Only the purest of the pure can lead a diversity effort. And it doesn’t count unless you were pure from the beginning. Growing to overcome past problems is not sufficient.
Their assumption is moreso that we cant grow to overcome past problems. So the only way to build themselves up is to tear others down.
Thats why the popular "anti-racism" philosophy is so antithetical to and ignorant of the lives and philosophies of many of the greatest civil rights leaders such as Frederick Douglass, Booker T Washington, and MLK.
Who are they? The people who believe racism exists?
Those who fight racism with racism and call it anti-racism or reverse-racism.
Those who use hate, blame, and punishment as their tools of power, rather than love, forgiveness, and self/community empowerment.
Those who focus on division rather than unity.
[0]: https://www.ocpathink.org/post/does-race-massacre-silence-sh...
Here[0] is the article I had meant to link to.
Ah man… I really feel bad that you read the wrong article a few times after I unwittingly mislead you. I'm genuinely sorry about that.
[0]: https://www.ocpathink.org/post/whites-will-always-be-racist-...
I'm going to have to start asking for better sources on antiracism than a white woman who makes a career out of corporate "diversity training." Like, of course that's her entire thesis.
White fragility is a very useful concept, for sure. But the way DiAngelo uses it seems to be more focused on making white people hem and haw and feel guilty for even trying instead of doing mutual aid, reading theory, forming community, anything actually helpful or useful.
If I wanted to set up a strawman, that's exactly what I'd do.
I'll probably read her new book that's coming out soon, but my prior assumption is that it's more of the same. I hope to be proven wrong.
My perspective aligns neatly with that describe here[0].
As Trevor Phillips would say[1], Critical Race Theory is exactly the idea I would invent if I were a racist.
[0]: https://www.heritage.org/civil-society/commentary/how-leftis...
You have provided evidence that it is the implicit claim of exactly one critical race theorist.
> which is why I'm challenging your support for it now.
This is a strawman. I began this discussion by pointing out that this very claim is counterproductive, which is why I'm not a fan of DiAngelo's work. Reasoning in the abstract about marginalized groups and the systemic issues they tend to face is not the same as asserting that they individually have all the same views or background.
I actually agree with her here, but I don't think that's the same as saying that racist people can't get better:
> While citizens can work on addressing racism, they can never be free of it, she said. “We don’t arrive and now we are not racist,” DiAngelo said.
In her view (and mine), becoming "not racist" isn't really a thing that happens and then you're done, and you don't have to worry about not being racist anymore. Rather, it's an ongoing effort, the same way being a kind person or a hard worker is. In this understanding, "all white people are racist" is not a condemnation of white people or an attempt to cast white people as inherently bad or irredeemable. Rather, it's meant as a wake-up call - "Yes, all white people, even you, believe racist things and sometimes act in racist ways." If you want to be anti-racist, it is important to recognize these things within yourself and improve them, in the same way that you work to improve the world outside you.
Since this is a different definitional understanding (semantics?) than the person who says "I'm not racist," it can be a tricky point to communicate properly without being misunderstood or taken out of context.
I don't agree with all of DiAngelo's points or writing, but on this core one, I think she's not too far off the mark.
It's a stupid statement no matter the explanation.
And honestly even the intent at bwst is advocating purity over practice, her point will waste a lot of resources on people who are more or less on board with said idea of anti-racism but are flawed.
“An irresistible and indispensable 360-degree guide to the new technology establishment.... A must-read.” New York Times
“Incisive.... The most fun business book I have read this year.... Clearly there will be people who hate this book — which is probably one of the things that makes it such a great read.” New York Times
“Reckless and rollicking... perceptive and funny and brave.... The resulting view of the Valley’s craziness, self-importance and greed isn’t pretty. But it’s one that most of us have never seen before and aren’t likely to forget.” Washington Post
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_York_Times_Fiction_Bes...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_York_Times_Nonfiction_...
“PMMess, as we’ll call her, was composed of alternating Bézier curves from top to bottom: convex, then concave, and then convex again, in a vertical undulation you couldn’t take your eyes off of. Unlike most women at Facebook (or in the Bay Area, really) she knew how to dress; forties-style, form-fitting dresses from neck to knee were her mainstay.”
“Out of nowhere British Trader informs me she is once again pregnant; the calendar math takes us right back to my move- out imbroglio in December, our last tryst after a breakup desert of nonintimacy. After a brief debate, British Trader confirms her desire to keep the child, whatever my thoughts on the matter. It occurred to me that perhaps this most recent experiment in fertility—and the first—had been planned on British Trader’s part, her back up against the menopause wall, a professional woman with every means at her disposal except a willing male partner—in which case I had been snookered into fatherhood via warm smiles and pliant thighs, the oldest tricks in the book.”
“To make an analogy, a capped note is like having to seduce five women one after the other, while an equity round is having to convince five women to do a sixsome with you. The latter is exponentially harder than the former.*
* The women analogy breaks down in that, unlike with women, the more investors you seduce into your moresome, the more likely others are to join. This is an expression of the lemming-like nature of tech investors, most of whom scarcely merit the title.”
—Antonio Garcia Martinez
Sam Harris and his conversation with Antonio covers the whole thing in more depth: https://samharris.org/podcasts/251-corporate-cowardice/
i'm thinking there is a decent chance trans-racialism will eventually become woke
Essentially, you gain "cred" by publicly taking down a more powerful figure than yourself. It's the problem of diablerie in Vampire: The Masquerade in that, once accepted, you create a set of rewards and initiatives that foster a constant churn of figures eager to snipe at those above them, to drain them of their woke cred and get at least a little for yourself in an act called "critique." Of course, there's only so much blood/cred to go around so figures rise and fall as these very public lives are examined for any kind of transgression: "If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him." Twitter and Tumblr are not exactly structured for careful, nuanced thought and so produce an endless stream of hot takes which, when gone cold, can be mined for evidence.
And so the revolutionaries are declared counter-revolutionaries and come to be the next layer of corpses in the mass graves they have dug, Khmer Rouge style.
EDIT misread "racialism" as "radicalism"
Innocent comments taken out of context or a general changing of accepted speech can turn a decade old bit of text into damning evidence of bigotry, racism, or any other ism.
Once something is on the internet, it is always on the internet.