A populist voice speaking for progressive causes? Can we elect him to the presidency?
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
A populist voice speaking for progressive causes? Can we elect him to the presidency?
A very important point to bring up, but no one ever does, whenever the ‘half of all marriages end up in divorce’ thing: those are only the divorces where differences occurred, or the spouse FOUND OUT about infidelity and couldn’t handle it. How many of the non-divorces still have people diddling and canoodling on the side? Probably , well, quite literally, a fuckload. There is no sanctity of marriage for most of the human race, including Christians. Meaning more than half the people spouting off against gay marriage are, again literally, fucking hypocrites (both interpretations included).
I like this d00d. He comes off as genuine and unpretentious.
Ah would ventcha to say he’s wicked right.
I’d go hunting with this guy.
“… motivated atheists in Minnesota…”
Bill’s not talking about anyone in particular, is he? ;)
He’s right about marriage being a financial transaction, by the way. And I’m surprised that more people either don’t know this or aren’t willing to use that as their definition of biblical/traditional marriage. I mean come on, you can’t tell me that the fundies wouldn’t get a huge kick out of essentially selling off their daughters.
He’s right, but he’s not wicked right, because he’s in Western Mass. I worked with Bill for years at a video store in Northampton in the late 80s and early 90s. We were pals, and he’s a hell of a guy.
Well, my Connecticut-born wife tells me people say “wicked” in Western Mass. Shoot, I never heard it and I lived there for years. The rest of my comment stands.
This guy looks like the guy named PZ Myers. May be that guy PZ Myers is in different make up in this clip. Ah, and he wants to elect this guy as president.
Some conspiracy going on.
I like this guy, but this should not be addressed to only white guys, bigots come in all colors.
The guy in the link is PZ Meyers.
You often hear him spoken of, finally we have a face to put with the name.
PZ was invited to the Kardashian wedding? Maybe I’m being elitist, but I thought he hung out with a better class of people.
A thing well said that needed saying.
I like this.
Let me guess. You are a white guy.
I am feeling better about the world, knowing he is out there.
Fat bastards with beards and spectacles rule!
I like this guy; straight to the point, no bullshit and honest. Obviously this guy is not in politics. He gives me hope for the rest of the world that there are men out there who think like this.
-Another white guy
He was in politics: the Northampton city council.
> I like this guy, but this should not be addressed to
> only white guys, bigots come in all colors.
>> Let me guess. You are a white guy.
No I am not. Asian Indian, if you want to know. Trust me, these issues are global, not restricted to a particular race or religion, it is just that you feel that way if you are only exposed to this in the US.
Probably not a good idea to elect him to the presidency. He seems like a smart guy, probably doesn’t want the job.
Then perhaps you are not aware that the phrase “bigots come in all colors” is a standard phrase of white supremacists, their apologists, and other assorted bigots in North America, used to distract, distort, belittle, and minimize legitimate complaints of bigotry and racism from minority groups of all kinds, in North America. It is used to dismiss and demean those who make legitimate complaints of bigotry and racism on behalf of minorities as “bigots against whites”.
This is common knowledge. However, among those who actually care about these issues, it is common knowledge enough that it is implicit, and does not need to be said. On the other hand, those who DO say it out loud, in North America, are invariably using politically correct code speech to express positions in favor of furthering white privilege and white power at the expense of minorities, in North America.
In other words, in North America, this is the kind of language that is used either by 1) bigots and their sympathizers, or 2) those ignorant of the political landscape and various code-speeches utilized in the racism debate in North America.
Which one are you?
@amphiox
Could you provide a reference for these “various code-speeches” to enlighten those of us you consider ignorant? I certainly will check it before I post anything to avoid your offending your heightened awareness of the racism debate.
@Amphiox
Wow! Take it easy … all I meant was those words apply to everyone regardless of race or religion that opposes the rights of gays and lesbians to marry. Did not mean to start a race war! Like I said I am not white, and I know a lot of people in my own ethnic group to whom this video is apt.
Didn’t the guy(?) just explicitly say he’s not in North America?
tedzissou, if you live in the USA then you already understand them as well as you understand “states’ rights”. If you don’t live in the USA then no, we probably don’t have a single comprehensive list for you, since this is all common knowledge, although if someone did bother to compile such a list that would be interesting.
And you’ll want to avoid using pro-racist slogans and dogwhistles not for the sake of any one person’s sensibilities, but rather for the same reason you’re not going to pretend to be ignorant about “states’ rights” — because you don’t want to advance the cause of racism by making racism seem innocuous. Right?
Amphiox, It’s quite clear to me what Charvakan was saying. I really dislike your post-#20, because first of all you set up a STRAW MAN. The comment you object to is “bigots come in all colors”. The straw man is a tangental interpreted connotation among North American white supremacists which you proceed to attack. Within that attack, you don’t substantiate your claims, other than offering that it is common knowledge. Ultimately you leave us with the false dichotomy that Charvakan is either a bigot, or ignorant. Your response to his comment was rude and not well thought out. Clearly it was not intended as a racist comment.
@strange gods before me
States rights? What does that have to do with “bigots come in all colors”?
Are you going to let racists co-opt the English language? Consider who is speaking!
Incidentally I was born in the USA and reside in Minneapolis, MN.
I don’t think you understand what a strawman is. To make a strawman, one must attribute the beliefs of the strawman to the opponent. Amphiox did not attribute the racist viewpoint to charvakan.
It’s not tangential. And it is fine to go ahead and attack that phrase while not attributing the particular belief to charvakan. Again, since Amphiox did not attribute the particular belief to charvakan, it was not a strawman.
Okay, but it is common knowledge. If you’re disputing any particular claim, you should say so, and then we can discuss it in more detail. Amphiox’s comment was sufficient to start with.
I don’t see how that’s a false dichotomy. charvakan evidently is ignorant about the meme as it presents in the USA. It is not terrible to be ignorant, and it is not terrible to point out that either ignorance or bigotry is present.
I don’t see how.
No, you’re wrong about that. It was well thought out.
No, that was not clearly evident. That’s why Amphiox asked. It retrospect it may be clearer that charvakan did make an ignorant comment.
You asked for a list. Remember? “States’ rights” would be on that list.
I am going to recognize the fact that some turns of phrase are particularly useful for racist propaganda, and as such have become fairly reliable shibboleths indicating that a person has been indoctrinated with racist propaganda and may even be propagating it.
Indeed, it is helpful to ask a person what they meant by that phrase, whether they know it’s a racist shibboleth, and so on. That’s how we can know to respond further by either attacking the person for being a racist or educating them on how to not sound so racist in the future.
I have never heard the phrase “racists come in all colors” used as a white supremacist dogwhistle, so I disagree that it is common knowledge.
I also live in MN, and some of the worst overt racism I have encountered is from light skinned POC towards dark skinned POC.
Not to say that there isn’t plenty of the white supremacist variety here.
Have you ever heard the phrase “black people can be just as racist as whites”?
Or affirmative action programs criticized by bigots as “reverse racism”?
Or when someone tries to point out an example of white privilege, having bigots try to shout it down with “you’re just being racist against white people”?
These, along with “racists come in all colours”, are all variants of the same meme.
All frequently used by bigots in North America to try to silence anyone who dares to speak out on behalf of minority grievances or against the existing privileges of the dominant racial groups.
Then you don’t get around much. A “dogwhistle” since the ’60s, when racism started to really be frowned on. Ask us old farts. We understand the how they try to get around being identified as abject racists.
Amphiox’s argument is a straw man because his conclusion does attribute the possibility of racism in Charvakan’s choice of words. Charvakan’s choice of words was intended to be taken literally with no racial connotation. Amphiox’s argument is tangential because it he is engaging in a separate conversation about racial speech.
I see how the quotation could be used as racial speech but would argue that it isn’t common knowledge, and it sure doesn’t indicate malice used in this context.
The conclusion is a false dichotomy because of the assertion that Charakan could be racist, and is rude because of that suggestion.
I’ll let you in on a little secret, charvakan. When I reply to posts like your first one, the provocative tone I adopt is deliberate.
Because the majority of the truly irredeemable bigoted assholes that are out there will invariably respond in a certain way to such a post. And when I see such a response I know with a sufficiently high degree of certainty that they are people who are not worth wasting time to debate with. (While there are of course exceptions, I do not have the time, inclination, or desire to wade through the morass of chaff to find these rare few. There are plenty of others far more skilled, and willing, at it than I that I an content to leave such Sisiphysean endeavors to)
Well, you can congratulate yourself that you did not respond in such a fashion. (At least not yet.)
And those who recognize that problem within their own ethnic group can simply replace “white” in the video with whatever ethnic group they prefer in their own minds.
They can even make note of it with a post like “This is a great video, and its message applies broadly. In the corner of the world where I live, I can just change every reference to “white” to X, and it is just as relevant.”
This would have conveyed everything I think you were trying to convey in your original post, and it would have avoided echoing the bigoted code-phrasing.
The first step in fighting against this co-option is to point out to those who might not be familiar with how this co-option is being done, when and how it is being done.
My understanding of his words was that he said he was Asian Indian. But there are plenty of Asian Indians living in North America, so it isn’t clear precisely where he was.
Tangentiality is in the eye of the beholder.*
But suppose that it is tangential. So what?
Tangentiality is a feature of blog discussions. Every comment can spin off in multiple directions.
Those who assume and insist that every reply to their blog posts must be a direct reply laser-targeted to their intended point are suffering from ‘it’s-all-about-me-itis’.
(A perfectly direct response, by the way, is a tangent at 90 degrees. EVERYTHING is a tangent of one degree or another.)
I’ve heard all of Amphiox’s other examples, but I’ve never heard the racists come in all colors. I didn’t say that it couldn’t be used as a dogwhistle, just that it may not be as common as you seem to think it is.
I am also not young, inexperienced, or sheltered.
You do know, though, that this is a variant and direct descendent of White-vs-Black racism, don’t you?
It arose from the racist power dynamic established by white-vs-black racism, where white = good, and black = bad, and thus “lighter and therefore more like white” accrues greater social status than “darker and therefore more like black”, and was reinforced by centuries of the dominant group favoring the lighter/more like white group over the darker/more like black group, and the oppressed group internalizing, often through necessity, the same social dynamic.
The ‘racists come in all colors’ is one of the milder and newer ones. The codes shift as the old ones get recognized (and thus cease to be politically correct) and no longer serve their purpose of hiding racist speech behind blandly politically correct expressions.
The WHOLE POINT of such phrasing is that they do sound reasonable to people who are not familiar with them and the political context in which they are made. Their purpose is to hide the racist agenda underlying their use from the greater public scrutiny. Once a code-phrase becomes common knowledge, it ceases to be useful as a code-phrase, and is quickly replaced.
And also, there are enough other commenters on Pharyngula who ARE willing to engage those rare few (and more skilled at it than I am), that I will be able to quickly identify them anyways simply by lurking on the thread for a little while.
Sometimes the most effective way of participating in a blog discussion is to be quiet and listen for a while.
Yes, I understand the history of it. I have all sorts of stock answers to respond to racism from whites, but I have yet to figure out a good way to call out this type of racism from POC.
It generally occurs in my work, and I am required to be polite to clients at all times. It’s all I can do to stop my jaw from hitting the floor when some guy from Saudi Arabia refers to a local housing project as “Little Mogadishu” and judging other humans value based on their skin tone.
And for those missing the point, the guy making these videos are targeting them directly at the privileged class he belongs to, i.e. the most privileged group in the US, white guys. As Amphiox posted up thread, if you see value in the videos’ message for a group other than white guys, then simply pass them along with his relabelling suggestions.
Racist meme in the wild:
http://kentuckysip.homestead.com/files/Slavery_kept_alive_by_race.htm
http://www.gowilkes.com/voice/view/?start=&msg=76866&h=195437
http://www.sanduskyregister.com/sandusky/news/civil-rights-activist-talks-about-bringing-change-through-nonviolence#comment-793051
http://www.hipforums.com/newforums/showthread.php?t=456163&f=36&page=6#post_message_7367551
http://www.opb.org/thinkoutloud/shows/grant-county-keep-out/#human2u-03-03-10-23-30
Again, I don’t think you understand what a strawman is. Attributing the possibility of racism in charvakan’s choice of words would not be a strawman.
This article may be helpful to you: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man
I’m not sure why you think this is relevant. The racist variant is also intended to be taken literally, as my links above in #39 demonstrate.
That’s obviously not true, since charvakan was talking about race. Maybe you meant to say “with no racist connotation.”
It was not tangential to what charvakan said, which was racial speech, and which might also have been racist speech. It was an attempt to either engage with knowingly racist speech or educate charvakan about a function of this meme as it presents in the USA. Both are fine things to attempt.
Okay. Then Amphiox’s original comment would be even more likely to be educational.
Malice isn’t the only problem worth addressing w/r/t racist-enabling speech.
I don’t think you understand what a false dichotomy is.
charvakan could be racist. You could be racist. I could be racist. Amphiox could be racist. It’s not inappropriate to bring up any of these possibilities when they may be relevant. Such possibilities become more relevant when someone uses speech which may have been picked up from exposure to racist propaganda.
I don’t see how that’s rude.
We are all racist to some degree, some of the time. We can be racist deliberately and we can be racist without realizing it. It is part of the human condition. Those of us who care and believe that racism is an evil to be fought recognize that this is possible. That people can act in a racist fashion without realizing that it is racist. That people can act with racist intent, without realizing that the motivation behind the intent is actually racism they do not recognize.
And when such racism is noted by others and called out, those who care about racism and consider it an evil to be fought will react to it in a certain way. And those who do not, in a different way.
And observing the difference in those ways of reaction is often illuminating in a multitude of ways.
Rudeness is in the eye of the beholder.
But suppose it WAS rude. So what?
How would you like your fainting couch?*
Little is more enlightening about a person’s character than how it responds to truth rudely delivered.
*Pharyngula grade(tm) fainting couches, to my knowledge, come in leather, plush, microsuede, corduroy, Hedgehog (recently discontinued – all models on clearance discount), and Echidna.
The fainting couch seems to be occupied by the mutual admiration society. I’ll go find a chair and sit this one out.
I read all of Strange Gods links. I think I need a shower now.
charvakan,
I apologise for my false assumption you are a white guy.
I hear the equivalent of your response often in Australia where I live. It is used as an excuse as to why white people should get away with bigoted actions and attitudes.
I dont understand how some people are unaware that this happens.
There is, to my knowledge, no easy way to call it out. To do so, you have to explain the complexity of how it is derivative without losing your audience, and that’s hard to do.
But because it is derivative, the way to end it is to deal with the source. Once white-on-black racism is ended, the social advantage of being “more like white”, and the stigma of being “more like black” will vanish with it, and this form of racism will, hopefully, wither away on its own accord soon afterwards.
Trickle-down doesn’t work in economics, but it might work here.
Ah yes, the classic pout-flounce.
Now THIS is one of the classes of replies that DOES suggest to me that the author of it is not someone I want to waste my limited time talking to.
The only and last additional thing I will say to tedzissou is yes, sitting out, lurking and listening, might, just might, do hir some degree of good.
@Koshla
> I apologise for my false assumption you are a white guy.
No apology needed. I now do realize that my first post could be interpreted as trying to share the blame away from ones own race.
@Amphiox, @strange gods before me
While I understand your concern about racism, I believe I made it sufficiently clear in my subsequent posts what I meant. I stand by what I said. While I don’t condone saying something that is explicitly racist, everything else has to be taken in context. It is OK to politely point out that certain terms may have historical baggage associated with it to those that may not be aware of such, but I feel this thread has gone beyond that.
charvakan,
Surely you don’t mean this! Context is part of the bigot’s defence when pulled up on something. Implied racism is still racism. If people say something that can be construed as bigoted then surely we should speak up and tell them that what they said is bigoted. That person then has a chance to defend what they said and context can be properly determined. Just like what happened on this thread with your first comment.
PS – I suggest you dont tell people what is OK to point out. Especially when you use ‘politely’ amongst it all.
charvakan, it looks to me this is more about the posters than you you or your comment. They tried to flush out a troll and rather than suck it up when they missed, they had a swing anyway. Try not to be put off.
My gob was and remains smacked.
What permanagater said. Amniox tries to pounce on someone they assume to be a troll (because of some key words they’ve cherrypicked out of a post), then don’t have the good grace to back down when they’re wrong.
Pro tip for Amniox and like-minded commenters: Not everyone who disagrees with an OP is against the content, FTB, A+, or social justice. Critical thinking should apply inwards as well as outwards.
[meta]
mos1, clearly you don’t read what’s written, you read what you wish to read.
(Amniox, eh?)
—
Naïf, you, O smacked-in-the-gob.
I said as much: “It retrospect it may be clearer that charvakan did make an ignorant comment.”
Then I direct you to John Phillips’s comment. Or Amphiox’s second paragraph: “it is common knowledge enough that it is implicit, and does not need to be said.”
What you said was not hateful, but also not relevant nor really worthwhile. There are tactical reasons sometimes for a person to address their remarks specifically to others of their own privileged group.
I don’t think you need to apologize, but you do look a bit silly “standing behind” relatively vacuous comments. I’d agree with you that the video could coherently be addressed to everyone — but that doesn’t necessarily mean it should be. There’s a lot of similar content in the world already addressed to everyone. Sometimes it makes sense to try to address one’s own privileged group in particular.
Context has been considered here, and upon considering that context, people came to other conclusions than the one you’d perhaps come to (or perhaps you might have come to the same, had you not been the speaker being considered).
For example: “Indeed, it is helpful to ask a person what they meant by that phrase, whether they know it’s a racist shibboleth, and so on. That’s how we can know to respond further by either attacking the person for being a racist or educating them on how to not sound so racist in the future.”
Indeed, it is also OK to do this impolitely.
That’s true. You may note that the reason it’s gone beyond such is because tedzissou wanted to make some additional claims: that Amphiox’s comment was unacceptably rude, et cetera. And now we have to deal with tedzissou’s myriad misunderstandings and mistakes. The discussion would be considerably shorter without all that — why, you might even be satisfied with it. But permanganater and mos1 wish to follow in tedzissou’s footsteps. Que sera sera.
+++++
It’s more about responses like yours now, piling SIWOTI on top of SIWOTI while not noticing there was a reason for the original response.
To charvakan’s credit, charvakan does notice this: “No apology needed. I now do realize that my first post could be interpreted as trying to share the blame away from ones own race.”
They? I haven’t addressed any comments to charvakan until now. I’ve been responding to tedzissou’s stupid complaints.
On the contrary, Amphiox said to charvakan: “Well, you can congratulate yourself that you did not respond in such a fashion. (At least not yet.)”
We’re unfortunately now in the position of having to take a swing at a few people who’re spectacularly capable at missing the point — tedzissou, mos1 and yourself. But I don’t see anyone thumping charvakan, only disagreeing somewhat with particular claims.
I imagine that when charvakan considers how much shorter this thread would be without responses like yours and tedzissou’s, charvakan will not be much put off.
Then I recommend you consider the same.
+++++
No such assumption is evident. The opposite is evident: “Then perhaps you are not aware […] Which one are you?”
It was 15 words out of the original 19. You’d have to cherrypick to ignore them.
Again, not true: “When I reply to posts like your first one, the provocative tone I adopt is deliberate. […] Well, you can congratulate yourself that you did not respond in such a fashion. (At least not yet.)”
Perhaps your issue is really that no one has been sufficiently deferential for your tastes. No one here needs to kiss charvakan’s ass, since no one here has wronged charvakan in any way.
Since no one has claimed that charvakan was a troll, no one could have wrongly claimed charvakan was a troll.
How unintentionally ironic of you.
As part of your introduction to inward critical thinking, you should try quoting something that could make your implicit claim — that someone here was attacking charvakan for being against the content, FTB, A+, or social justice, rather than addressing a specific problematic phrasing that charvakan used, and then a series of specific errors from tedzissou, and now permanganater and yourself.
Stop being wrong on the internet, and people will stop telling you you’re wrong on the internet.
… try quoting something that could [justify] your implicit claim …
I love that he’s getting such wide attention. I used to see him all the time in ‘Hamp when the video store was still there and it’s great to see Western MA represented. I love the crazy liberal upper valley.
Oops, my first ever post on FTB above, hadn’t checked the ‘be notified by email’ box. That’s my excuse for belated further comment and I’m sticking to it.
Anyways, @53, strange gods before me ॐ:
Um. Yeah. No.
Really, the guts of this is you called charvakan ignorant. Which he wasn’t; not in any sense any reasonable person could subscribe to.
Which you then realised.
Instead of eating a bit, maybe osmosing some of charvakan’s refreshingly-olive-branch tone, you dug in and went harder becuase, well, because, you know, best form of defence – and all that…and well, everyone’s watching goddamit…bloody hell….
So. You can parse all this until you’re blue in the face (and watching you do that so far is crude fun, but slow). But here’s the thing. Deal honestly with the fact that an evidently nice guy from another country makes a reasonable and well-intentioned comment; a far-fetched if not facifully offensive construction is capable of being spun upon it, and off you go.
Finally, to explain that strange sensation: I’m guessing at FTB you’re not used to beuing called out for being a garden-variety arse-hat, which is why it feels funny.
and you still fail at both reading and comprehension, a swing and a miss. Want to try again. BTW, you’re obviously new around here or you would know we call each other out all the time. Ask strange gods before me himself, or even myself, about that. Say something stupid/ignorant/etc, and someone will ask you to justify it with evidence, it’s SOP around here, whoever you are, regular or newbie.