How Should We Think About Race and "Lived Experience"?

This article tries to out-logic racism (so smart!) but completely overlooks that different cultures have different experiences regarding who is a part, what it means to be a part, and how their culture meshes with the whole. And the sudden and intense interest in biological difference is kind of creepy too.

Obviously people of different cultures are slightly genetically different, otherwise how could you be racist against strangers! In the case of the professor who learned she was not ethnically indigenous, people didn’t want her out just because she, individually, was pretending to be native. It’s because there is an entire industry and extensive history of non-native people smothering native culture, telling native people through movies, books, etc. of what their own culture is or what it means, and of native arts and symbols being used by white people to make a quick buck. She /symbolized/ a sore point for the community and furthermore she was not open about it. The whole situation was unfortunate, but the author seems more interested in her case to prove his own point than in the concerns of the community he is poorly explaining about.

> (Probably there's some principle of standpoint theory that says that I as a white person am not allowed to judge Mi'kmaq Indians. Fine, far be it from me to challenge standpoint theory. But many of Elizabeth Hoover's ex-friends who turned against her are white, and I judge those people.)

I don't expend any time thinking about race or “lived experience”. Both are irreverent to how one is going to advance ones prospects in this world.