Don’t forget Glenn Loury, Adolph Reed Jr., Coleman Hughes, Thomas Chatterton Williams, among others.
I’m still meditating on the idea that I might like these guys because it makes me comfortable. But I don’t see what Robin DiAngelo or Ibram X Kendi is asking me to do that is particularly uncomfortable, aside from lecturing and shaming friends and family members who say something considered racist. That and open my wallet for reparations. (Not a big discomfort since I already support fairly high taxes and big government.)
Nah…I like these guys because they sound reasonable.
'People who think others need their permission to be allowed to exist are supremacists"
This really is the crux of it.
The presence of supremacists, as such, is incompatible with establishing and maintaining a pluralistic democracy.
So, those of us who prefer establishing and maintaining a pluralistic democracy are faced with something of a dilemma when supremacists are found in our midst. They must be excluded from the polity, because they will make every effort to destroy our civil society and its institutions.
The question remains how best to accomplish the exclusion of supremacists from our polity.
At the very least, I suggest it begins with excluding supremacists for each or our lives, whether the supremacist is a family member, friend, neighbor, acquaintance, or participant in commerce.
When I first read about wokeness and being woke, before it was, as you so aptly describe, stolen, I came to the conclusion that woke is essentially, simplisitically admittedly, about having empathy. And that was several years after I realized that for most on the right, empathy is viewed as a weakness, or <gasp> being liberal.
Right after Trump was elected I went down the “understanding” and “reconciliation” rabbit holes for a little while. But it quickly became apparent that while those of the left were supposed to reach out to and make excuses for those on the right, there were no expectations for the Trumpers to understand, much less change. Better angels indeed.
Lives in a $700,000 house (that has increased in value by a quarter-million in the past four years) makes a six-figure salary and drives a $60,000 pickup truck. Is absolutely furious, demands that "the system" be "broken", that Donald Trump is just the guy to do that, and "it will be a miserable four years for everybody", but nevertheless it MUST be done. Read the whole thing and tell me if you can find one thing that would explain why someone who has been so richly rewarded by this country would want it to be destroyed.
Nice work. On the anger thing, in 2018, I bought and read Rebecca Traister's book, Good and Mad: the revolutionary power of women's anger. I now have on my to-buy list Elizabeth Flock's new book The Furies, about women's violence to end injustice. You are correct in your assessment of these other people both-sidesing things. Keep going.
When I stumble across these kinds of pundits who keep trying to argue we should just "seek understanding" and compromise and unity with people who ARE UNDENIABLY SUPREMACISTS, it makes me think about Naomi Shulman's great piece about Nice People Made the Best Nazis. These are people who are willing to go along to get along (especially if the grift is proftable), and by the privilege of their skin color and sex, they reason in the event the Supremacists win, then they will benefit. They also seem to imagine that there's a real life circumstance where some minority will actually beat them out for a job, and clearly that couldn't be based on actual merit and character, it must be that nefarious DEI initiative, because everyone knows deep in their hearts that "white = more merit," while systemic racism is the thing that shall not be named. :P
"No Time To Be Nice: Now Is Not The Moment To Remain Silent
November 17, 2016
Nice people made the best Nazis.
Or so I have been told. My mother was born in Munich in 1934, and spent her childhood in Nazi Germany surrounded by nice people who refused to make waves. When things got ugly, the people my mother lived alongside chose not to focus on “politics,” instead busying themselves with happier things. They were lovely, kind people who turned their heads as their neighbors were dragged away.
I don’t remember the first time I heard the stories my mother told me; I feel like I always knew them. She’s dead now. If she were alive, I imagine she would be quite sanguine; all her anxieties would be realized, so there would no longer be anything left to fear.
I thought of my mother’s neighbors right after the election, when apolitical friends of mine breathed a sigh of relief that we could stop talking about politics. “That’s over!” they said happily. “Let’s focus on other things.”
But then a white nationalist was named chief strategist to the president-elect. Aren’t you alarmed? I asked.
“I choose not to discuss politics publicly,” one friend said. And posted a picture of puppies.""
The Poochies of the world are offering pictures of puppies and pleas for peaceful co-existence with *people who don't want to allow certain types of people to exist at all in our society.*
Oh, and lastly, I wonder if we will ever live in a world where a white christian man will commit a mass shooting at his workplace, and the blame will be put on DEI for having forced said workplace to hire an incompetent HR person that then hired that man.
So, this youtube video (which I believe I arrived at through YouTube's algorithm) was the first time I heard about McWhorter, and the last time I took him seriously.
I have read John McWhorter, and I'm here to tell you that his political essays are exactly what you think they are.
I got into him via Lexicon Valley, the linguistics podcast he used to host. Lexicon Valley was genuinely delightful - witty, idiosyncratic, and incredibly informative for people like me, who have no training in linguistics but do have an interest in language. Curiously, his approach to language was steeped in diversity, equity, and inclusion, treating all language forms as not only valid but exciting. Most curiously of all, he engaged seriously and critically with the impacts of colonialism on language, and through language on culture.
It was because I enjoyed Lexicon Valley so much that I dived into his political work, and was... disappointed. John McWhorter's political work is deeply concerned about the problem of free speech - but to hear him tell it, the biggest threat to free speech is college students disrupting speakers they don't like and complaining about course content. For someone so concerned about free speech, he is oddly not concerned at all about various states and localities using the power of law to restrict what books and speech people have access to, and to threaten the freedom and livelihood of teachers and librarians who want to expand rather than constrict that access. If he mentions right-wing censorship from a position of power at all, it is only in passing, to bolster his both-sides bona fides and to draw a specious equivalence to left-wing "censorship" from a position of powerlessness. It is, to use a favorite phrase of yours, in bad faith.
Don’t forget Glenn Loury, Adolph Reed Jr., Coleman Hughes, Thomas Chatterton Williams, among others.
I’m still meditating on the idea that I might like these guys because it makes me comfortable. But I don’t see what Robin DiAngelo or Ibram X Kendi is asking me to do that is particularly uncomfortable, aside from lecturing and shaming friends and family members who say something considered racist. That and open my wallet for reparations. (Not a big discomfort since I already support fairly high taxes and big government.)
Nah…I like these guys because they sound reasonable.
'People who think others need their permission to be allowed to exist are supremacists"
This really is the crux of it.
The presence of supremacists, as such, is incompatible with establishing and maintaining a pluralistic democracy.
So, those of us who prefer establishing and maintaining a pluralistic democracy are faced with something of a dilemma when supremacists are found in our midst. They must be excluded from the polity, because they will make every effort to destroy our civil society and its institutions.
The question remains how best to accomplish the exclusion of supremacists from our polity.
At the very least, I suggest it begins with excluding supremacists for each or our lives, whether the supremacist is a family member, friend, neighbor, acquaintance, or participant in commerce.
oops ColUmbia University
When I first read about wokeness and being woke, before it was, as you so aptly describe, stolen, I came to the conclusion that woke is essentially, simplisitically admittedly, about having empathy. And that was several years after I realized that for most on the right, empathy is viewed as a weakness, or <gasp> being liberal.
Right after Trump was elected I went down the “understanding” and “reconciliation” rabbit holes for a little while. But it quickly became apparent that while those of the left were supposed to reach out to and make excuses for those on the right, there were no expectations for the Trumpers to understand, much less change. Better angels indeed.
Oh yes, let's please understand the people who hate us and want us all to be murdered. Let's start with this fella:
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/01/22/new-hampshire-primary-voter-00136850
Lives in a $700,000 house (that has increased in value by a quarter-million in the past four years) makes a six-figure salary and drives a $60,000 pickup truck. Is absolutely furious, demands that "the system" be "broken", that Donald Trump is just the guy to do that, and "it will be a miserable four years for everybody", but nevertheless it MUST be done. Read the whole thing and tell me if you can find one thing that would explain why someone who has been so richly rewarded by this country would want it to be destroyed.
Nice work. On the anger thing, in 2018, I bought and read Rebecca Traister's book, Good and Mad: the revolutionary power of women's anger. I now have on my to-buy list Elizabeth Flock's new book The Furies, about women's violence to end injustice. You are correct in your assessment of these other people both-sidesing things. Keep going.
When I stumble across these kinds of pundits who keep trying to argue we should just "seek understanding" and compromise and unity with people who ARE UNDENIABLY SUPREMACISTS, it makes me think about Naomi Shulman's great piece about Nice People Made the Best Nazis. These are people who are willing to go along to get along (especially if the grift is proftable), and by the privilege of their skin color and sex, they reason in the event the Supremacists win, then they will benefit. They also seem to imagine that there's a real life circumstance where some minority will actually beat them out for a job, and clearly that couldn't be based on actual merit and character, it must be that nefarious DEI initiative, because everyone knows deep in their hearts that "white = more merit," while systemic racism is the thing that shall not be named. :P
An excerpt of the Naomi Shulman piece:
https://www.wbur.org/cognoscenti/2016/11/17/the-post-election-case-for-speaking-out-naomi-shulman
"No Time To Be Nice: Now Is Not The Moment To Remain Silent
November 17, 2016
Nice people made the best Nazis.
Or so I have been told. My mother was born in Munich in 1934, and spent her childhood in Nazi Germany surrounded by nice people who refused to make waves. When things got ugly, the people my mother lived alongside chose not to focus on “politics,” instead busying themselves with happier things. They were lovely, kind people who turned their heads as their neighbors were dragged away.
I don’t remember the first time I heard the stories my mother told me; I feel like I always knew them. She’s dead now. If she were alive, I imagine she would be quite sanguine; all her anxieties would be realized, so there would no longer be anything left to fear.
I thought of my mother’s neighbors right after the election, when apolitical friends of mine breathed a sigh of relief that we could stop talking about politics. “That’s over!” they said happily. “Let’s focus on other things.”
But then a white nationalist was named chief strategist to the president-elect. Aren’t you alarmed? I asked.
“I choose not to discuss politics publicly,” one friend said. And posted a picture of puppies.""
The Poochies of the world are offering pictures of puppies and pleas for peaceful co-existence with *people who don't want to allow certain types of people to exist at all in our society.*
Wonderful piece. I'd never come across or heard of this Poochie. I doubt I'll seek him out.
Oh, and lastly, I wonder if we will ever live in a world where a white christian man will commit a mass shooting at his workplace, and the blame will be put on DEI for having forced said workplace to hire an incompetent HR person that then hired that man.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzPKk19t3Kw
So, this youtube video (which I believe I arrived at through YouTube's algorithm) was the first time I heard about McWhorter, and the last time I took him seriously.
Ooh, Poochie is one outrageous dude!
I have read John McWhorter, and I'm here to tell you that his political essays are exactly what you think they are.
I got into him via Lexicon Valley, the linguistics podcast he used to host. Lexicon Valley was genuinely delightful - witty, idiosyncratic, and incredibly informative for people like me, who have no training in linguistics but do have an interest in language. Curiously, his approach to language was steeped in diversity, equity, and inclusion, treating all language forms as not only valid but exciting. Most curiously of all, he engaged seriously and critically with the impacts of colonialism on language, and through language on culture.
It was because I enjoyed Lexicon Valley so much that I dived into his political work, and was... disappointed. John McWhorter's political work is deeply concerned about the problem of free speech - but to hear him tell it, the biggest threat to free speech is college students disrupting speakers they don't like and complaining about course content. For someone so concerned about free speech, he is oddly not concerned at all about various states and localities using the power of law to restrict what books and speech people have access to, and to threaten the freedom and livelihood of teachers and librarians who want to expand rather than constrict that access. If he mentions right-wing censorship from a position of power at all, it is only in passing, to bolster his both-sides bona fides and to draw a specious equivalence to left-wing "censorship" from a position of powerlessness. It is, to use a favorite phrase of yours, in bad faith.
Looking forward to parts 2 and 3 of this piece.