Dedicated to my grandfather, Yu Doo Yeon, who supported the Korean resistance against our Japanese colonizers
White people have been killing and stealing on a global scale since the 14th Century
In light of the public lynchings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery, I’ve been thinking a lot about why white people are the way they are. We rarely speak of (much less interrogate) white culture in “polite” conversation because white supremacist, patriarchal, capitalist culture is the air we breath.
The current racial environment can confuse one into thinking that white people killing and violating is recent, but it’s actually quite ancient. White people have been stealing lives and resources from other lands since the 14th Century. Colonialism (also known as global thievery and unwanted intervention) was perpetuated by white people from Europe (Belgium, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Portugal, Russia, Spain) and Asia. The Japanese and Chinese are among the fairest, whitest people in Asia and some of the few non-European imperialist powers.
Colonialism and imperialism are far from dead, they have simply evolved into our modern oppressive systems of global colorism and hyper-materialistic capitalism.
Like every human on earth, I am the product of an imperialist past and colorist present. My people in Korea were colonized by Japan for 35 years before a defeat in WWII sent Japan to its knees. During Japanese colonialism, Koreans were stripped of their freedom, lives, land, names, culture and language. When the world war ended in 1945, Korea was granted a bastard “independence” by the United States and the Soviet Union. The Cold War between these white global superpowers brought the Korean War to my peaceful peninsula and ripped our home in two by 1953.
Going halfsies was considered a fair trade to these two white powers resulting in permanently divided families and destroyed lives. Korea remains divided to this day. North Korea is a totalitarian, isolationist regime whose economy was crippled after a devastating man-made famine in the 1990s when the Soviet Union fell apart. Russia and China supported North Korea continues to deny basic freedoms to its citizens and is an infamous human rights abuser. United States backed South Korea has become a capitalist and cultural superpower with one of the highest suicide rates in the world and is apparently the worst place to be a working woman. Thank you white imperialism!
I was born and raised in America as a Korean immigrant baby and like so many, have been swept into the racial politics of white supremacist America. I have learned about the Brown and Black corpses that sturdy the foundation of our beloved country. Our nation was born of genocide of indigenous Americans and our economy was built through African slavery. We must acknowledge this history and atone if we can ever move towards healing and building an America we can be proud of.
A scarcity mindset led to colorism
People are not inherently born “bad” or “good”, so what conditions have led to rational thieving, murdering and hoarding among white imperialists for hundreds of years? My thesis is that colonialism and imperialism are the result of cultures of resource scarcity. A scarcity mindset can be caused by numerous environmental and geographical factors including (1) long harsh winters, (2) geographic isolation such as living on an island and (3) limited access to continuous resources for survival. The UK and Japan are both island imperialists and Northern Hemisphere countries tend to have colder climates and harsher winters.
According to modern psychology, a scarcity mindset leads to obsessive tunnel vision on obtaining lacking resource(s) and prioritizing the short-term over the long-term. This mentality results in viewing resources as one finite pie where getting your slice of pie is a zero sum game. I believe a scarcity mindset is what drove white people to steal, kill, and rape on a global scale. If trauma can be inherited, a scarcity mindset could as well. Our collective scarcity mindset has caused us to use our Earth’s resources unwisely, violate one another’s humanity and drive ourselves towards self-destruction.
Shift to an abundance mindset
We must individually and collectively shift to an abundance mindset if we agree with the thesis that a scarcity mindset has contributed to many of the ills of the world including imperialism, hyper-materialism and colorism. Shifting to an abundance mindset rejects short-term, resource hoarding in favor of a broad, loving perspective that is focused on long-term value for the entire human family and this planet we consider our home.
Here are three ways to shift to an abundance mindset:
- Believe you are enough and that you have enough
- Practice gratitude
- Create win-win situations
This is not an easy or simple practice, however, it might just save our collective humanity.
Source: https://www.fireflydanville.com/the-abundance-vs-scarcity-mindset/
