Expanding the SC aka The end of democracy

[hollodero]

(06-23-2022, 02:52 PM)Dill Wrote:  I doubt that "racism gets mentioned too often," in the U.S., given "the not so great heritage" that you recognize "is in large parts just true."

But aside from that, I want to agree

Well, agreeing is boring, while of course addressing this part you don't agree with is dangerous. It's sensitive and more that that, there's a grave danger that I trigger you giving an extensive outline about all kinds of historic stages of racism that the country went through and how they are still relevant today. Things that are most likely true and fair.
I'm of course not saying you need to stop to talk about racism. There's plenty of issues where it is necessary to do so, like housing, encounters with law enforcement, inherent biases in the workforce that hamper a black person's chances to advance in the workfield and many more, often a legacy of oppression and a result of current biases. Sure, talk about that please. But I'm distinctly saying that at times, it is too much. Like telling a white woman her wearing dreadlocks is condemnable, because cultural appropration. When we get to racial hairstyle police, it's too much. And it's of course not that topic, it's the sum of topics like these. A loud group of natural born accusers always looking for a thing to be outraged about, quite often coming across as pretty narrow-minded and potentially racist as well. Like dismissing what an old white man says just by pointing out he's an old white man, which happens regularly to the applause of many. Not sober, not helpful.

And sure, these are all little things. But overall, at least when listening to certain people with certain agendas, I feel at times the debate crosses the line of being actually patronizing and condescending even. In a sense of over-victimization, for example. The black person needs constant support in anything, his race has been so beaten up by white oppression that he can't possibly make it without us helping all the way. I also feel it makes no sense to teach white people that they have to walk on eggshells and be ubercautious around black people who are so much hurting and so fragile, and if they make a misstep they need to be demonized. At a point some of those mindsets imho create more diversion between the races instead of less. Like the more extreme parts of critical race theory that the right claims is the whole thing while the left claims it does not exist at all. White people are inherently oppressors through their whiteness and black people are inherently victims and let's make a school project about that. Well, my opinion would be, maybe not. And maybe using "old white man" as an insult isn't such a clever trope either. But I know it's just one more of these tiny things that just sum up, sum up to a plethora of viewpoints where I find myself asking, wait, does this make things better, and does this even make sense? Or is there a tendency to put a racial context to as many things as possible to be a good person and it's sometimes too much and more damaging than helpful.

I will leave out identity politics and popular culture for this explanation of what I meant, for this it is getting out of hand already. I'm not really in a position to talk about these issues.

(06-23-2022, 02:52 PM)Dill Wrote: [...] for keeping the real threat to democracy in sight. People who want to get rid of filibuster are not "dismantling democracy" or some such. States passing "voter integrity" laws while defending Trump's attempted coup are striving to do exactly that. So I just can't endorse systematic/automatic suspicion of Dem motives every time the issue of Constitutional change to preserve democracy arises.

People who don't want the "true parts" of U.S. history taught frequently accuse "the Left" (i.e., people who think the true parts should be taught) of "hating America" and wanting to destroy it. Of course, "the left" is trying to destroy a certain version of U.S. history--one which buries the "true parts"--just as the right is trying to preserve that version.  Teaching the "true parts" threatens the kind of power which grew upon  the refusal to acknowledge them. Hence hostility to things like a "Juneteenth" a national holiday and federal oversight of voting laws. Making "too much" of black people and inequality.

This history debate is a social division much like the science-based ones over evolution and global warming. It's in part about people coming down on different sides of the standards/values which underpin modern science and scholarship, which doesn't exclude "true parts," however uncomfortable they might make us. I think that a lot of Americans (not a majority, but a significant plurality), do not really understand those standards/values, or certainly don't support them where they conflict with received beliefs. 

Agreeing is boring, I said, and hence I will say that I feel at times you're oversimplifying the positions of people with a different viewpoint.
Eg. I have no strong opinion on Juneteenth really; but I'm in favor. But if someone said he's against it being a national holiday, I would not automatically assume that this person aims to keep his power over black people preserved. Not even everyone who accuses the left of hating America is a racist that demands revisionist history. But sure, not that I really disagree as a whole with what you say.