And that's why I've attempted to stop using the terms "racism" or "racist" online - the terms have been unilaterally (and in my view, smugly) redefined by activists, and so at best you wind up arguing (mostly unproductively) about definitions rather than content. At worst, people just argue past each other, implicitly referring to differ…
And that's why I've attempted to stop using the terms "racism" or "racist" online - the terms have been unilaterally (and in my view, smugly) redefined by activists, and so at best you wind up arguing (mostly unproductively) about definitions rather than content. At worst, people just argue past each other, implicitly referring to different things and making no sense to each other.
Also, even without recent redefinitions, when the same term is used for anything from lynchings to teaching kids standard English in school, it's both inherently confusing and easily weaponized to borrow extreme emotional valence from one end of the spectrum to exaggerate the seriousness of something at the other end. "Racism" has become a huge amorphous blob concept, not much better than, say, "scientists say".
So instead I decided to exclusively (as best I can remember) use the terms "racial prejudice", "racial discrimination", "racial bias", "racial stereotyping", "racial hatred" etc. in discussion with strangers. Even DiAngelo etc agree that all races can do these things to all races, so it circumvents a tiring and predictable replay of the same old metadiscussion.
Perhaps a new term like "racial patronization" would be useful to add to that vocabulary, for the "low expectations" form you reference in the article. (Acknowledging that it's a subform of racial bias and racial stereotyping).
An unexpected benefit is that I found that deciding more specifically which term to use was clarifying for me as well. I suggest readers try this in their own writing and see how it goes.
I recall a study which found from video recorded interactions that liberals tend to simplify their vocabulary and sentence structure when speaking to an unknown Black person, while conservatives tend to verbally treat them more as equals. I believe that when critical social justice ideology promotes empathy for the downtrodden by centering "the poor oppressed who need our help" in their conscious and unconscious, it reinforces negative unconscious stereotypes of functional inferiority. A typical white progressive's internal model of a archetypical Black person is often somebody barely literate living in urban poverty and oppression by police - and they can have trouble recognizing that a majority of Black folks are middle class or above today. (There are differences in the economic stats between races, but not as stark as their internal model would have it.)
My spouse grew up in Geneva, and tells of how when visiting New York on family leave, her mother automatically spoke French to the serving staff. In that case, she would obviously catch herself when they looked in confusion, but a liberal automatically speaking simplified language to Black people would typically would never realize it - although a message can be sent anyway.
If CSJ advocates were serious about "micro-aggressions" and rooting out their own "unconscious biases", they would take this as a key element to reform about themselves, but (in my view) since this "being kind to our oppressed lessors" with a corresponding boost to one's own moral status (at least in one's own unconscious) is one of the unacknowledged psychological payoffs powering the adoption and spread of the ideology, this tends to be pushed out of consciousness.
"Also, even without recent redefinitions, when the same term is used for anything from lynchings to teaching kids standard English in school, it's both inherently confusing and easily weaponized to borrow extreme emotional valence from one end of the spectrum to exaggerate the seriousness of something at the other end. "Racism" has become a huge amorphous blob concept, not much better than, say, "scientists say"."
I love this entire paragraph. It maps so well onto my frustration with the weaponisation of language and the flattening out of the concept of racism. We're at a point in society where I simply don't want to hear about people being asked "where are you from," or feeling like they're being watched too closely in their local convenience store.
Yes, this is racism, or racial stereotyping/bias, but there are so many more pressing problems affecting people of colour. And writing academic theses about it won't change the attitudes of the convenience store owner or the geographically curious stranger. The influence of academia on racial discourse (and, in fact, any social justice discourse) has been pretty much wholly negative.
Where I use the phrase "pretty much" solely to allow for the possibility that there's a positive case that I'm not currently thinking of.
THIS! Exactly. I have the same issue with feminism, which has gone down a similar path of treating the smallest slight as though it were necessarily an extension of a world conspiracy to subjugate and abuse women. There is a world of difference between being sexually assaulted, on the one hand, and being "mansplained" to by a dude who assumes I'm a helpless bimbo, on the other. I don't relish either experience, but they are worlds apart, and pretending they're not diminishes our perception of the harm caused by true victimization. Furthermore, claiming that 'society' is somehow responsible for enabling attitudes that necessarily lead to acts of rape minimizes the responsibility of actual rapists for their crimes.
I try to avoid the whole set: racism, sexism, homophobia (stupid word), transphobia (ditto), misogyny .... since they all come in one piece, I just use “bigotry.”
Actually, I consider that to be somewhat of a hijacked word as well. Originally it meant intolerance of differing opinion. From Webster:
"obstinate or intolerant devotion to one's own opinions and prejudices : the state of mind of a bigot"
One can still find this, and very similar, in most dictionaries. By which standard many CSJ ideologues would easily qualify. One could be intolerantly and obstinately devote to their own opinions and prejudices as a conservative or liberal, as racist or anti-racist, as Muslim or atheist or Christian or Buddhist.
However, the term "bigotry" is now more often used in public by activists on the left, in reference to the other side, so it's used as if it just meant "racist but even more so". Or perhaps some other -ist. So newer dictionaries, being descriptive rather than prescriptive, tend to include this new usage as well.
So we may need to fall back on "zealotry" or "dogmatism" to partially capture what "bigotry" used to mean.
And that's why I've attempted to stop using the terms "racism" or "racist" online - the terms have been unilaterally (and in my view, smugly) redefined by activists, and so at best you wind up arguing (mostly unproductively) about definitions rather than content. At worst, people just argue past each other, implicitly referring to different things and making no sense to each other.
Also, even without recent redefinitions, when the same term is used for anything from lynchings to teaching kids standard English in school, it's both inherently confusing and easily weaponized to borrow extreme emotional valence from one end of the spectrum to exaggerate the seriousness of something at the other end. "Racism" has become a huge amorphous blob concept, not much better than, say, "scientists say".
So instead I decided to exclusively (as best I can remember) use the terms "racial prejudice", "racial discrimination", "racial bias", "racial stereotyping", "racial hatred" etc. in discussion with strangers. Even DiAngelo etc agree that all races can do these things to all races, so it circumvents a tiring and predictable replay of the same old metadiscussion.
Perhaps a new term like "racial patronization" would be useful to add to that vocabulary, for the "low expectations" form you reference in the article. (Acknowledging that it's a subform of racial bias and racial stereotyping).
An unexpected benefit is that I found that deciding more specifically which term to use was clarifying for me as well. I suggest readers try this in their own writing and see how it goes.
I recall a study which found from video recorded interactions that liberals tend to simplify their vocabulary and sentence structure when speaking to an unknown Black person, while conservatives tend to verbally treat them more as equals. I believe that when critical social justice ideology promotes empathy for the downtrodden by centering "the poor oppressed who need our help" in their conscious and unconscious, it reinforces negative unconscious stereotypes of functional inferiority. A typical white progressive's internal model of a archetypical Black person is often somebody barely literate living in urban poverty and oppression by police - and they can have trouble recognizing that a majority of Black folks are middle class or above today. (There are differences in the economic stats between races, but not as stark as their internal model would have it.)
My spouse grew up in Geneva, and tells of how when visiting New York on family leave, her mother automatically spoke French to the serving staff. In that case, she would obviously catch herself when they looked in confusion, but a liberal automatically speaking simplified language to Black people would typically would never realize it - although a message can be sent anyway.
If CSJ advocates were serious about "micro-aggressions" and rooting out their own "unconscious biases", they would take this as a key element to reform about themselves, but (in my view) since this "being kind to our oppressed lessors" with a corresponding boost to one's own moral status (at least in one's own unconscious) is one of the unacknowledged psychological payoffs powering the adoption and spread of the ideology, this tends to be pushed out of consciousness.
"Also, even without recent redefinitions, when the same term is used for anything from lynchings to teaching kids standard English in school, it's both inherently confusing and easily weaponized to borrow extreme emotional valence from one end of the spectrum to exaggerate the seriousness of something at the other end. "Racism" has become a huge amorphous blob concept, not much better than, say, "scientists say"."
I love this entire paragraph. It maps so well onto my frustration with the weaponisation of language and the flattening out of the concept of racism. We're at a point in society where I simply don't want to hear about people being asked "where are you from," or feeling like they're being watched too closely in their local convenience store.
Yes, this is racism, or racial stereotyping/bias, but there are so many more pressing problems affecting people of colour. And writing academic theses about it won't change the attitudes of the convenience store owner or the geographically curious stranger. The influence of academia on racial discourse (and, in fact, any social justice discourse) has been pretty much wholly negative.
Where I use the phrase "pretty much" solely to allow for the possibility that there's a positive case that I'm not currently thinking of.
THIS! Exactly. I have the same issue with feminism, which has gone down a similar path of treating the smallest slight as though it were necessarily an extension of a world conspiracy to subjugate and abuse women. There is a world of difference between being sexually assaulted, on the one hand, and being "mansplained" to by a dude who assumes I'm a helpless bimbo, on the other. I don't relish either experience, but they are worlds apart, and pretending they're not diminishes our perception of the harm caused by true victimization. Furthermore, claiming that 'society' is somehow responsible for enabling attitudes that necessarily lead to acts of rape minimizes the responsibility of actual rapists for their crimes.
I try to avoid the whole set: racism, sexism, homophobia (stupid word), transphobia (ditto), misogyny .... since they all come in one piece, I just use “bigotry.”
Actually, I consider that to be somewhat of a hijacked word as well. Originally it meant intolerance of differing opinion. From Webster:
"obstinate or intolerant devotion to one's own opinions and prejudices : the state of mind of a bigot"
One can still find this, and very similar, in most dictionaries. By which standard many CSJ ideologues would easily qualify. One could be intolerantly and obstinately devote to their own opinions and prejudices as a conservative or liberal, as racist or anti-racist, as Muslim or atheist or Christian or Buddhist.
However, the term "bigotry" is now more often used in public by activists on the left, in reference to the other side, so it's used as if it just meant "racist but even more so". Or perhaps some other -ist. So newer dictionaries, being descriptive rather than prescriptive, tend to include this new usage as well.
So we may need to fall back on "zealotry" or "dogmatism" to partially capture what "bigotry" used to mean.