CHECK Magazin - Gesundheitsmagazin für Männer No.4

COMMUNITY
ENGLISH
INCIDENTALLY, RACIST
After the #blacklivesmatter protests around the global last year, no
one can say that the discussion about racism isn’t important. But why
is our community walking on eggshells around the topic?
RACISM IN THE COMMUNITY
Queer Matters e.V. organizes roundtables
in which current topics from the areas of
health, culture and community are addressed.
As the #blacklivesmatter continued to
grow in prominence, the team, based in the
community center Village Berlin, decided to
conduct a survey. They wanted to find out
whether members of the community had
experienced racisms, and, if so, how? The
questionnaire specifically addressed members
of the Village Berlin community and not
the queer community in general. While the
results of the survey are still being assessed,
we were able to chat with project manager
Thomas Schallhart. After viewing initial
results from the survey, he confirms that
racism and racist experiences are very much
part of LGBTQI* people’s lived experiences.
How can it be that there are such unhealthy
inhumane tendencies in a community that
experiences discrimination itself again and
again?
HOW DO PEOPLE BECOME A RACIST?
A racist is someone who behaves differently
towards people because they have a different
skin color, heritage or culture. Some people
even believe that because of such differences,
they are something better. Thomas
Schallhart describes a fundamental problem
with racism that we were racially socialized
in a white society: „We are constantly being
told, directly and indirectly, that black people
and people of color are less valuable than
white people.“ But a lot of racism also comes
from history. “For centuries, white Europeans
have exploited, enslaved and oppressed much
of the world. An important mechanism was
to classify European culture as ‚normal‘ and
anything else as different and of less value.“
UNCONSCIOUS AND CONSCIOUS
RACISM
Social researchers in the field speak of conscious
and unconscious racism. The difference
lies in whether the person can assess the consequences
of what they said. Certain AfD politicians
(the far-right Alternative für Deutschland
party), for example, consciously say
racist things in order to get votes from people
who are either consciously or unconsciously
racist themselves. Unconscious racism is not
always that easy to determine, but basically
begins with dividing people into a collective
and assigning them certain characteristics.
The statement „All Arabs are anti-gay“ is a
good example. If you hear such statements
more often, the probability is higher that you
internalize this view. The next time you meet
a woman with a headscarf, you unconsciously
act negatively because you think she is anti-gay.
This negative behavior is already racist,
whether it is consciously or unconsciously.
ANYONE WHO REMAINS SILENT
BECOMES COMPLICIT
In addition to racist socialization, we were
taught another problem: silence. Many people
know the situation when Grandpa Karl uses
racist terms or the strange colleague from the
sales department scolds foreigners. Nobody
dares intervene and if they do, the person
quickly becomes the defensive and digs in their
heels. Tolerating racist statements doesn‘t
make you a racist per se, but it does contribute
to the fact that racism can develop freely. The
study by Queer Matters e.V. also shows that
there is a problem with how criticism of racism
is dealt with. However, Thomas Schallhart sees
a lot of potential here to effectively combat racism,
“It doesn‘t do much to simply observe the
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