Bill Lear wrote:
Fine.
And you agree that the statement "blackness makes people stupid and
morally degenerate" is not the DUMBEST way in the world to communicate
such a set of ideas to people? How in the world can the left hope to
change anything with such a litter of language? What utter contempt
this shows!
There are some issues here:
We are the left. In fact, if you add the subscribers of PEN-L, LBO and
perhaps a few other outlets, that's probably the sum total of all that
exists of the left in the USA (non-US list-members, I hope understand
that I am honoring them through omission ;-)). So when we talk to each
other such terms should be admissible. When I am trying to convince my
wannabe white friend I will use different, more expressive language and
terminology.
"Blackness makes people stupid and morally degenerate" => how do you
define "blackness"? Today mostly that is understood to mean blackness of
the skin i.e., black people. So yes, that is a racist thing to say,
because alongside that opinion are also control of levers. But is it a
dumb thing to say? That depends again on what is meant, who says it and
whom it is said to. No different than the use of the word "nigger" by a
black person.
Finally, when the oppressor class/group correlates fairly well to the
term employed, any errors in the generalization should be excusable
*within* the community.
So yes, tactically speaking, it is a bad idea to use the term
"whiteness" to denote an attitude (that motivates actions) that is
predominant historically in the white population (in the region of
interest). It is also terminological confusion and perhaps we need seek
better terms. But racist? I don't see how (by the criteria I outlined in
my previous post).
(I need add that there is a fair bit of presuming going on in my theses
above. I could be very wrong in all those presumptions. But then, I
would be wrong, not racist).
--ravi
