Last Saturday, Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) posted an Instagram photo featuring Capitol Hill interns with the caption, “I think this sets a record for the most number of #CapitolHill interns in a single selfie.”
That may be true, but people took note of the photo for a different reason — almost everyone in it appears to be white.
Some Twitter users noted the lack of diversity, posting about the photo with a #GOPSoWhite hashtag.
A few days later, interns working for Congressional Democrats decided to respond. Audra Jackson, an intern working for Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX), decided to take her own selfie — one showcasing the diversity of interns on her side of the aisle.
My intern Audra Jackson led Democratic Interns in their own selfie 2day showing #DemInternDiversity #DemInternSelfie pic.twitter.com/83UcIOKS5s
— US Rep E.B.Johnson (@RepEBJ) July 19, 2016
Pictures, worth thousands of words. Via Think Progress.
The first picture isn’t showing up. Did they already take it down? Or replace it with a picture of a snowman in a snowstorm?
I can see it -- depends on your connection, might be verizon belching. Here’s the link: https://www.instagram.com/speakerryan/ It’s down a bit on the page, 2nd row, I think.
Or, it might be some sort of software block -- Instagram is kind of notorious for being easily blocked by everything.
That’s priceless.
Both images showing up fine for me. Maybe because I whitelist this site on my blocker software (No-Ads subscription for the win!)
Hmm. Turned on my blocker (Ghostery) and it gave me the first picture, but not the second.
Ryan’s pic is whiter than ND, never thought I’d see that.
How many of those aryan women interns will actually get jobs in Republican politics?
Shiv, very few, I expect.
Those white women will still think any job they get will be because of talent, while any person of color will have gotten a job because of reverse discrimination.
Those two pictures really do say it all. It is true what they say -- excessive uniformity works in fundamental weakness, in this case the weakness of being raging racist areshats with a narrow, privileged world view.
You would think it obvious that, for an organization aspiring to government to be credibly able to function, first it must reflect those it is to govern, and last time I checked the American populous was not made up exclusively of relatively wealthy White people.
According to Snopes, this comparison doesn’t really score the point that people who forward it think it does. The first picture isn’t necessarily all Republican interns — rather, it was a assortment of interns from both parties who were randomly chosen to attend a seminar. Thus, it reflects a larger problem of lack of diversity overall on Capitol Hill, not just among Republicans.
http://www.snopes.com/republican-and-democratic-interns/
Brucegee1962:
Right, all hanging with a Republican, and why that random selection managed to select only white people. I am just gobsmacked. <- That bit is sarcasm. Quite honestly, this is the sort of shit I expect to see from asshole dudebros who don't want to deal with the blinding whiteness of conservatism. And yes, I'm aware some people of colour are conservatives, just as some queer folk are - you can always find those willing to slave themselves squarely against their own self interest. This sort of shit also diverts the discussion away from things that seriously matter, like Trump and the far right and the conservatives moving into outright white nationalism, which is scarier than fuck. And yes, I think those photos do score exactly the point they are trying to make. Most white people wouldn't so much as blink, let alone think, at Ryan's photo, because they see themselves, they see what they want to see, and are content. The rest of us? We're staring at a field of stone white, again. We don't see ourselves, again. Fuck, they couldn't even be bothered with a token.
I guess the seminar was “How white people can avoid sunburn in DC”.
Yes, it definitely does make the intended point. Ryan took that picture and didn’t see anything wrong at all, and, in fact, wanted to publicize it. That’s the massive white privilege on display in one clear shot. The fact that Snopes and other missed that point as well is just as telling. These are people who have no understanding of racial privilege. The picture from Audra Jackson is a clear counter point.
For anyone who couldn’t be bothered to read the Snopes — the point there and in my post was that, while conservatives including Ryan obviously have an enormous problem with diversity, democrats don’t necessarily get to pat themselves on the back and give themselves a gold star either. Rather than just waving around their own opinions, Snopes used a source with presumably some first-hand knowledge of what he was talking about:
Perhaps you know more about the situation than this guy, though, so I guess I shouldn’t necessarily take his interpretation over yours.
And yes, there are also reasons for this besides just racism (not saying racism isn’t a reason too, of course). For instance, internships, both in government and industry, are often either unpaid, or pay so little that you can’t live off them, so you have to be privileged as fuck just to be able to accept one. Just another hidden way that privilege perpetuates itself.
I like to think that understanding the various causes of things is more likely to lead to actual solutions than just knee-jerk “Paul Ryan is a jerk” reactions. I mean, he IS a jerk, but saying that won’t help any, whereas paying interns a living wage across the board might.
brucegee1962
Precisely no one has said that, nor has anyone said Ryan is an irredeemably terrible person. The comments that have been offered are in response to his behavior, not his character. And you are ignoring what has already been explained: that the disheartening effects of tweeting the photo are different and distinct from the intent behind posting it, that only someone willfully blind to, ignorant of, and uninterested in institutional racism would make such a thoughtless, unexamined gesture. No one asked him to take or share the image. He’s responsible for his choices. Intern events in Washington, D.C. are a dime a dozen; the world was not itching to know who attended this year’s Congressional Summer Intern Lecture Series nor were we yearning for yet another self-congratulatory selfie.
What E. B. Johnson and Audra Jackson did demonstrates just how easy it would be to accurately represent what current interns look like, if you make the effort. This is analogous to the Stephen Colbert / Samantha Bee approach to improving the state of American comedy. You either try to do better or you shrug your shoulders and (unconsciously or no) accept the status quo, pretending that doing so makes you objective, rather than part of the problem. Part of the solution is and always will be representation: hiring, mentoring, and highlighting members from otherwise excluded communities emboldens members of those same communities to join in and encourages employers and recruiters to look beyond white people for other sources of talent, education, and ambition.
@ robertbaden
It’s interesting that several commenters are preoccupied with the white women in the first image (both photos place the bulk of the women in the foreground), as though they outnumber the white men. Another case of 30% non-default being overestimated as the majority?
As for talent, I’m assuming you mean that the women must obviously lack it and wouldn’t be there but for their whiteness. The talent of the white men is not in question.
Sorry, the results of the gender perception gap surveys that I’m familiar with are that when asked to analyze the gender make-up of groups with 17% women, men report perceiving the group to be evenly divided between men and women, and when women make up 33%, men feel that women represent the majority. Likewise, talent and talking. And definitely likewise, race, where the mere existence of one or two people of color make white people feel sad and discriminated against.
I noticed the women because I have tremendous difficulty reconciling a brutally reactionary party with an interest from women in becoming involved with said party. I’d say the same of the queer reactionaries but they’re typically not visible minorities.
Logic ain’t that guy’s strong point I guess.
Sioban
The ruling groups always have a few spots for minority members who serve as fig leaves to cover their agenda of discrimination. Selling your own people out is a time-honoured and well-paid tradition.