[sudo-discuss] Telling Oakland stories in Sudo space: my own part 1 of (?)

[Anthony Di Franco]

​
Most of the time, sudo room is simply a good place to be around good people
doing interesting and worthwhile things, one open to the community.

But when it's at its worst, which it has been quite often during the last
few days, it serves as a vehicle for fantasies of finding authenticity,
righteousness, insight, and empowerment through discovery of and
association with a stereotyped, exotic, mysterious other that read like
they came straight out of an Allan Quatermain novel. Self-aggrandizing
fantasies that patronize and dehumanize the people they feature as props
and the suffering victims they use as human shields to deflect criticism.

A while ago I tried to object to this tendency in oblique terms, and it led
to a tremendous and tremendously bitter misunderstanding. Seeing this
tendency be expressed more directly now makes me think it was more than a
misunderstanding. This time I will be more direct and try to leave no
possibility of misunderstanding.

I struggled through outrage at the hypocrisy to find the words with which
to object this time. I thought of Ivan Illich's
warning<http://www.swaraj.org/illich_hell.htm>to American students
headed to Mexico, which I often come back to.
Eventually I remembered that Teju Cole, a more talented writer than I am,
one in closer contact with more profound examples of what I object to,
provided the right words
here<http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/03/the-white-savior-industrial-complex/254843/?single_page=true>
:

*"The banality of evil transmutes into the banality of sentimentality. The
world is nothing but a problem to be solved by enthusiasm. The White Savior
Industrial Complex is not about justice. It is about having a big emotional
experience that validates privilege... I deeply respect American
sentimentality, the way one respects a wounded hippo. You must keep an eye
on it, for you know it is deadly."*

I have learned to respect sudo room in that sense (among many others), and
I've developed a habit of keeping an eye on it from a safe distance, out of
some similar kind of dire necessity (among many other reasons).

Paraphrasing Cole with apologies: *"[Oakland] has provided a space onto
which white egos can conveniently be projected. It is a liberated space in
which the usual rules do not apply: a nobody from America or Europe can go
to [Oakland] and become a godlike savior or, at the very least, have his or
her emotional needs satisfied. Many have done it under the banner of
"making a difference." To state this obvious and well-attested truth does
not make me a racist or a Mau Mau..."*

​*"What innocent heroes don't always understand is that they play a useful
role for people who have much more cynical motives. The White Savior
Industrial Complex is a valve for releasing the unbearable pressures that
build in a system built on pillage.​.."* [ellipsis again with apologies to
Cole]

*"But those whom privilege allows to deny constellational thinking would
enjoy ignoring this fact."*

​It would be better if sudo room were always, as it usually is, simply a
good place to be around good people doing interesting and worthwhile
things​, open to the community, *nothing more*.

On Tue, Nov 19, 2013 at 10:44 PM, Pete Forsyth <peteforsyth at gmail.com>wrote:

> All:
>
> In the spirit of Rhodey's recent message,[1] I'd like to share an Oakland
> vignette of my own, about a pool league I recently joined. But first,
> here's why:
>
>  I began to get especially excited about Sudo Room when I started to
> realize it aspires to be more than just a bunch of computer geeks coming
> together to hack computery stuff (awesome enough in itself) -- that it also
> wants to be a community that hacks *life* together. Meeting chefs and
> filmmakers was the first wave for me, and then I started hearing heatlfelt
> and inspired talk about stuff like social change and engaging with local
> government. Yeah!
>
> Many of us, though, are new, or newish, to Oakland. And we are people who
> want to have a positive impact on the world around us. But Oakland is a
> place with deep history and culture, and on a pretty basic level, it would
> be...impolite...to come to a party and immediately start trying to change
> what it is. So the desire to get to KNOW Oakland is one that resonates very
> strongly with me, as an important first step before contemplating ways to
> INFLUENCE Oakland. I think sharing stories is a powerful way (among others)
> to get to know something complex and multifaceted.
>
> Anyway, enough of the philosophizing. I want to tell you guys a little bit
> about the pool league I joined a couple months back.
>
> Apparently, there have been several Oakland/East Bay pool leagues over the
> last 30 years or so (where each team has a home bar, and competes weekly
> over a scheduled season). Right now, there's only one league (or at least,
> only one connected with this community). It's coed, it's a 30 week season
> (we're about 9 weeks in), it's run by a woman who has run an all-women's
> league but just started this one, and it will culminate in a trip to Reno
> for all participants. By now, having played against all the other teams,
> and can say I am truly the only white person in the league;[2] and I think
> I'm also unique (more or less) in my connection/familiarity with
> Internet/hacker culture.
>
> I've played in a pool league before, but it's been 10 or 15 years. As this
> league was forming, I heard about it from a number of regulars at my local
> bar in Emeryville -- the organizer, and a number of people who have ended
> up on various teams in the league. There was some buzz about it, and I
> ended up joining a team that plays out of an East Oakland bar.
>
> The first couple weeks passed pretty quietly. Weeks 3 and 4, though, got
> rowdy! Lots of arguments in various games, and of course, there was some
> inertia to it -- the overall mood became increasingly tense each night. I
> felt cautious about this -- as a newcomer, I was reluctant to be involved
> in the arguments -- I was still getting to know the vibe and the people.
> But that only goes so far. I felt a responsibility to the integrity of the
> game (I know the rules better than many in the league, who are more
> familiar with "bar rules" than "league rules"); and moreover, a
> responsibility to my team. I have to advocate for myself in my own games --
> that's part of what I showed up to do -- and there are situations where I
> have to step it up on behalf of my teammates, too. To keep it short, weeks
> 3 and 4 were were it "got real" for me.
>
> In week 5, there was a new twist: my friend Eugene, who's recently been
> taking photography classes (and who hasn't played pool in a competitive
> context), had been asking about coming to take some photos, and was finally
> able to make it to a match. I had run this by the league coordinator and a
> couple teammates, so I was confident our bases were covered -- but after
> the hot tempers of the preceding weeks, I was nervous! Were we now in a
> new, hypercompetitive mode where the slightest detail is going to lead to a
> shouting match? Is it OK to introduce a new and unfamiliar element to a
> volatile situation? What kind of effect will it have?
>
> Fortunately, overall it was a super mellow night. Both teams seemed
> relaxed. I found myself lining up laid back blues tracks on the jukebox
> between my games, and caught several of my teammates and opponents nodding
> their heads or singing along throughout the evening.
>
> But one moment was an exception. I was watching a teammate's game, and
> felt a surge of adrenaline as a dispute broke out about whether her
> opponent had made a clean hit.[3] I had seen the shot clearly, and knew
> what I'd seen, but there were enough eyes on the table and enough people in
> the discussion that I was happy to sit back and watch it play out. But I
> did notice that Eugene, who had begun to hit his stride with the camera,
> was continuing to snap pictures. I was thinking this might be weird, but
> nobody else seemed fussed over it, so I stayed passive, just taking it all
> in. The players were raising their voices, talking over each other,
> captains and teammates had stepped up to the table to weigh in. Most of the
> 10 players present were involved in an escalating argument.
>
> After a couple minutes things started to wind down -- an agreement had
> been reached. The players got back to their game, but people continued
> talking about the shot. Eugene came close enough that I could grab his
> elbow. "What did you think of that?" I asked. Eugene and I have a shared
> passion for sports, and I was certain that he would have an opinion --
> maybe not of the substance of the dispute, but at least something about the
> dynamics among the various players. But he gave me a blank look. "Of what?"
>
> In that simple statement, it hit me: between the jargon/etiquette of the
> game of pool and the cadence of the Ebonics,[4] there is a world I have
> come to know much better than I did a few months ago. I don't know that I
> understand it *well* -- I'm not sure if that's even possible without having
> grown up in this community! I still find myself in situations almost every
> day where I haven't the slightest idea what the people around me are
> talking about. But without realizing it, I had become much more highly
> attuned to what was going on, at least in that situation.
>
> Ever since, that moment has stuck with me. As I walk down the street, get
> a sandwich at the corner store, or ride the bus, I've been asking myself:
> how much of what I see and hear is fitting together? Do I understand what's
> going on here? Fully? Or a little bit? Who is trying to get whose number,
> what happened to that boy in school today, why is that woman laughing? What
> would I have been able to perceive when I moved here last spring? And I'm
> starting to realize: it's rarely true, actually, that I haven't the
> *slightest* idea. I might not understand everything, but as time passes I
> understand more. To me, that's pretty exciting, because beginning to
> understand helps unlock the possibility of participating in a relaxed and
> genuine way. And if I'm going to be here, it's important to me to *be here.*
>
> I'm curious to hear from others who are relatively new to Oakland, how
> your process of getting to know it is going.
>
> -Pete
>
> p.s. Want to help support the league...or have an itch to gamble? We have
> a raffle going on! Tickets are $1, and must be purchased by Thursday
> evening. The prize is a Thanksgiving turkey -- and I can inquire about
> Tofurky or other alternatives if necessary ;) Proceeds go toward making the
> Reno trip at the end of the season...well, the word that comes to mind
> is..."mo'betta."
> p.p.s. Want to PLAY in the league? I think some teams have lost players to
> shifting work schedules etc. Let me know, and I can see if there are
> openings!
>
> ----
> NOTES
>
> [1]
> http://lists.sudoroom.org/pipermail/sudo-discuss/2013-November/004593.html
> [2] Since race has been a sensitive issue lately, let me be clear: I
> believe racial relations have an important, maybe even central, role in
> Oakland history and culture. I have never had great exposure to any black
> community before, and am trying to take it in for what it is, and -- to the
> best of my ability -- leave preconceptions behind. I do not claim to be
> perfect at this.
> [3] If you're not familiar with the "ball in hand" rule in competitive
> pool: if you don't hit one of your own balls first (stripe/solid), your
> opponent can place the cue ball anywhere on the table and take the next
> shot. As you might imagine, sometimes it's very hard to tell which ball was
> struck first, so this is a common point of contention.
> [4] OK, I'm more than a little self-conscious about this term. I am eager
> for input! It's a term people seem to use casually in this community, but
> I'm not sure how it's taken elsewhere. I think it carries a lot of baggage.
> But, there's definitely a dialect here that can be difficult for me to
> understand. I'm not sure what are the best words to use for it.
>
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