Antiracism as the new religion
[Hat tip: Ace.]
This piece by John McWhorter is well worth reading. A few excerpts:
…Antiracism is now a religion. It is inherent to a religion that one is to accept certain suspensions of disbelief. Certain questions are not to be asked, or if asked, only politely””and the answer one gets, despite being somewhat half-cocked, is to be accepted as doing the job…
For example, one is not to ask “Why are black people so upset about one white cop killing a black man when black men are at much more danger of being killed by one another?” Or, one might ask this, very politely””upon which the answers are flabby but further questions are unwelcome…
To say one is not to question is not to claim that no questions are ever asked. The Right quite readily questions Antiracism’s tenets. Key, however, is that among Antiracism adherents, those questions are tartly dismissed as inappropriate and often, predictably, as racist themselves. The questions are received with indignation that one would even ask them, with a running implication that their having been asked is a symptom of, yes, racism’s persistence.
Racism used to be about behavior, often quite overt behavior. Segregation and Jim Crow laws. Clear discrimination in which there was no equality of opportunity. Lynchings. Going further back in time, slavery.
These things are, fortunately, long gone. But the promised land—equality of outcome—has not been reached, and doesn’t seem all that close despite the achievements of some black people and the evidence of President Obama’s election. The persistence of inequality of outcome can only be explained by two factors or a combination of those two factors: problems inherent in the black community or black people, or problems inherent in the non-black (white and “other) community’s treatment of black people. Look inward or look outward, or look both ways.
It is much less painful to look outward, however. And of course there will always be some truth to the claim that racism exists, especially if you define it as thoughtcrime: there is no way to eradicate all elements of racism from some people’s hearts and minds, and this goes for people of all races.
Lately the Left has gotten around the entire dilemma by the elevation of the doctrine of “disparate impact.” In that way, inequality of outcome is assumed to be evidence of inequality of opportunity resulting from racism, even if it’s such a subtle form of racism it cannot be detected in any other way.
equality of outcome was never promised.. in fact it was denied as possible in a free individualist state…
that is a communist concept and always was
which is why women are now fighting for equal pay… what is equal pay? it means a woman working as a secretary gets the salary of a neurosurgeon…
but do they EVER actually explain that what its purpose is, is to institute soviet style economics?
the department of labor:
Women make up nearly half of our nation’s workforce. Yet from factory floors to boardrooms, their talent and hard work are not reflected in their paycheck. Today, women on average are paid only 78 cents for every dollar a man earns. For women of color, that pay gap is even wider.
they dont say how that is derived, or why that has not changed since the 1970s… do they?
Time for Equal Pay Now
April 13, 2015
It’s Time for Equal Pay Now
Women’s Bureau Director Latifa Lyles writes on the continued fight to close the wage gap on Equal Pay Day 2015…
no mens bureau…
September 17, 2014
Encouraging Pay Transparency
Department of Labor Proposes Rule to Prohibit Pay Secrecy Policies and Actions by Federal Contractors and Subcontractors…
November 12, 2014
Working to Close Pay Gap
OFCCP is identifying patterns of underpaid workers and linking them to discriminatory problems in order to close the pay gap…
the problem is that there is no pay gap… it only exists if you compare apples to oranges, and dont account for the differences. if you account for differences, women actually make more than men… (cause who wants a lawsuit to destroy their company?)
even the wiki is quite wrong and not truthful on it
Equal pay for equal work s the concept of labor rights that individuals doing the same work should receive the same remuneration
define “same work” dont leave it up to YOUR assumption…
does an entry level person in the same job get the same pay as someone 10 years in that job?
even the white house:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/issues/equal-pay
Equal pay is a family issue. Women make up nearly half of the U.S. labor force and are a growing number of breadwinners in their families. More women are also working in positions and fields that have been traditionally occupied by men. When women are not paid fairly, not only do they suffer, but so do their families.
and when men are not paid, the women say, where have all the good men gone? where can i find a husband to fit my hypergamous desires? will women marry equal? will they stay with equal?
they are about to be made even more miserable as their assumption is that they will get pay raises, not that their husbands will get pay cuts to their level.
ie, they wont lift up 78% to equal the dollar amoung they will cut the dollar amount to equal the 78%
but as far as i can tell, women are not to bright on these changes they keep getting told to make and be for and such…
think of it this way. a woman making 78,000 a year with a husband making 100,000 a year will make a combined 178,000… will she be happy with the equal pay when her salary stays the same, and his drops to hers? so that now the family brings in 156000 and they lose 22,000?
but just as with other things, what is being offered is not explained so that idiots think their assumptions will be fulfilled.
Some orchestras have musicians audition from behind a curtain so as to remove the possibility of bias based on sex, race, age or ethnicity. This ensures that the music performance is paramount.
If racial factors could be removed from the treatment of blacks, they would do worse than they are doing at present. There would be fewer black doctors, lawyers, and college graduates. Putting a thumb on the scale to “make it fair” is common.
Given the huge educational and intellectual differences by race, equality of outcome can only come from government coercion.
the soviet revolution has been here for a while, we are just too dumb to realize they are replacing the old stuff with new soviet stuff piece by piece. like replacing a wall one brick at a time till now you have a rubber wall instead of a concrete one, and dont notice the substance of what you see has changed.
glad i will be dead…
but sadly, i will miss the wailing of the women who will cry and hate it even more… after all, their sons and daughters now can never be successful!!!!
then agian, women will cut up their children for sale of body parts and call it womens health and protect it… so really, will it be any less delusional?
Artfldgr:
Equality of outcome is a leftist concept antithetical to liberty. It was never envisioned as part of the US. But as I indicated in the post, it is what the left is chasing (or pretending to chase), and of course it can never be reached. I think Thomas Sowell in The Quest for Cosmic Justice is excellent on this subject.
Equality doesn’t even exist, it’s like a fake religion.
“Antiracism is now a religion.” It is not a religion, leftism is the religion, but racism is one of the few moral principles the left has not destroyed. According to the left, white racism is the original sin which led to humanity’s expulsion from the garden of Eden. To make their dogma work the left must first believe that there is not really a genetic basis for race at all and that therefore any difference between outcomes between races have to be caused by a hostile environment. Since the races are supposedly genetically indistinguishable the belief that there are different races is really a myth.
At the same time the left hold that white racism is the original sin. That can only be true if there is an identifiable white race to hold responsible for that original sin. Since the dogma of white guilt is based on two mutually contradictory premises, the left can not subject their dogmas to rational analysis.
Incidentally, I don’t accept the argument that “It is inherent to a religion that one is to accept certain suspensions of disbelief. Certain questions are not to be asked, or if asked, only politely-…” All philosophies or systemic logical constructs do have basic premises which are assumed – not proved. Many secularists attribute irrationality to religion because they don’t understand the basic unspoken premises which support their own beliefs.
In their relentless obsession with race, those crying “racist” most often have become what they claim to abhor.
Liberty, Justice, Equality. Pick any two.
Equality: The Impossible Quest
More correctly, pro-choice as a new religious doctrine, which is notably amoral and opportunistic. They are nothing if not selective in their principles. Case in point, homosexual, while excluding other orientations and behaviors. And, of course, Cecile the Abortionist, who makes Gosnell look like an amateur.
The persistence of inequality of outcome can only be explained by two factors or a combination of those two factors: problems inherent in the black community or in black people, problems inherent in the non-black (white and “other) community’s treatment of black people or in non-black people. Look inward or look outward, or look both ways.
It is the culture stupid!
Here, the female version.
Title of mah mastah thesis was:
Socio-cultural components of economic growth …
Had no impact ….
The persistence of inequality of outcome can only be explained by two factors or a combination of those two factors: problems inherent in the black community or in black people, problems inherent in the non-black (white and “other) community’s treatment of black people or in non-black people. Look inward or look outward, or look both ways.
Thomas Sowell the Great nailed it a long time ago:
Crippled by Their Culture.
And, creepy they are!
Not only is it a religion, but a business, or rather a racket, as well. There is a great deal deal of money to be made in writing and public speaking on the subject of the malevolence of whites and the ubiquity and all-pervasive evil of white racism (Tim Wise being a particularly egregious example), but black race-hustlers and progressive whites have an insatiable appetite for such material, as evidenced by the phenomenal success of the new book by TNC.
Not only is it a religion, but a business, or rather a racket, as well.
It has been for a while!
Howard University at play!
All for now!
I just finished an interesting novel titled “The Camp of the Saints” by Jean Raspail written in 1973 about anti-racism. The left goes on and on about race and spews the same pious bromides that we still hear today. A Democrat of today could use the speeches in the novel and no one would know that they were written 45 years ago. The results if put into practice would produce the same disaster as in the novel.
There is no place on earth where large numbers of people of African descent live as well as they do in the U.S. That includes African nations. The standard of living of Americans is largely created by people of European descent.
If all the white folks in a given state were to disappear, black folks would suffer greatly.
Two hundred years ago white folks in Haiti were run off in a slave revolt. It’s been a rat hole ever since.
Mr. Frank said: “If all the white folks in a given state were to disappear, black folks would suffer greatly.”
See Detroit and Baltimore.
Hell, see Zimbabwe and South Africa, for that matter.
I’ve pointed out before that every other race and culture is taught to be proud of their heritage and history. Only white people are taught to be ashamed of theirs. This despite the fact that the white race is entirely responsible for the creation of the modern world. Every other race has benefited from the accomplishments and inventions of the white race. Today even relatively poor people in Africa and Asia use smartphones that communicate by satellite.
More than anything, it was “white guilt” that elected Obama. It didn’t matter how many blacks voted for him; he never could have won with millions of votes from white people who have come to believe that they “owed” him somehow.
The other day, a commenter at Ace of Spades linked the American Renaissance website. True, he was not a regular and was guilty of spamming several comment threads with the same link, which is a breach of blog etiquette. But several commenters jumped on him with “get out of here and go back to Stormfront”, probably without even bothering to read his link. They ironically proved the very point he was trying to make.
I checked out his link and found that it is a pretty good site, with thoughtful posts and comments. No, I don’t agree with every comment I’ve seen there. I don’t agree with every comment I see here, either. But anyone who sees no difference between American Renaissance and Stormfront deserves to be called a “cuckservative”, quite frankly.
Today, white Americans are probably the least racist people on Earth. Yet we are continually browbeaten with the notion that we must atone for past sins, which invariably means that we should give up our wealth, property, and political power. This needs to stop. White people must develop an explicit sense of racial consciousness and pride. Our survival depends on it. We are importing the dregs of the Third World at a frightening pace. I do not want to live in a neighborhood where whites are a minority, and if America becomes a white minority nation, it will cease to be America as we have known it.
If you study the word racist you find it was invented in the 1930s by Magnus Hirschfeld, a German doctor. As you have noticed, the leftists are obsessed with race sex and money and they have words for this obsession, sexism, racism and classism. So when you are accused of one of these isms they are claiming you are obsessed by sex, race or class. This is so obviously psychological projection. I find it funny.
But anyone who sees no difference between American Renaissance and Stormfront deserves to be called a
The KKK was founded by Nathan Bedford Forrest as a patrician brotherhood to help local families get through the post war era. Democrats turned it into a racist, domineering, terrorist death squad that helped elect Democrats by executing Republicans and blacks.
Thus I do not hate institutions merely because of their name or origin. I hate them because of their masters, their virtues or vices.
When the KKK was still being funded and organized by Democrats, it had a threat level extremely high, since they could kill/intimidate, and nothing would happen to them, much like Democrat union protected police raids. That federal or state level immunity is what gave their extremist views the danger.
Now a days they have been defanged. They are far less a threat. If 50 KKK white hoodies came to my neighborhood or house, I could negotiate with them as equals, since my firepower would be equal or greater than theirs.
However, back in the day when the KKK was funded and organized by Democrats, I could never negotiate with them as equals, unless I had wealth, leverage, or violence to compare with the entire Democrat party.
To free humans, this changes how they react to certain people. People with greater powers, should be treated differently than your equals or inferiors.
The weaklings that obey their cultural doctrine, will hate a symbol merely because it is a symbol, and not because of its actual threat. Nobody asks the normal peons at the bottom of the power ladder, what they think about anything, because they’re as stupid as the people you see being interviewed on “candid camera” youtube.
It takes a higher level of awareness, effort, wisdom, and intelligence to see beyond the facade of an organization in to its true purpose and leadership.
And the reason they don’t do it with Stormfront or other orgs is because they are weak, howling, afraid, doggies that cover up their fear by barking really really loud. They may not be afraid of Stormfront, but they are afraid of greater society calling them racists and exiling them. Such weak spined idiots are going to tell us what to do in the future, it seems. Not sure which is the greater comedy/tragedy.
The primary issue with racism in America was that it destroyed the economy of Southern plantation farms. The North had greater industrial might because they had free workers, not because the North stole the resources of the South, like Democrats keep telling their poor white Southern brethren after Reconstruction.
Racism also outlawed education of the blacks on the plantation, thereby creating the equal of a breeding program. But a breeding program for humans does not make a strong economy or strong culture. It’s like Planned Parenthood trying to “plan” how to sell parts off, it’s a dead end goal.
Racism when it was used as a weapon to justify Democrat monopoly and totalitarian tyranny, became a serious problem. But racism when it is not backed by Democrats or any organized KKK terror cell, becomes far less of an issue.
The Left likes to turn their enemy’s weapons and defense systems against them. Which is why they are using the civil rights laws, which were used to defeat Democrat racists that circumvented the Union victory in CW I, against blacks, whites, Republicans, etc. Especially the South, a long time revenge of the Democrats when the South threw off Democrat shackles after 1960.
Paul in Boston wrote:
The left goes on and on about race and spews the same pious bromides that we still hear today. A Democrat of today could use the speeches in the novel and no one would know that they were written 45 years ago.
And in the meantime, we’ve been dragged through many repetitions of the same old rancid script: increasingly angry cries of racism followed by more white guilt, more money, programs and special treatment of blacks to alleviate the guilt and injustice–which never seem to work (usually making the problem worse) while inflicting cost and unfairness on whites and society in general.
As I see it, McWhorter’s essay is primarily an attempt to breathe new life into this stale, nasty, PC script through his “religion” metaphor, one which only sorta works if you understand “religion” in the most cynical way possible: as a scam devised to control and manipulate people for power and profit. Because his “Antiracism religion” is fueled by increasingly shrill complaints of racism, which are used to control and manipulate whites for power and profit.
McWhorter makes an number of dubious comparisons between his “Antiracism” and actual religion, the most significant of which is that whites are branded with the Original Sin of “White Privilege.” One expects him to debunk this putrid idea, but he never gets around to it, even mentioning blandly and without disapproval the fact that white schoolchildren are now browbeaten with this noxious, racist idea.
In the end, McWhorter does find something to criticize in this vile notion of ineradicable, white “Original Sin”: the fact that it leads whites to “a kind of charismatic passivism,” a “willfully incurious, self-flagellating piety” that “distracts us from activism,” from “helping black people succeed” and creating “something more genuinely progressive.” So McWhorter does not really object to the revolting concept of white “Original Sin”; he just wants it to be more productive. As if a white person has no right to a life of his own, his primary purpose being to help black people succeed.
So despite his fancy academic prose and his suspect religious metaphor, McWhorter winds up in the same loathsome place as Al Sharpton: the unquestioned acceptance of collective white guilt and the ceaseless demand that whites do more.
Thus, McWhorter is the intellectual version of Obama, a man who hides his stale, destructive, radical ideas behind a facade of soothing, polished, seemingly reasonable, allegedly fair-minded rhetoric.
Personally, I am long ago fatigued by the left/black racist meme. I judge people as individuals. I do not need a msm play book to decide who I will or will not choose to associate with.
Personally, I am long ago fatigued by the left/black racist meme. I judge people as individuals. I do not need a msm play book to decide who I will or will not choose to associate with.
Tribes
I remember reading that back when it was written, G6. Nostalgia, of early days
Nostalgia, of early days
Yes.
All the evangelizing of the past 20(?) years has been for naughts.
Now we’re heading back for small tribes.
Be courteous to all, but intimate with few, and let those few be well tried before you give them your confidence. George Washington
Nothing new under the sun ….
Prepare, practice, practice some more ….
If you really want to be called racist bring up IQ testing results.
Zombies of the Left wouldn’t even understand IQ if their masters told them to.
Human brains are what zombies normally seek in the myths. Then again, Planned Profit sells a lot more than brains, don’t they.
Don’t they.