Sunday, August 13, 2017

Well Intentioned but Naive Polarization

Here is an example of well intentioned sentiment (violence is bad and thinking other people are inferior is nasty).


The problem is that the sentiment is rather naive of what is actually happening on the ground.  I certainly excuse politicians for this.  They get excoriated if they don't represent the right sentiment.  But, academically minded can and should do better.

The problem is, as I understand years of twitter feeds and youtube feeds, some of the protesters are protesting agains racism and demagoguery.  However, the racism they are protesting against is in terms of classical racism (based of skin phenotype) rather than new racism (based upon punch-down intersectionality).

How else do you explain "Nazi's" who are proud to have Jewish friends, who overtly stand against classical racism towards people of color, and rally around equality under the law, etc.  While there are certainly some (perhaps many) full on white supremacists, and while I fully understand the value of condemning anything associated with such movements, the problem is, statements like Notley's are likely to come across as exceptionally hollow to those who may have been protesting these exact things but are now condemned as deplorably racist Nazi's.

Thus the situation is sort of like how Evergreen professor Brett Weinstein was condemned as a racist for complaining against racism.  Perhaps the main difference being there was a crazy supremacist prof down the hall who did the same act for different reasons...and plans weren't in place for distancing and denouncing.  Perhaps that means the protestors are in fact soft of Nazi styled white supremacy.  That is a very logical point to consider.

My main worry isn't about how "Nazi" the group was - I think with current polarizations, accurate assessments would be hopelessly flawed.  My worry is that calling people racist who, in their minds, were protesting racism (even if just against whites) diminishes the social stigma of racism and creates a backlash that needn't have been created with a bit of wisdom.

But I certainly understand how people view the condemnation of anything associated with supremacist groups more valuable than any potential backlash.  I just worry that the backlash calculus has been underestimated and hence outcomes may strengthen rather than weaken racism.

No comments:

Post a Comment