United States Politics Thread 46

[Glass Half Baked]

(snip)

[Linguoboy]

I actually wrote my previous comment with the preface "Yes, this is all a joke." Then I edited it out because I thought it was obvious. I mean... It says "Kids' Gop" for shit's sake. What more do I need to do, throw a pie?

*sigh*

Do I really have to explain that all "jokes" still build upon certain premises and that these premises are not immune to criticism simply by virtue of being incorporated into a "joke"? I, likewise, thought this was blindingly obvious, but apparently one can't take anything for granted...

[alynnidalar]

Because I have stupid hobbies, I've spent way too much time over the past week or so reading up on the various Capitol rioter/insurrectionist cases, including reading a lot of affidavits. As I am now an expert in riots, protests, and insurrection, I provide the following useful tips gleaned from affidavits:

1. Do not commit crimes.
2. If you are going to commit crimes, do not post about it on social media. This includes Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Parler, Snapchat, Discord, Telegram, Clapper (no, I'd never heard of it before this either), or Tiktok.
2a. Even if you don't, make sure your wife doesn't either.
2b. Also don't text people about it. (this is a good one)
2c. And if you text people at least don't send them pictures or video.
2d. DEFINITELY do not call your probation officer and tell her you violated probation to go commit crimes, especially if you are wearing an ankle monitor.
2e. On the ankle monitor note, be sure to turn off your geolocation sharing app or leave your phone at home.
3. Make sure you have good relationships with everyone in your life prior to committing crimes. For example, make sure your ex-wife (to whom you were married for EIGHTEEN YEARS) does not hate you so much that she calls the FBI the hot second she finds out you were involved.
3a. Also avoid blowing up those relationships after you've committed crimes, for example by threatening to shoot your own son and daughters if they turn you in.
4. Make a vague attempt to disguise yourself, for example by wearing the cheap, easily-acquired facemasks that literally all of us own because we're in the middle of a pandemic.
4a. Especially do this if you have very visible face tattoos (not to be confused with another guy's distinctive facial tattoos) (or this guy's)
4b. Or very noticeable hand/finger tattoos.
4c. Covering your face is extra important if you are famous, such as the guitarist of a well-known metal band.
4d. It may also be helpful to avoid wearing a jacket with your name on it, and also giving a reporter an interview that includes your full name.
5. Avoid wearing extremely identifiable clothing, such as your high school varsity jacket when you're 26 (this is not crime advice, just life advice tbh) or your literal US Olympic team jacket.
5b. You should probably also change your shirt in the two days between the Capitol riot and getting on your flight home. (if you only read one affidavit, read this one; it's amazing)
6. Don't violate curfew and talk to cops while visibly holding something you stole from the Capitol, and then run from the cops.

All jokes aside, the affidavits are a bizarre mix of hilarious and chilling. I'll read one where some guy happily does a TV interview admitting to crimes while giving them his full name, and then the next one is like "this guy was arrested with multiple guns and also his truck was full of molotov cocktails" or "this guy who drove from Colorado with a trailer full of ammunition literally only wasn't at the event because his truck broke down and he didn't get there until the next day, thank God" or all the law enforcement that participated. Even the funny ones get a lot less funny when you realize that often the reason people were so open about talking to the media, posting on social media, etc. is because they were so convinced of the righteousness of their cause that it didn't occur to them that they were committing crimes--or they thought getting arrested at riots was only something that happened to black people. (great article on this topic here)

Most of this info comes from the George Washington University tracker. Alan Feuer (a NYT reporter) has also been running some good, frequently-updated threads of what's going on if you're interested.

Some bonus stats: as of January 27, there's been 161 federal cases filed against rioters, which is just over one case per police officer injured (officially 139, including one death, two suicides, an officer who is very likely to lose an eye, an officer with two cracked ribs and two smashed spinal discs, loads of head injuries, and plenty of more minor injuries that weren't reported). Virtually all cases so far have just slapped people with generic "was in the Capitol and wasn't supposed to be" and "caused a ruckus in the Capitol" charges because those are easy to prove, but as time goes on, they've started adding more serious charges with more serious evidence--including indications that prosecutors are going to pursue sedition charges in some cases (ordinarily extremely difficult to prove).

So this little adventure is not going to be resolved any time soon, no matter what happens with these impeachment proceedings...

[Travis B.]

Oh, and also don't go the Capitol wearing a fur hat with horns and red, white, and blue face paint which one is well-known for from other demonstrations.

[Rounin Ryuuji]

Which is also another example of not concealing highly visible and immediately recognisable tattoos.

[rotting bones]

These people don't understand how revolutions work, and that is part of their general misconceptions about how the world works. It is difficult to cure them because their delusions are part of what they are trying to save through revolution. Many of them see those delusions as the core of their identity, the flower of "white culture". Try teaching them spiritual insights that white people originally came up with like Hegelian dialectics, and they dismiss them as cuck postmodernism and their teachers as crackhead lunatics. Future fascists will probably be less helpfully degenerate.

[MacAnDàil]

So yeah that Iced Earth guitarist is the son of a John Birch Society member, a far-right organisation that basically sees everyhing to their left as communism in disguise. It links well into conspiracies of NWO and One-World government. Financed by Fred Koch and Fred Trump among others.

Oh and it seems Alex Jones' Infowars was more popular than the Economist website for a while, though the bans on major sites have worked a charm: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/04/tech ... affic.html

[alynnidalar]

5a. Or a sweatshirt with your name and business phone number printed on it.

[Travis B.]

I have been reading about the recent attacks on (often older) Asian people here in the US and learned that they were very often committed by Black individuals and that there exists significant anti-Asian sentiments amongst Black people here in the US and, conversely, there exists significant anti-Black sentiments amongst Asian people here in the US (consider the case of the Rodney King riots).

The thing that gets me about this, though, is the people who claim that only white people can be racist. So this isn't racism? Sure, anti-Black sentiments amongst Asians have been encouraged by white racists, but they have not been helped either by anti-Asian sentiments and actions on the part of Blacks. What do we call racial prejudice amongst non-White people when we dismiss all racial prejudice amongst non-White people?

[KathTheDragon]

the people who claim that only white people can be racist. So this isn't racism?

Tmk this is generally said specifically in the context of between white non-white people, not amongst non-white people.

[Emily]

I have been reading about the recent attacks on (often older) Asian people here in the US and learned that they were very often committed by Black individuals and that there exists significant anti-Asian sentiments amongst Black people here in the US and, conversely, there exists significant anti-Black sentiments amongst Asian people here in the US (consider the case of the Rodney King riots).

The thing that gets me about this, though, is the people who claim that only white people can be racist. So this isn't racism? Sure, anti-Black sentiments amongst Asians have been encouraged by white racists, but they have not been helped either by anti-Asian sentiments and actions on the part of Blacks. What do we call racial prejudice amongst non-White people when we dismiss all racial prejudice amongst non-White people?

no one says only white people are racist, they say that "anti-white racism" isn't racism

[Travis B.]

no one says only white people are racist, they say that "anti-white racism" isn't racism

I have read people on a number of occasions explicitly defining racism as "racial prejudice plus power", with having power being equated with being White, thus defining, often explicitly, non-White racism out of existence; simultaneously the same individuals seemed dismissive of racial prejudice on the part of non-White people, as if it did not matter. Of course they may have only been mentally dismissing racial prejudice on the part of POCs aimed at White people, and failing to conceive of racial prejudice aimed at, say, Asians (what about racial prejudice aimed at Ashkenazi Jews, as in the attacks on them by Black Israelites, and what about the racial hatreds between different East Asian groups?)

[zompist]

I have read people on a number of occasions explicitly defining racism as "racial prejudice plus power", with having power being equated with being White, thus defining, often explicitly, non-White racism out of existence;

That's actually a pretty good formulation, and it's a pity you're too caught up in your grievance to see it.

As a linguist, you should recall that words have different meanings. Among other things, that means that you can't take someone else's use of a word and insist it means what you want it to mean.

These "people", whoever they are, are calling racial prejudice "racial prejudice". You want to use "racism" for this, but they've told you, by giving a definition, that they are not using the word this way. Therefore you cannot twist their words to pretend that they are saying non-white racial prejudice doesn't exist.

"Racial prejudice plus power" is a good handle for understanding a lot of what's wrong in the US. Lots of people have racial prejudice, but only white people have the power to make entire institutions prejudiced. They control the police departments, hiring in almost every industry, publishing and entertainment, the majority of government. Non-white people, no matter what their feelings, do not have that power.

In general, people continue to use "racist" in many ways. Often it does mean racial prejudice. Even in those cases, however, the connection to power is always there. A dispute between neighbors, or passersby in a park, may originate from personal racial prejudice, but when the police or the press arrive, institutional racism gets involved, and the white and Black people are treated differently.

[Travis B.]

The distinction I would prefer to make is between everyday individual racism (rather than saying "no, that's just racial prejudice, racism does not mean that (despite everyone actually using it that way)"), and systemic racism, i.e. racism that is part of societies and institutions as wholes, but which may vary based on context (e.g. the systemic racism present in American society is not the same as the systemic racism present in Japanese society, for instance). That way we're not redefining a term from how it's commonly used, while at the same time we are using a term as it already means when we are specifically talking about the racism baked into a society as a whole.

[Travis B.]

Note that I do not deny that power is part of this, as power is what makes the racism in systemic racism systemic. Without power, individual hatreds would remain individual hatreds, even when people act on them (e.g. in the cases that I mentioned here, even with racial prejudice on the part of individual Black people towards Asian people, which has culminated in actual violence in a number of cases, this racial prejudice is not reflected on the part of society as a whole, i.e. Asian people can be reasonably confident that institutions will not act towards them in a prejudiced fashion*).

* with some exceptions such as admissions into certain universities

[Linguoboy]

This worn-out hobby horse again, Travis?

The distinction I would prefer to make is between everyday individual racism (rather than saying "no, that's just racial prejudice, racism does not mean that (despite everyone actually using it that way)"), and systemic racism, i.e. racism that is part of societies and institutions as wholes, but which may vary based on context (e.g. the systemic racism present in American society is not the same as the systemic racism present in Japanese society, for instance). That way we're not redefining a term from how it's commonly used, while at the same time we are using a term as it already means when we are specifically talking about the racism baked into a society as a whole.

We know you prefer that. We read your posts with your choice of usage in mind. In return, we only ask that you read what others write with their choice of usage in mind. This is how we do things in a pluralistic society. When you become the 21st-century Shihuangdi, you can burn all works which use the term "racism" in a way you don't care for. But we ain't there yet.

[Ares Land]

The original problem is that whenever racism in minority communities is pointed out, it is always used as an excuse not to consider racism among the majority.
The same is done, BTW, with anti-semitims, prejudice towards women, religion, what have you.

We can see the end result in France: we moved from 'Arabs are lazy and criminal' (that was too obviously racist) to 'Arabs are Muslim, and therefore deny women rights, are potential terrorists and so on...'. This sets an absurd dilemma: abandon your religion, and then maybe we can talk about racism.
The same happens with racism among minority communities: much has be made too of the fact that Asian have suffered racist attacks from blacks and Arabs. Again, this sets an absurd standard: 'prove to us that your community -- and anyone that happens to look a bit like you -- is 100% free from racism and then we can talk about our own racism.' That happens with anti-White racism ('black people say mean things about white people, this means there's no racism in France. Except for Arab and Blacks who are racist, and thieves too.') and antisemitism.
The interesting thing is that there's a lot of cherry-picking involved (There's often no love lost between Arabs and other African communities, but somehow this doesn't get commented on.)

Basically, pointing out racism among minorities provides an excuse not to consider the possibility of white people being racist too. Not to mention, that attitude hasn't helped one bit towards reducing racism within minorities.

Hence the idea of restricting the 'racism' moniker to white people.
I see the reasoning behind this. As it happens I know Moroccans that don't like black people much, Senegalese immigrants that don't like Arabs. The end result is that, well, they don't like black people or Arabs. They don't get to choose who they work with or who they live with based on their prejudices; neither do they get a whole half of the political spectrum almost entirely dedicated to pandering to their prejudices.
For that matter, they won't even voice that sentiment except among very close intimates.
As I happens I also know racist white people: they get to noisily complain about people they don't like at every occasion, while living in all-white neighborhoods, working at all-white workplaces. They get just about every excuse for being racist, TV channels pandering to their worldview, and a tasty choice of political parties each finely tuned to the amount of racism they're willing to own up to.

It's pretty clear one case is far less damaging than the other.

And yet, I'm not comfortable with racism being defined to include only white-on-minority racism. It only convinces the already convinced.
In effect it serves as a ground for turf battles within the left, and a shibboleth for the more militant. Besides, it's confusing, and it's probably scaring off the moderates.
I mean, I do get the idea, but I think the last thing we need right now is the left-wing scaring off the moderates.

[Linguoboy]

Basically, pointing out racism among minorities provides an excuse not to consider the possibility of white people being racist too. Not to mention, that attitude hasn't helped one bit towards reducing racism within minorities.

I recently had a demonstration of how this works in another group.

A Black friend on Facebook started a discussion around the discrepancy in the amount of respect that white people show Black names as evidenced by the amount of effort they put into learning to pronounce unusual names borne by white people versus those borne by Black people. (Note that when I say "Black names", I don't just mean "stereotypical African-American names"; one woman contributed a story about having her French name treated respectfully over the phone when the person on the other end perceived her as "white"--not an inference, because the other person said as much when they met in person--and then disrespected by the very same person once it was obvious she was Black.) I posted about this on a language-discussion board and got one response along the lines of, "Have you considered that these Black people's perception of the situation is clouded because they're racist towards white people?" (And this was after I'd share the very same specific example I just posted above.)

Rather than get into the whole terminological argument (which--if you couldn't tell--I'm well and truly tired of from my time on the ZBB) I just said "What you're calling 'racism' here I would call 'racial animus' and those aren't the same thing" and moved on to addressing his other points. Black people bitching about how white people won't say their names correctly isn't at all comparable to white people refusing to say their names correctly in the first place--not in its origins, not in its motivations, and not in its effects.

ETA: And another example in the same group which shows another pitfall. Basically, it was a quibble about whether government actions which demonstrably have a discriminatory impact on members of particular racial groups can fairly be called "racist" if there's no proof of racist intent. The whole point of broadening the definition of "racism" to encompass more than simply racial animus was to keep arguments from going down rabbit holes like these. At the end of the day, how much does it matter whether the law was expressly intended to be discriminatory or whether the draughters just ignored those who said it would be discriminatory in practice? The same civil rights get violated either way.

[Ares Land]

"Have you considered that these Black people's perception of the situation is clouded because they're racist towards white people?" (And this was after I'd share the very same specific example I just posted above.

Oh boy. There's just nothing right about that. (In a similar anecdote, a colleague of mine is called, shall we say, Asom, a Laotian first name -- not his real name, but on par in terms of difficulty. Another colleague of mine consistently calls him Osam. It's been two years. It's getting increasingly awkward.)

[Travis B.]

I think something that needs to be considered is that race does not function the same way in different societies. Take my example of Japanese society - there is far more systemic racism aimed at ethnically Chinese and Korean people in Japan than here in the United States. One cannot assume that the same racial hierarchy exists in all societies - in Japan, for instance, white Europeans are not unambiguously at the top of the hierarchy. This is why I am against treating things as if there were one racial hierarchy, with white Europeans at the top, in a one size fits all manner across all places and times. (Even the very definition of "white" has changed drastically over time.)

Of course, I completely agree that racial prejudice held by minorities must not be used to excuse systemic racism. Take the hate crimes against Asians by black people here in the US - that still pales in comparison to the number of unarmed black people killed by police each year here (in the recent attacks one person was killed, which is still one too many, but still a far smaller number). White people do not get to say "but but but they're racist too!" as if their own systemic racism does not matter, as if that makes everything equivalent.