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I am taken aback because I'm a hard leftist and almost always disagree with your sentiments, but . . . I agree with that, mostly. The middle paragraph needs a

I am taken aback because I'm a hard leftist and almost always disagree with your sentiments, but . . . I agree with that, mostly. The middle paragraph needs a bunch of caveats and explanations and exceptions based on our political views and media we pay attention to, but yes, right on. White liberals in America actively and passively coopt and undermine non-white minorities in general, and absolutely the black community, specifically. Even FDR screwed black people. Thank FDR for implementing real estate red-lining as we know it, for example, while well-meaning liberals elevated poor white people to the middle class and put them in their own houses. Yes, these things are bad and wrong. And they're also largely taboo.

rayiner 4y ago
The very good book "The Color of Law" doesn't pull its punches about how much stuff FDR did that was harmful to black people: https://www.epi.org/publication/the-color-of-law-a-forgotten-history-of-how-our-government-segregated-america https://www.epi.org/publication/the-color-of-law-a-forgotten.... But with FDR, at least you had a traditional coalition. Black people and white segregationists voted together because--even with redlining, etc.--both groups benefited from federal investment into what was at the time a very poor south. George Wallace was a pro-labor, New Deal Democrat. That coalition politics is still powerful. Joe Biden is president because Jim Clyburn rallied black southern voters in the Democratic Primary. But to a great degree, the minority politics has been co-opted by white liberals in academia, the media, NGOs, and corporations. Any minority voices in the mix are either hand-picked by white liberals (e.g. professors at prestigious universities) or depend on white liberal donors (e.g. NGOs). Advocacy is coded as "black" or "Muslim" or "Asian" even if it has no meaningful support from black, Muslim, or Asian voters. That advocacy reflects what white liberals already wanted, whether or not it has any nexus to what people in those minority groups want. It also reflects trade-offs in terms tone, willingness to compromise, etc., that reflects the attitudes of affluent white people with no skin in the game. And often, those efforts are downright self-serving--diversifying the ranks of corporate executives and board members, while continuing to ship the lower-skilled jobs disproportionately held by minorities, to the benefit of overwhelmingly white shareholders.

rayiner 4y ago

The very good book "The Color of Law" doesn't pull its punches about how much stuff FDR did that was harmful to black people: https://www.epi.org/publication/the-color-of-law-a-forgotten-history-of-how-our-government-segregated-america https://www.epi.org/publication/the-color-of-law-a-forgotten.... But with FDR, at least you had a traditional coalition. Black people and white segregationists voted together because--even with redlining, etc.--both groups benefited from federal investment into what was at the time a very poor south. George Wallace was a pro-labor, New Deal Democrat. That coalition politics is still powerful. Joe Biden is president because Jim Clyburn rallied black southern voters in the Democratic Primary. But to a great degree, the minority politics has been co-opted by white liberals in academia, the media, NGOs, and corporations. Any minority voices in the mix are either hand-picked by white liberals (e.g. professors at prestigious universities) or depend on white liberal donors (e.g. NGOs). Advocacy is coded as "black" or "Muslim" or "Asian" even if it has no meaningful support from black, Muslim, or Asian voters. That advocacy reflects what white liberals already wanted, whether or not it has any nexus to what people in those minority groups want. It also reflects trade-offs in terms tone, willingness to compromise, etc., that reflects the attitudes of affluent white people with no skin in the game. And often, those efforts are downright self-serving--diversifying the ranks of corporate executives and board members, while continuing to ship the lower-skilled jobs disproportionately held by minorities, to the benefit of overwhelmingly white shareholders.