I prefer this oneI like Tinfoil Tuesday.
An excuse to reprint my favourite tinfoil hat pic:
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Woke-ists on the left, Trumpists on the right, stuck in the middle?
- Thread starter icehorse
- Start date
Sure they do.
I strongly suspect you're trying to be sarcastic here. The problem is, you apparently aren't familiar with the works of the people I mentioned
I think I might be????I strongly suspect you're trying to be sarcastic here. The problem is, you apparently aren't familiar with the works of the people I mentioned
From memory that was never their argument.
That largely came from their detractors.
The arguments made were that people should/ought to be constantly vigilant to combat racism. And to be complicit, if you understand all the implications, then and only then were you being racist.
To contribute to systemic racism could be done entirely unintentionally. To do such a thing doesn’t necessarily make a person racist, per se. Merely another cog in the machine, so to speak.
Basically you can intentionally be a racist by ignoring the implications or not making any effort to combat them, however small. If you did try to make an effort, then you were just a product of racism. In the same manner of people who were racist in the 60s even if they were for integration. Or how people in the 1800s who were progressives were themselves homophobic. Even if some favoured of gay rights (for the time.) Still racist/homophobic but “forgivable” in a sense. Because it’s largely cultural, rather than a person being malicious. I’m probably not explaining it correctly. But basically advocating activities have moved on from mere protests. It’s analysing and actively combating prejudices on the ground level
At least that’s my hazy memory of such works. Been a while
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I've read this several times, and I'm struggling to parse it. But if I'm understanding you correctly, it seems you're helping me make my point. It seems that at least one of the things you're saying is that "if you're not 'constantly vigilant', then you're being racist". Did I understand that correctly?
If so, doesn't that imply that if you don't make racist vigilance your top priority, then you're a racist?
Twilight Hue
Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
Young people today ignore that as well as my stupid generation.
Bear in mind I’m merely playing Devil’s Advocate here.
With regards to your question, no not exactly.
It’s saying that as a society we have a very entrenched culture that has racism woven into it. As well as homophobia and other prejudices. Which is an observation from most social studies even. Apparently, such is the claim anyway. I’m not a sociology major, so I dunno
Personally I have no issue with this claim since there are a lot of societal expectations from past and even current that do reinforce negative stereotypes and social behaviour regarding gay folks, POC, women and sometimes even men. They have changed over time, certainly. But I think we can do better in the future. Always room for improvement, as they say
This is why we have outdated jokes and stereotypes to begin with. Culture has simply changed over time and certain things just aren’t socially acceptable anymore. This is because of how those portrayals/jokes etc has shaped people’s perceptions of people over time. And how it has negatively impacted communities. Again I don’t really take issue with this claim because we had to “study” such a phenomenon in high school SOSE class even
And this will no doubt happen in the future too. That’s just culture.
Basically you should try to keep aware of societal influences on you and just try to be better. One day at a time even.
If you don’t do that but purposefully, then you’re being racist. Because you’ve shown indifference and even gone out of your way to ignore influences that are still harmful or can hurt others.
Now is that going too far? I don’t know. But language and culture at large will continue to change regardless of opinions. Because a stagnant culture/language is a dead one. That’s just reality
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exchemist
Veteran Member
Yes I think this has to be right. I have lived long enough to see how social attitudes have changed in my lifetime. Things that were the norm, or the subject of jokes, when I was a boy, seem really shocking now. For example, jokes about homosexuality, or about black people, were commonplace in 1960s Britain. Or just watch an early James Bond movie and see how Bond sexually assaults a lot of his women, only for them to succumb to desire because, supposedly, he is so damned attractive, i.e. "No" means "Yes" if you insist hard enough. Any woman will tell you that is not how it works, but that was the idea about women and sex that was promoted back in the 1960s.
Such examples just show how standards move on. There is no reason to think everything is now perfect, because since we had these blind spots back then, why would we not have blinds spots today? Therefore we must always be aware that there can still be areas where we need to improve and become more considerate.
The flip side of this is important too, however. We should not be quick to go back in history and judge individuals by today's standards. Historical figures were products of the culture of their time, just as we are of ours. So we should cut them some slack.
mikkel_the_dane
My own religion
All fair and well. Now you guys just need to include the crazy ones.
We got race, sex, gender and all those covered. The only ones you have left out is my tribe. I might be a high functioning cognitively/mentally disabled person, but I am still a human like the rest of you
exchemist
Veteran Member
Autism is well on the road to social acceptance now. I have read several articles recently about it. One in the Financial Times told the story of a successful businesswoman who was notorious for an abrupt and prickly personality and who was dreadful in meetings, but had good judgement and got good results........ and was found fairly recently to be on the spectrum. A big AHA! moment for her work colleagues. Of course, once one knows, one can find it far easier to make allowances. I'm sure we are getting there, by degrees, though of course it will be too slow for many.
mikkel_the_dane
My own religion
Yeah, then we just need all the other variants and learn to limits of "I am rational and you are not!"
Yerda
Veteran Member
Hi @icehorse
Here's what I'm seeing.
The "woke left" talking point is just another facet of the culture war. The point is to give excuses to people, whom upon seeing the psychotic politics unfolding on the right, still want to vote for it.
How do you protect the notion that you are a good person voting for what is right when what you're voting for is corruption, criminality and the use of prejudice as a rallying point? Well, just look at them damn wokes trying to destroy the fabric of society.
In reality you have a global political right completely committed to stealing everything that isn't nailed to the floor, undermining every institution of democracy, destroying civil society while accelerating the human towards civilisational disaster - at best. And somehow what is really pressing is how some obscure theorists said something that suggests white culture is a bit racist and some trans activists being pissy on twitter.
Here's what I'm seeing.
The "woke left" talking point is just another facet of the culture war. The point is to give excuses to people, whom upon seeing the psychotic politics unfolding on the right, still want to vote for it.
How do you protect the notion that you are a good person voting for what is right when what you're voting for is corruption, criminality and the use of prejudice as a rallying point? Well, just look at them damn wokes trying to destroy the fabric of society.
In reality you have a global political right completely committed to stealing everything that isn't nailed to the floor, undermining every institution of democracy, destroying civil society while accelerating the human towards civilisational disaster - at best. And somehow what is really pressing is how some obscure theorists said something that suggests white culture is a bit racist and some trans activists being pissy on twitter.
exchemist
Veteran Member
I'm not a man of the Left in the least, but I do think you are onto something here.
Have you listened to or read anything by the folks I listed earlier?
I think what you're saying here is fairly reasonable. But I don't think the folks I listed earlier are as reasonable as you are.
Yerda
Veteran Member
I've read a couple of articles by Ta-Nehisis coates. Not my cup of tea.
Haven't read DiAngleo. Read Matt Taibbi's review of her book and it sounds dreadful.
Well, in fairness a lot of extreme advocates rarely are. Because they are the “radicals.”
It’s important to remember that a lot of the folks you are speaking of come from rather specific academic backgrounds. So the definitions they use might not gel well with common vernacular. And can easily be manipulated to say whatever a person wants it to, really. I can just as easily point to rhetoric by say Malcom X and claim he’s “going too far.” That he’s accusing all folks of being racists. And I can probably do that very easily using his very own words, just by framing it a certain way.
Personally I think that approach is entirely unhelpful. But I’ve seen it happen with a lot of concepts from groups such as anti feminists. And even from feminists, in fairness
Hell I fell for a lot of the anti third wave feminist rhetoric for a while even. Because I just wasn’t very familiar with the nuances of the language used. Also I wasn’t in a very good spot mentally at the time, let’s just say.
An interesting phenomenon I’ve found is that when you pair up individuals from opposing “social justice circles” when they stop talking past each other, you find they really want the same outcome. What differs is the approach and sometimes merely the language used.
Take toxic masculinity for example. A common taking point from a lot of MRAs and anti feminists is to use the phrase as evidence of their opponents hatred of masculinity in principle. This was/is easily achieved because on face value that’s what the phrase looks like to a layperson. “They’re calling masculinity toxic now? Damn men hating Feminazis!!”
But if you actually look into how the phrase is used academically, you can easily see it’s merely a term to express concern for young boys and men having to live up to very harmful negative and often outdated stereotypes about masculinity. And how this negatively impacts men overall. Calling for more healthy role models of masculinity and reaching out to boys in order to stop toxic cycles, which often can result in very worrying stats. (The high rate of Suicide of young men and boys for an example.)
Ironically both MRAs and Feminists likely agree on the topic of toxic masculinity overall. But often people fail to see the trees for the forest. I think that’s how the saying goes? Lol
We like to think of social progress as being championed by reasonable, entirely rational folks who are compassionate, decent and hardworking. Basically we yearn to see role models in activism. We actively look for such a phenomenon even. And whilst you can absolutely point to such examples. Truth of the matter is that humans are messy individuals. A lot of grass roots activism is often mired in emotions and often reactionary in nature. Humans will respond to their environment after all. And for every “reasonable champion” you can point to, you can just as easily find another who felt more extreme methods were necessary to get the point across to society. There are martyred figures in social justice circles going back to the original suffragette movement even.
So overall I can’t blame the folks you speak of for their reactions. I probably disagree on many of their talking points. But they are merely reacting to their lived experience. At heart I’m very stringently “live and let live” I guess. And growing up around teachers who constantly demanded I play Devil’s Advocate for every position under the sun, I try my best to look at all points of view. Might not succeed, mind. But I try
I think there is certainly a good middle ground. But a lot of the concepts which sounded scary to me, once I sat down and tried to really think about them. Turns out a lot of them weren’t so bad after all.
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Very true.
I’m a big Bond fan. But some of the older movies, whilst I do enjoy them, do leave me a bit unsettled. It was so nice to see M call him out for his past behaviours in the newer films lol
And I thought they did a fairly decent job with the soft reboot of franchise. Because let’s be real, the franchise is pretty outdated to begin with.
Also movie studios need to cast Idris Elba as Bond already!! Even if they have to wait to do it after the female 007 arc. Fine.
Though I’ll admit that I am kind of beyond curious to see how the film handles that particular arc, if I’m honest. It could be spectacular and brilliantly nuanced or merely another in a long line of lazily pandering corporate checklist type deals. I’m obviously hoping for the former, but I don’t have much faith in Hollywood lol
But the latter is not something Leftists want. We want flawed, three dimensional characters as “representation.” Because that’s the human experience
Very true. My father was actually a very old man. Born in the late 1920s, no joke. He was very open hearted, kind and rarely displayed any real prejudice. He was a man who exemplified the notion of
“Don’t care what a person looks like, where they come from or what language they speak. A man (person) treats me right, I’ll do the same back.”
That’s just the type of bloke he was. But every so often he’d joke about something that my millennial mind would be aghast at. Because I simply wasn’t used to such jokes or phrases. The culture I grew up in told me that I was to be appalled if confronted with said jokes. That didn’t mean my dad was a racist or xenophobic. Merely a product of his time.
Also very true.
A lot of my personal “idols” are pretty flawed individuals. And that’s putting it mildly lol
I think we should accept history as it is, but try to grow from it. Do not condemn a man from the 70s simply for saying something at the time was considered innocuous, but which nowadays would be considered appalling. What’s important is we now recognise the sentiment as harmful now. If the man in question apologised, we should also recognise that.
That a person was a product of their culture and time should not diminish their good deeds. Though we should always point out the bad, so as to learn what not to do in the future. Imo
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exchemist
Veteran Member
Yes, I'm a great fan of the Connery Bond films. But his assault on ***** Galore in Goldfinger gives me the creeps. The only saving grace about that (in real life, as it were) is that Honor Blackman said of Connery that he actually WAS very fanciable indeed and that if she had not been married she "certainly would have gone there".
P.S. How idiotic that the software on this site won't allow me to give the name of this Bond character.