Objectively intelligent.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Question for you, as I try to understand what you are saying here. As you know, other people here, including Adder, use the word "racist" differently that you do. Since Adder is the one who called Taibbi's post racist, you are taking into account what he means by that word, and are using it in the same way, yes?

There’s a flaw in my own argument there. I used “would be present” where I should have said “could be present.”

[Adder]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

This is almost as dumb as your assertion Taibbi is compromised by Russians, which is tinfoil hat stuff.

If a critic writes a hit job on a book about Nazis, is he a Nazi sympathizer? If he writes a hit job on a book about the Irish, is he bigoted toward the Irish?

There are myriad reasons for performing a hit job on a book. Taibbi may in fact simply dislike her argument. He may be mad that her book on racism is selling better than his.

Stop being the dog barking at every spinning wheel.

You aren’t this stupid. Stop it.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

You miss the point. DiAngelo is not a screwball. You are a screwball. I read her. I enjoyed her and found her enlightening. You, and a whole lot of my silliest white friends (many without a terrific canon of books read or subjects studied behind them) are the people who are being tuned out. You take what she says and run it to absurdist ends. It's like a new orthodox religion for white progressives who need hobbies.

No sensible thinker would engage a person such as you, who simply screams "Bigot!" at everything he sees. They'd deem you frivolous. And yet you do it, over and over and over.

Once again, you need to realize that well meaning people do, say and support racist ideas. I do it. You do it. Tiabbi did it. The challenge is for you to accept that and realize that it doesn’t reveal an irredeemable aspect of your character unless, having seen it, you persist.

Which is 1A in the thesis of White Fragility, which you “enjoyed”. I only ask that you read further bcs you clearly didn’t get it from there. How To Be Antiracist involves a black author realizing his own racist ideas, which I both recommend you read and realize that you will still ignore, because it’s not really anything I and others haven’t said to you for coming up on multiple decades.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Adder

You aren’t this stupid. Stop it.

You’re delusional and childlike. Get a grip.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Because I think it’s quite useful to let people who say dumb things as Cotton did have those things criticized in a mainstream medium.

Cotton would just get atta boys on Brietbart or Fox. Here, he was savaged by those who thought his views dumb and repugnant.

I think less siloing is needed. Sunlight eradicates a lot of our tribalism.

One more time, with feeling: The NYT can put a lot of sunlight on Cotton's ideas without doing what it did, and without relaxing its ordinary editorial standards.

ETA: I do not think Taibbi pushes dumb ideas. I think his personal website is one where he exercises his pen and plays with concepts. His RS articles are much tighter and often pull in bits of his earlier personal website work. Others have done something similar, using web material as a rough draft or to test popularity of a subject with the audience.

His personal site seems to be a place where he throws up wooly, ragged pieces that ramble from point to point without every developing one at length or responding in good faith to someone who he disagrees with. A editor might have said, gee, that doesn't sound like a fair characterization of what White Fragility is arguing. Can you quote a whole sentence from the book? Can you figure out what its author would say to you in her own defense? He's not stupid, but he's self-indulgent. If he's posting rough drafts to gauge his audience's appetite for lulz, that sounds like a business plan, not a path to good writing.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Not everything is racist. Some things don't have anything, anything at all, to do with race.

And not everything that has to do with race is racist. Matt Taibbi taking shots at DiAngelo? Not automatically racist. In terms of either impact or intent, his article does not warrant someone saying, "He's racist!" and not having that suggestion tested.

Nor does anyone's defense of him automatically mean they are demonstrating white fragility. They aren't. They're demonstrating exhaustion. Exhaustion with dimwits like Adder who are abusing DiAngelo's concept.

If everything is racist and anyone who argues something may not in fact be racist exhibiting fragility (one wonders how this applies to Black people who'd defend Taibbi, but that's another conversation*), then everything in the world - literally everything - can be and arguably must be seen through a lens of race.

That is objectively an absurd statement. It's also delusional, and seriously fucking boring. If I go to an art gallery and see a work depicting people of a certain race, then race is present, and racism would by extension be present. It is related to the work. If I walk a few rooms away and look at water lilies, or melting clocks, racism is not present. The work in no way has anything to do with race.

I'm not fragile about being called anything. Sexist, racist, phobic in one regard or another. I don't care. Opinions are free. People can think what they like of me.

But I do dislike dumb. And asserting that race is a primary element of everything around us is dumb. People like Adder calling everything racist immediately, without considering the subject in detail is dumb. And defending them by saying anyone challenging them for being dumb is actually exhibiting fragility is both dumb in itself and cynical. It's placing the argument beyond reproach. And that's transparent. That telecasts weakness of an argument. That which cannot withstand scrutiny and insists on delegitimizing scrutiny of itself is usually lacking in one regard or another.

DiAngelo made a good argument. But she also took people like Adder to task. Defending Adder's behavior I'd say puts one at odds with DiAngelo.

_______
* Which Adder would duck by saying, "Blacks and can racists, and suggesting otherwise make you racist," refusing to address the real issue.

Same old bullshit.

TM

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Adder

Once again, you need to realize that well meaning people do, say and support racist ideas. I do it. You do it. Tiabbi did it. The challenge is for you to accept that and realize that it doesn’t reveal an irredeemable aspect of your character unless, having seen it, you persist.

Which is 1A in the thesis of White Fragility, which you “enjoyed”. I only ask that you read further bcs you clearly didn’t get it from there. How To Be Antiracist involves a black author realizing his own racist ideas, which I both recommend you read and realize that you will still ignore, because it’s not really anything I and others haven’t said to you for coming up on multiple decades.

His idea is not necessarily racist. He’s finding fault with her book. I think unfairly, because he’s cherry picking her frivolous arguments, but again: That Is Not Inherently Racist.

If I take issue with an author’s thinking, and that author happens to be anti racist, that does not immediately make me a racist. It immediately makes me a critic.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

Same old bullshit.

TM

Incorrect. You have no reply.

And you know it. Logically, all you can do is say I’m fragile. But I don’t care. So I can’t be fragile. My issue is with the construct. Adder can’t just declare everything racist and then when called to the carpet, cry, “Fragility!” It destroys conversation. It places subjects beyond scrutiny. It smacks of religious thinking.

You can only win this debate by avoiding logic.

ETA: Or abusing semantics. But I’m not allowing that, either. I’m using the broad definition of racism. I’m talking about systemic racism.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I'm not resistant in the slightest to the idea that Taibbi is racist. I just don't think a post that says, essentially, oh, that's so racist, without additional explanation, is adding much to the conversation. Taibbi's review of that book seems completely of a piece with the other thing of his that Sebby posted recently about the media, in that it's a bunch of drive-by cheap points rather than an effort to respond to what smart people are saying and thinking. It's no surprise that he's posting that stuff on his own site instead of getting it published, because it's self-indulgent.

I thought it would be understood by everyone that I was not sharing Taibbi because I agree with him, but maybe I needed to say that.

How are you still doing this? I didn’t say that Tiabbi “is racist.” Is said I was surprised that he was willing to be as racist as he was in that piece. He wrote a racist piece. Does that reveal his character? That’s up to individual judgment, but the piece and the ideas it expressed were racist, in that it disparaged antiracist ideas and upheld racists ones. What he said had the inherent character of reinforcing existing racial hierarchies and dismissing attempts to dismantle them. It was racist. Whether or not he “is” doesn’t interest me in the least.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Not everything is racist. Some things don't have anything, anything at all, to do with race.

And not everything that has to do with race is racist. Matt Taibbi taking shots at DiAngelo? Not automatically racist. In terms of either impact or intent, his article does not warrant someone saying, "He's racist!" and not having that suggestion tested.

Nor does anyone's defense of him automatically mean they are demonstrating white fragility. They aren't. They're demonstrating exhaustion. Exhaustion with dimwits like Adder who are abusing DiAngelo's concept.

If everything is racist and anyone who argues something may not in fact be racist exhibiting fragility (one wonders how this applies to Black people who'd defend Taibbi, but that's another conversation*), then everything in the world - literally everything - can be and arguably must be seen through a lens of race.

That is objectively an absurd statement. It's also delusional, and seriously fucking boring. If I go to an art gallery and see a work depicting people of a certain race, then race is present, and racism would by extension be present. It is related to the work. If I walk a few rooms away and look at water lilies, or melting clocks, racism is not present. The work in no way has anything to do with race.

I'm not fragile about being called anything. Sexist, racist, phobic in one regard or another. I don't care. Opinions are free. People can think what they like of me.

But I do dislike dumb. And asserting that race is a primary element of everything around us is dumb. People like Adder calling everything racist immediately, without considering the subject in detail is dumb. And defending them by saying anyone challenging them for being dumb is actually exhibiting fragility is both dumb in itself and cynical. It's placing the argument beyond reproach. And that's transparent. That telecasts weakness of an argument. That which cannot withstand scrutiny and insists on delegitimizing scrutiny of itself is usually lacking in one regard or another.

DiAngelo made a good argument. But she also took people like Adder to task. Defending Adder's behavior I'd say puts one at odds with DiAngelo.

_______
* Which Adder would duck by saying, "Blacks and can racists, and suggesting otherwise make you racist," refusing to address the real issue.

You’re just plugging your ears and not engaging with what others are saying. Again.

Also, in 21st Century America, everything has to do with race. You’re in denial if you don’t see it.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

His idea is not necessarily racist. He’s finding fault with her book. I think unfairly, because he’s cherry picking her frivolous arguments, but again: That Is Not Inherently Racist.

If I take issue with an author’s thinking, and that author happens to be anti racist, that does not immediately make me a racist. It immediately makes me a critic.

It is and that’s why you need to keep reading.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

One more time, with feeling: The NYT can put a lot of sunlight on Cotton's ideas without doing what it did, and without relaxing its ordinary editorial standards.



His personal site seems to be a place where he throws up wooly, ragged pieces that ramble from point to point without every developing one at length or responding in good faith to someone who he disagrees with. A editor might have said, gee, that doesn't sound like a fair characterization of what White Fragility is arguing. Can you quote a whole sentence from the book? Can you figure out what its author would say to you in her own defense? He's not stupid, but he's self-indulgent. If he's posting rough drafts to gauge his audience's appetite for lulz, that sounds like a business plan, not a path to good writing.

Well, dude’s gotta eat. Might be partially a business plan.

But his writing and his viewpoint, when condensed in RS or his books, is both uniquely untethered from the usual viewpoints one sees (left v. right) and incredibly insightful.

And the bon mots... Dude can turn a phrase like few others.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Adder

You’re just plugging your ears and not engaging with what others are saying. Again.

Also, in 21st Century America, everything has to do with race. You’re in denial if you don’t see it.

Here you go again, plugging your ears and refusing to listen anyone who tells you can’t just cry “Fragile!”

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Adder

It is and that’s why you need to keep reading.

Oh my but are you a truly deluded fuck. Seriously.

Suppose I am antiracist and I critique another antiracist’s book because I think there are flaws in her reasoning. Does that make me racist? Suppose she replies back by critiquing my antiracist views? Is she now racist too?

And if either of us calls each other racist, are our responsive defenses to be immediately discounted as fragility?

You see how see how absurd this becomes.

You have no logic. It degrades to silliness.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Adder

How are you still doing this? I didn’t say that Tiabbi “is racist.” Is said I was surprised that he was willing to be as racist as he was in that piece. He wrote a racist piece. Does that reveal his character? That’s up to individual judgment, but the piece and the ideas it expressed were racist, in that it disparaged antiracist ideas and upheld racists ones. What he said had the inherent character of reinforcing existing racial hierarchies and dismissing attempts to dismantle them. It was racist. Whether or not he “is” doesn’t interest me in the least.

I appreciate this post for explaining what you are thinking -- I didn't mean to misquote you, but my objection to the last one was that you called the piece racist without saying anything more.

I don't think disparaging antiracist writing is necessarily racist. If an antiracist tract is poorly written and hard to read, saying that could be fair. Do you agree with Akila Lacy's attack on Lee Fang?