With the caveat that I am but one very insignificant person with regard to all this, here’s my take: I broadly agree with the utilitarian goal of maximizing th

With the caveat that I am but one very insignificant person with regard to all this, here’s my take: I broadly agree with the utilitarian goal of maximizing the efficacy of one’s aid. But the reason I can’t fully co-sign is that I feel there are some things that aren’t really quantifiable. Example: a classic response to BLM is that police commit relatively few murders compared to murders overall. My feeling is that the people entrusted to protect and serve have an additional responsibility; that violence + abuse of power is somehow “worse” than violence on its own. But how do you quantify that? How many “normal” murders are equal to one “police” murder? I don’t even know how to begin answering that question. And I don’t think BLM should be immune from pushback because some of its goals can’t be objectively measured! But I do think a lot, if not most, criticism has been from a place of prejudice. That we’re going to look back on this in 50 years the way we look back on the Civil Rights Movement now, where some of the goals will have been achieved and basically everyone pretends they would have supported it all along (even though they oppose the contemporary version because they’re not protesting nicely or whatever). So when people see shallow dismissals, I think their guards (justifiably!) go up, because they know where it’s coming from more often than not. I’m not trying to deny Scott the grace you’re talking about. I know it was a mostly throwaway paragraph in a longer essay. I’m just noting that his whole thing is supposed to be about digging into the strongest versions of uncomfortable arguments to get at the truth. Straw manning is supposed to be anathema — so when he does it, I think it’s worth questioning why.