5 ms·

I've had no shortage of the leftists in my life saying directly "White Supremacy is _everywhere_". They absolutely will take evidence of things like race agnos

I've had no shortage of the leftists in my life saying directly "White Supremacy is _everywhere_". They absolutely will take evidence of things like race agnostic capitalization as somehow being evidence of "white supremacy". Just look at the "open letter" signed by 1,288 "public health professionals" (https://archive.md/v8ehj https://archive.md/v8ehj) which demand an unequal response to the "protests". Demanding strict condemnation of "white protesters resisting stay-home orders" which "are also rooted in white nationalism and run contrary to respect for Black lives."

beaconstudios 5y ago
the "white supremacy" they mean is in the critical sense of the term; not that there are a bunch of Nazis or KKK walking about, but that the institutions of the US favour white people. It's kind of a complex statement that requires background knowledge/understanding, and a lot of leftists who've taken critical studies courses tend to trot out these technical terms while ignoring the fact that most people understand them to mean something completely different.
- dude187 5y ago
  It's really not true though. Not only do those institutions not prefer White people, but the only cases of people misrepresenting their race are White people pretending to be some other race. That's because it makes it _more_ likely they'll be admitted...
  - beaconstudios 5y ago
    again, it's more complicated than that. Just because institutions are explicitly race-neutral, doesn't mean they actually are. They can easily perpetuate existing problems even if they are legitimately race-agnostic.
    - dude187 5y ago
      I strongly reject the idea that the hinge factor is on race. Whether it's well meaning or ill intentioned, I believe that the continual demand that the focus be on race just creates racism, hate and divide.
      - beaconstudios 5y ago
        well, that certainly is an opinion.
- sershe 5y ago
  It is not complex and doesn't require much background knowledge ("critically" reading a couple books like So You Want To Talk About Race is enough, or you can just skip those and read Cynical Theories). This "critical sense of the term" is basically a political wedge. There are two almost completely unrelated issues at play: 1) Institutions, like in most of the world, sort people by class and reward success; therefore, they may propagate class divisions and allow (or even amplify) differences in achievement. 2) Due to the history of the USA, the class in the USA is tied to race to a considerable degree. (2) can and should be solved separately with policies ranging from affirmative action to reparations/better redistribution; however, this is not what (or not everything that) activists want. Books like New Jim Crow for example are explicitly ambivalent about affirmative action, because it allows some people success while leaving the rest of the poor behind and distracting from the struggle/compassion for them. Leftists instead bundle those together and use it as a wedge against unsuspecting/apolitical center - if you are against "solving" (1) with leftist policies, you must be a-ok with (2) and therefore you are racist. When in reality, (1) in isolation is one of the greatest things for a society and should not be "solved" at all. Kendi is the most explicit and obvious example of this that comes to mind, others may be less explicit about it. It's important for Americans to distinguish race from class, and to understand that, just like in the rest of the world, inequality as such is totally fine, and in fact good for society; "equity" is evil beyond school age, as proven thru history every time it has been tried. I grew up ~poor in Russia surrounded by other ~poor people, all white; that made me extremely classist. I personally cannot wait for a wonderful day where every kid has a chance to make a life for themselves, and a representative (M% white, N% black, etc.) upper-middle class in America can look with a slight pity and disdain at similarly (M% white, N% black, etc.) poor and say "you've had your chances, so why cannot you be more like me?" :)
  - beaconstudios 5y ago
    It's good for the hard working to be rewarded, I don't think anyone except the most extreme would disagree with that, including most leftists. The problem in the USA is that black people started out as slaves and this massive social oppression was never balanced out; famously the "thirty acres and a mule" reparations never materialised. As such black people largely remain a separate economic class due explicitly to government policy. The idea of equity as I understand it is to try to emulate or create an actual level playing field, where equality of opportunity is just pretending that race neutral policy creates an even playing field on its own. The whole "calling people racist for not advocating for equity" thing is ridiculous I agree; I think only a noisy subset of "woke scolds" actually do this. The actual idea is that institutions that ignore the reality of race in America are perpetuating those conditions, and thus are "institutionally racist", but that doesn't mean that the people in that institution are racist; it just means they're not anti-racist, which means they are basically just neutral/ambivalent/unaware. The postmodern left has a lot of pretty bad behaviour in the public eye, but the underlying theory is sound.

beaconstudios 5y ago

the "white supremacy" they mean is in the critical sense of the term; not that there are a bunch of Nazis or KKK walking about, but that the institutions of the US favour white people. It's kind of a complex statement that requires background knowledge/understanding, and a lot of leftists who've taken critical studies courses tend to trot out these technical terms while ignoring the fact that most people understand them to mean something completely different.

dude187 5y ago
It's really not true though. Not only do those institutions not prefer White people, but the only cases of people misrepresenting their race are White people pretending to be some other race. That's because it makes it _more_ likely they'll be admitted...
- beaconstudios 5y ago
  again, it's more complicated than that. Just because institutions are explicitly race-neutral, doesn't mean they actually are. They can easily perpetuate existing problems even if they are legitimately race-agnostic.
  - dude187 5y ago
    I strongly reject the idea that the hinge factor is on race. Whether it's well meaning or ill intentioned, I believe that the continual demand that the focus be on race just creates racism, hate and divide.
    - beaconstudios 5y ago
      well, that certainly is an opinion.
sershe 5y ago
It is not complex and doesn't require much background knowledge ("critically" reading a couple books like So You Want To Talk About Race is enough, or you can just skip those and read Cynical Theories). This "critical sense of the term" is basically a political wedge. There are two almost completely unrelated issues at play: 1) Institutions, like in most of the world, sort people by class and reward success; therefore, they may propagate class divisions and allow (or even amplify) differences in achievement. 2) Due to the history of the USA, the class in the USA is tied to race to a considerable degree. (2) can and should be solved separately with policies ranging from affirmative action to reparations/better redistribution; however, this is not what (or not everything that) activists want. Books like New Jim Crow for example are explicitly ambivalent about affirmative action, because it allows some people success while leaving the rest of the poor behind and distracting from the struggle/compassion for them. Leftists instead bundle those together and use it as a wedge against unsuspecting/apolitical center - if you are against "solving" (1) with leftist policies, you must be a-ok with (2) and therefore you are racist. When in reality, (1) in isolation is one of the greatest things for a society and should not be "solved" at all. Kendi is the most explicit and obvious example of this that comes to mind, others may be less explicit about it. It's important for Americans to distinguish race from class, and to understand that, just like in the rest of the world, inequality as such is totally fine, and in fact good for society; "equity" is evil beyond school age, as proven thru history every time it has been tried. I grew up ~poor in Russia surrounded by other ~poor people, all white; that made me extremely classist. I personally cannot wait for a wonderful day where every kid has a chance to make a life for themselves, and a representative (M% white, N% black, etc.) upper-middle class in America can look with a slight pity and disdain at similarly (M% white, N% black, etc.) poor and say "you've had your chances, so why cannot you be more like me?" :)
- beaconstudios 5y ago
  It's good for the hard working to be rewarded, I don't think anyone except the most extreme would disagree with that, including most leftists. The problem in the USA is that black people started out as slaves and this massive social oppression was never balanced out; famously the "thirty acres and a mule" reparations never materialised. As such black people largely remain a separate economic class due explicitly to government policy. The idea of equity as I understand it is to try to emulate or create an actual level playing field, where equality of opportunity is just pretending that race neutral policy creates an even playing field on its own. The whole "calling people racist for not advocating for equity" thing is ridiculous I agree; I think only a noisy subset of "woke scolds" actually do this. The actual idea is that institutions that ignore the reality of race in America are perpetuating those conditions, and thus are "institutionally racist", but that doesn't mean that the people in that institution are racist; it just means they're not anti-racist, which means they are basically just neutral/ambivalent/unaware. The postmodern left has a lot of pretty bad behaviour in the public eye, but the underlying theory is sound.