they (you, OP, you) don't realize that they're participating in a much more dangerous form of oppression, because it _feels good_. It probably made you feel really good that you "educated" all of us on HN on this super important racial topic that you just happen to be "woke" on. You probably thought that was you "doing your part to end racism." Well your moralist masturbation just perpetuated the very cycle of racism that you espouse to despise.
somehnguy 6y ago
Geez people find a new thing every day to get offended about. Amazing.
anigbrowl 6y ago
Sure, Jan I don't think there's any solid evidence of disproportional use of of one ethnic group by another. You can certainly find individuals who thoughtlessly or deliberately do that but generalizing that to some random population (eg of office workers) is likely wrong.

monkeywork 6y ago

It is amazing the lengths people will go to find something to complain about.

busterarm 6y ago
We need a Godwin's law for things being described as "-ism".
- wkearney99 6y ago
  or anything -esque.
Volt 6y ago
Like… "other people using reaction GIFs".

benignslime 6y ago

I think that's just some form of confirmation bias you've formed, as I've never noticed that. I will say most of my offices have been multi-cultural, but even then, I've been on and led teams of white-only males that never succumbed to even posting these gifs. I guess guilting people into censoring their choices is a point of action, but I think the entire process should just be faded out. Slack admins don't need to allow these plugins. Theres nothing stopping people from literally going to giphy.com or whatever, but that's not why it's popular -- and it's definitely not why FB is shelling 400 million for it.

zachrose 6y ago
Digital blackface is not my idea, nor is it something I noticed. (I am white.) Someone else explained it to me. I was probably a bit skeptical that a funny GIF of Oprah could be linked to Jim Crow, but in the historical context of blackface there are some unavoidable similarities.

J5892 6y ago

No, the term to Google here would be "misinterpreting inclusive cultural norms as appropriation".

zachrose 6y ago
One of these has 57,000 results and the other one has zero.
- codemonkey-zeta 6y ago
  I'm confused by the plurality of this single overly-aggressive cultural perspective that any intercourse even vaguely race-related necessarily is a transgression against the minority race involved. Your analysis of the anecdote(!) that white offices seem to use people of color in gifs more often is concerning. It doesn't seem reasonable to think that working-class whites -- through meme communication at work -- oppress anybody in any meaningful way. Of course I understand _why_ someone would think that, and I largely agree with it. That is the theory that modern white culture consists of microaggressions which enforce a race-order in society while outwardly appearing "equal" and "inclusive". But the memes at work? Aren't there more important institutionalized racist policies to tackle? When you argue that the individual's choice to use memes with people of color is itself a problem worth addressing, we lose the more important issues that need to be fixed to the noise. If you really want to convince someone (or society) that something needs to change, you don't ask them to change a million things, you ask them for one thing. That's why we've been divided on race issues for so long, but it's even worse what's happening now. Now, the left (or those whites "in power" who say they are "woke" and want change) realizes it's easier to sit back and claim martyrdom for failing to convince the right (or those whites "in power" whose support is needed to make systematic racial change) because of some fundamental flaw in our opponent, rather than because of some flaw in the completely incoherent message of "change" that we are maintaining. And it's disgusting because the left revels in this self-righteousness while actively sabotaging our own "goals" in order to reserve for ourselves this position of universality. If we really want to make any change we would pick ONE policy. We would push and push until it HAD to become _law_. Then we would continue to push that program until that law HAD to become a _success_, and we would use that success to push ONE more policy. But we muddy the conversation with inane demands like "the (anecdotal!) tendency of white people to use people of color in gifs to communicate on Slack must be addressed," not so that we will actually _change_ that behavior, but once again to reserve the moral high-ground for, you guessed it, WHITES IN POWER (US). I think this is the most sinister and disgusting forms of racism, and it's being perpetuated by US! Most progressive whites I know really ARE good people, and really DO want social change, but they (you, OP, you) don't realize that they're participating in a much more dangerous form of oppression, because it _feels good_. It probably made you feel really good that you "educated" all of us on HN on this super important racial topic that you just happen to be "woke" on. You probably thought that was you "doing your part to end racism." Well your moralist masturbation just perpetuated the very cycle of racism that you espouse to despise.

somehnguy 6y ago

Geez people find a new thing every day to get offended about. Amazing.

anigbrowl 6y ago

Sure, Jan I don't think there's any solid evidence of disproportional use of of one ethnic group by another. You can certainly find individuals who thoughtlessly or deliberately do that but generalizing that to some random population (eg of office workers) is likely wrong.