A day doesn’t go by without some Dutch mass media reminding us that “racism is in the eye of the beholder” or some such similar misguided nonsense. We are, time and time again, told that this racism is nothing more than individual discrimination, that there is nothing systemic in it, that “we are way ahead the rest of the world”, etc. From the white Dutch side, the champion of this rhetoric is perhaps Rutger Bregman, self proclaimed “historian” (there has been a lot of debate in the Dutch blogosphere around his credentials). However, the most insidious form of advancement of these “values” comes in the form of media pushing and promoting non white people making these claims. Say, a Person of Color attempts to create awareness over the fact that Zwarte Piet is racist. Media will publish a dozen articles, opinion pieces, quotes, interviews, photographic evidence, archival reports, etc from other PoC contending that “no, there is absolutely nothing racist with Zwarte Piet! this perceived racism is a wrong interpretation of historical data! you are just ‘seeing things’ where there are none to be seen!” etc etc.
Now, this mechanism is quite common within dominant cultures that desperately wish to preserve the status quo. This is part of the “racist antibody” in action: the system needs to defend itself against claims of wrong doing and nobody is more effective to do so on their behalf than a member of the group making the claims.
None of this would aggravate me as much if it wasn’t the very mechanism that leads to the fabrication and enforcement of a false racial consciousness in this country. There isn’t much research done (not that I could find, at least) on the topic of false consciousness in relation to racism, and there is even less of it in relation to Europe (or The Netherlands). However, for the sake of definition and because it is so clearly spelled out, I would point to the research published in The Journal of Black Psychology, Color-Blind Racial Ideology and Psychological False Consciousness Among African Americans. This research is very specific to African Americans and to the US. However, the definitions therein get exactly the point I am trying to highlight in the Dutch context:
The concept of false consciousness is the closest interdisciplinary term that we were able to identify that provides a theoretical framework to link the racial ideology of color blindness to the concept of group interest. According to Jost and Banaji (1994), false consciousness consists of “holding false beliefs that are contrary to one’s personal or social interest … [and] contribute[s] to the maintenance of the disadvantaged position of the self or the group” (p. 3). In essence, false consciousness reflects an internalized, culturally sanctioned belief that encourages individuals in a stratified society to adopt the viewpoint of those in power. Acceptance of the dominant viewpoint, in turn, serves to keep minorities in a subjugated position by justifying their oppression and thus encouraging inertia. Jost (1995) further identified the following six dimensions of false consciousness: (a) “failure to perceive injustice and disadvantage,” or denial of the ways in which groups face inequalities based on their minority status; (b) “fatalism,” or the belief that even if inequalities exist, there is nothing that can be done to eradicate the disparities; © rationalization of the social order or group-based inequalities; (d) blaming of minorities for their own oppression (i.e., “false attribution of blame”); (e) identification with those who are in power, or internalization of oppression; and (f) “resistance to change,” or accepting and/or fighting to maintain the status quo (p. 397).
And this is what is so simultaneously crafty and deceitful in Dutch mainstream media: any individual disagreement (because, SHOCK! PoC are not a monolith holding homogenous and identical opinions) is used to crush any attempt at challenging certain ingrained and pervasive forms of racism. This mechanism also precludes any possible discussion around the institutional and systemic nature of this racism. The ultimate goal is to create, promote and enforce a false consciousness. “Nobody is being racially oppressed! it’s just that some people like to see trouble where there is none!”.
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