Hygiene, part 2

After yesterday's post, you may be wondering if -- as misogyny can be used against men to encourage them to choose filth -- can you use racism similarly against white people?

Yes. Yes you can.

In this case, the racism will not always work as expected, but there are factors that are worth looking at.

Let me back up.

A few years ago there was some discussion about how a lot of people don't wash their legs. 

These people did tend to be mostly white, but it is not most white people. About a fifth.

The primary reason appeared to be laziness, but also a belief that the soapy water is flowing down anyway, so that perhaps that passive exposure could be enough.

https://www.today.com/health/do-you-wash-your-legs-shower-internet-divided-t154176

I will agree that it is not necessary to scour yourself; your skin is very different from the cast-iron skillet you fried fish in. 

There must be a happy medium.

Something else that came up -- not necessarily directly connected -- was that it was common for Black people to use washcloths for bathing, but less common for white people.

This was sent up in an early episode of The Neighborhood:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzg6aaX1QTg

One thing I remember from the first time I saw that clip was Beth Behrs coming out amazed saying, "Who knew?", her use of the washcloth having been transformative.

For my two cents on the topic, I can see the advantage of a washcloth doing some light exfoliating while spreading the soap around, and then going through the laundry cycle in a way that a loofah probably wouldn't. That is valuable after collecting dirt and dead skin.

I still use my hands, because that is what I am used to. Old habits die hard.

I also know that the division does not strictly follow racial lines, with there being white people who use washcloths and I assume Black people who don't.

However, there is a stereotype there, so when you have a comedian expressing disgust at people using washcloths and taking it as a sign of poverty, well, that says something:

https://www.sportskeeda.com/pop-culture/this-feels-extremely-racist-tom-segura-washcloth-controversy-explained-poor-people-comments-sparks-furor

The article says that after being called out for the racism he denied it was about racism. Don't they always?

The article also keeps referring to "poor people", but I remember him saying it as "the poors"; adding the "people" is giving him too much credit.

It's a weird reaction anyway, but it's in keeping with his stated refusal to wash his legs and feet. I mean, confronting legacy racism is even more work than washing your legs.

Let me throw in something else; I do know Black people who -- if they do not shower at night -- wash their feet before getting into bed.

I see the value of this too, but generally do not do it.

Now, you may be thinking that with a lot of Black people there seems to be some overkill on the cleanliness issue, and then kind of the opposite on white people.

Is it possible that some of that comes from a history of slavery and Jim Crow and then the War on Drugs and urban dog whistles, where part of white supremacy was associating darker skin with dirtiness and contamination and poverty and crime?

Could families that believed that they needed to work twice as hard to get half as much also have tried hard to prove themselves clean, inculcating generational habits that are not thought about so much now, but happened for a reason?  

Could that have also led white people to feel less of a need to try? 

Old habits die hard.