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I'm not surprised. Google cancelled a Ukrainian engineer who had objections to the CRT "fact" that all white people enjoy privilege. Remember that Ukrainians ha

by vfred 5y ago

I'm not surprised. Google cancelled a Ukrainian engineer who had objections to the CRT "fact" that all white people enjoy privilege. Remember that Ukrainians had to suffer Hitler, the Great Famine, Stalin and the Soviet Union. The insidious mind games that the Google nomenklatura plays are described here, by an honest and harmless person. Highly recommended, also the comment section under the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cs27FtYKEos https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cs27FtYKEos

zimpenfish 5y ago
> the CRT "fact" that all white people enjoy privilege Do you have a source for this? I am very far from knowledgeable about CRT but AFAIK what you've said there is just an incorrect right-wing talking point in the current anti-CRT fervour.
- lamppost123 5y ago
  I believe there are many schools of CRT, so nitpicking is always possible. Di Angelo, whose views are being taught at Google, seems to believe that white privilege and white unconscious racism are prevalent. I'm not sure that this is a "right wing" talking point. Here is a Black man, who studied CS at Oxford, talking about white privilege: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAo3t_KWHhI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAo3t_KWHhI
  - zimpenfish 5y ago
    > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAo3t_KWHhI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAo3t_KWHhI I mean, looking at the content, that's a heavily conservative, definitely alt-right, if not outright right-wing, channel. And the segment immediately prior to him proclaiming the white privilege is "a garbage concept" is him proudly relating the story about how he triggered and trolled people by "identifying as a female powerlifter" and all the alt-right people who covered it...
    - CodeGlitch 5y ago
      So I've watched pretty much of all Triggernometry output, the 2 presenters have interesting backgrounds. Konstantin grew up in Soviet Russia and has been pretty left-wing his whole life (now identifies more centre-left), and Francis is a former teacher who spent time in Venezuela (I think his mother is from there?). As you can assume, they are pretty critical of communism. However it's interesting you've described the content as right-wing, as it's far from that. They are very pro-freespeech, and have interviewed some pretty old-school left-wing people such as George Galloway. Of course people just see that they interviewed people like Nigel Farage and assume they are right-wing (just because you interview a right/left winger doesn't make you that thing).
      - zimpenfish 5y ago
        > (just because you interview a right/left winger doesn't make you that thing) Indeed not but your reaction to what they're saying does - if you sit there and don't push back against X-wing views, that does tend to paint you as X-wing-leaning yourself (regardless of where you were born and where you claim to be politically.) In the linked video from above, for example, there's no pushback to Zuby's strongly conservative views about trans people, wokeness, abortion, etc.
        CodeGlitch 5y ago
        I think their style is just to ask questions and get the guest to open up about whatever topic they're discussing, and they do push back if the guest says something outlandish. They usually just want the discussion "out there" for other's to make their own minds up. > strongly conservative views about trans people, wokeness, abortion, etc. Don't forget that outside of Twitter, Academia and Silicon Valley (i.e. most of the world), these are not "conservative" views but pretty mainstream. (I'll caveat that with abortion that one is probably too big a topic to discuss here.)
    - bad_username 5y ago
      It sounds like you are using "conservative" or "right wing" to mean "wrong" or "bad".
sudosysgen 5y ago
It's funny, you're denouncing CRT, but using CRT to analyze Soviet history in a racially critical manner.
- lamppost123 5y ago
  I don't see CRT being used, just common sense. One does not need a framework for everything.
  - sudosysgen 5y ago
    CRT is just the common sense of realising that government treated certain perceived races differently and the rest is mostly just normal history. That being said, Ukrainian opression in the USSR is not something you can only approach with common sense. You need a rigorous approach to it and even then you can land on quite different conclusions.
    - api 5y ago
      When I started seeing the right-wing freakout over CRT I went and read some stuff on it. Let me put it this way. Yes, there are things I disagree with in the CRT package, but there was nothing in there that justifies the amount of attention it's getting. Some parts were quite reasonable. The idea that it's not just the letter of the law that matters but how the law is applied by the actual people applying it is common sense. The idea that a bureaucracy or social system can have biases built into it that none of the participants are fully aware of (systemic racism) is also obvious to anyone who has ever dealt with bureaucracies. This latter point is the base from which the straw man “all whites are racist” is extracted. That’s not what they are really saying. They are pointing out that one can participate in a system that has built in biases without consciously holding those biases. Like most political freak outs (including some on the left) it's overblown bullshit to rally up the base. Remember that modern US elections tend to be won on which side has larger turnout, and getting the base riled up with anger is the way you maximize turnout. The usual tactic is to cherry pick the craziest possible quotes or craziest people from the other side and portray them as representative of the entire movement. Sure you can find people in the CRT community saying stupid crazy things, but that is true for any group of people if you search hard enough. The left does this too by e.g. painting all Christian conservatives as Dominionists when the latter is an extreme fringe position rejected by most.

by vfred 5y ago

zimpenfish 5y ago

> the CRT "fact" that all white people enjoy privilege Do you have a source for this? I am very far from knowledgeable about CRT but AFAIK what you've said there is just an incorrect right-wing talking point in the current anti-CRT fervour.

lamppost123 5y ago
I believe there are many schools of CRT, so nitpicking is always possible. Di Angelo, whose views are being taught at Google, seems to believe that white privilege and white unconscious racism are prevalent. I'm not sure that this is a "right wing" talking point. Here is a Black man, who studied CS at Oxford, talking about white privilege: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAo3t_KWHhI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAo3t_KWHhI
- zimpenfish 5y ago
  > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAo3t_KWHhI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAo3t_KWHhI I mean, looking at the content, that's a heavily conservative, definitely alt-right, if not outright right-wing, channel. And the segment immediately prior to him proclaiming the white privilege is "a garbage concept" is him proudly relating the story about how he triggered and trolled people by "identifying as a female powerlifter" and all the alt-right people who covered it...
  - CodeGlitch 5y ago
    So I've watched pretty much of all Triggernometry output, the 2 presenters have interesting backgrounds. Konstantin grew up in Soviet Russia and has been pretty left-wing his whole life (now identifies more centre-left), and Francis is a former teacher who spent time in Venezuela (I think his mother is from there?). As you can assume, they are pretty critical of communism. However it's interesting you've described the content as right-wing, as it's far from that. They are very pro-freespeech, and have interviewed some pretty old-school left-wing people such as George Galloway. Of course people just see that they interviewed people like Nigel Farage and assume they are right-wing (just because you interview a right/left winger doesn't make you that thing).
    - zimpenfish 5y ago
      > (just because you interview a right/left winger doesn't make you that thing) Indeed not but your reaction to what they're saying does - if you sit there and don't push back against X-wing views, that does tend to paint you as X-wing-leaning yourself (regardless of where you were born and where you claim to be politically.) In the linked video from above, for example, there's no pushback to Zuby's strongly conservative views about trans people, wokeness, abortion, etc.
      - CodeGlitch 5y ago
        I think their style is just to ask questions and get the guest to open up about whatever topic they're discussing, and they do push back if the guest says something outlandish. They usually just want the discussion "out there" for other's to make their own minds up. > strongly conservative views about trans people, wokeness, abortion, etc. Don't forget that outside of Twitter, Academia and Silicon Valley (i.e. most of the world), these are not "conservative" views but pretty mainstream. (I'll caveat that with abortion that one is probably too big a topic to discuss here.)
  - bad_username 5y ago
    It sounds like you are using "conservative" or "right wing" to mean "wrong" or "bad".

sudosysgen 5y ago

It's funny, you're denouncing CRT, but using CRT to analyze Soviet history in a racially critical manner.

lamppost123 5y ago
I don't see CRT being used, just common sense. One does not need a framework for everything.
- sudosysgen 5y ago
  CRT is just the common sense of realising that government treated certain perceived races differently and the rest is mostly just normal history. That being said, Ukrainian opression in the USSR is not something you can only approach with common sense. You need a rigorous approach to it and even then you can land on quite different conclusions.
  - api 5y ago
    When I started seeing the right-wing freakout over CRT I went and read some stuff on it. Let me put it this way. Yes, there are things I disagree with in the CRT package, but there was nothing in there that justifies the amount of attention it's getting. Some parts were quite reasonable. The idea that it's not just the letter of the law that matters but how the law is applied by the actual people applying it is common sense. The idea that a bureaucracy or social system can have biases built into it that none of the participants are fully aware of (systemic racism) is also obvious to anyone who has ever dealt with bureaucracies. This latter point is the base from which the straw man “all whites are racist” is extracted. That’s not what they are really saying. They are pointing out that one can participate in a system that has built in biases without consciously holding those biases. Like most political freak outs (including some on the left) it's overblown bullshit to rally up the base. Remember that modern US elections tend to be won on which side has larger turnout, and getting the base riled up with anger is the way you maximize turnout. The usual tactic is to cherry pick the craziest possible quotes or craziest people from the other side and portray them as representative of the entire movement. Sure you can find people in the CRT community saying stupid crazy things, but that is true for any group of people if you search hard enough. The left does this too by e.g. painting all Christian conservatives as Dominionists when the latter is an extreme fringe position rejected by most.