Joanna and Her Mascots
Posted: Fri Aug 10, 2012 3:39 am
As with most politically correct ideological conformists, words mean a great deal to Joanna Brooks, especially when a white person is in the "wrong" neighborhood:
Absolutely. A white presidential candidate has to be very careful what he says and how he says it around this most sensitive of the Left's cultural and racial mascots, American black people (oh, excuse me, I meant to say African Americans. As we all no, the vast majority of American blacks are first generation immigrants).
Got that? The NAACP is an exclusive black club, and closed to interlopers, unless otherwise specified (just like the Congressional Black Caucus).
Notice how Brooks here assumes that blacks qua blacks vote, not on the basis of core principle, critical thinking, and educated comprehension of the issues, but upon the basis of racial solidarity. Again, this is indicative of the unbelievablly alienated, culturally and intellectually isolated contemporary academic world she has inhabited for so long and which she brings to her analysis of every issue.
What counts for Brooks as "civil rights" issues upon which one could have a good, poor, or modest record? She doesn't say, and probably for the very salient reason that she understands that here actual criteria is not "civil rights" in any normative, rationally descriptive sense that would be tenable within a self governing, limited government based democratic republic, but racial caste status within a politically and ideologically bifurcated oppressor/oppressed template that sees all human beings, not as unique individuals with their own perspectives, perceptions, and worldviews, but as members of cohesive, lumpen identity groups.
These groups are, of course, reliant, to a great degree on the Anointed to guard and protect them against the raging maelstrom of racism, bigotry, and hate the permeates the Pleistocene world outside the anointed, politically correct halls of academe that is American society.
And here Brooks evinces no concept of the lineage aspect of the core doctrine surrounding the "priesthood ban" and assumes, upon the ground of pure politically correct moral rectitude (no critical thinking required here, just the halo) that racism was the central animating principle. She gets to do this, because she is among the anointed, not because she has any actual evidence. But she's already made clear, in many other of her essays, that evidence is an optional aspect of any argument from the Left. As before said, the answers to all questions have already been answered by the ideological template through which the human condition is perceived. All that remains for the Anointed is to cast the standard epithets and congratulate each other for their enlightened moral superiority and riveting intellectual sophistication
In other words, Romney should bow, scrape, and crawl on his belly in an orgy of white liberal guilt such as fixates Joanna Brooks before black people - any black people, as if he, himself, had ever had anything to do with oppressing any black person, had ever had a racist thought in his life, or been in any way involved with anything of a racial nature that had ever happened to any American black person.
Welcome to the ideological consequences of the concept of collectivism. Romney is white. White people enslaved black people centuries ago. Romney is white, therefore, Romney shares a communal or collective guilt with his "race" for all those past sins, including Jim Crow and defacto segregation. Further, leftist identity ideology stipulates that little has actually changed since Bull Connor and separate water fountains. Romney, as a rich, white capitalist, is not only, like a kind of original sin, still carrying the stigma of the those who imposed the slave collar and the scars of the whip, but is implicated in the continued systematic, institutional oppression of black people as a group by the dominant white ruling class who hold the vast majority of political and economic power.
Romney is not an individual here, but a representative of a group who contains, within himself, the collective attributes, history, and sins of that group. Likewise, each black person in the NAACP, regardless of actual life experience, is a representative of a lumpen mass thought of as unitary and identifiable as a group. Romney is as guilty of slavery, Jim Crow, and racial bigotry - again, irregardless of his actual beliefs and conduct- as were the plantation owners of the old South.
To Brooks and many like here within modern academia, Romney is a member of a tribe, and blacks members of another. As organic collectives, they cannot relate to each other on equal and unique terms, individual to individual, but can only relate as members of identity groups in a Manichean (really, one must think, Hegelian) oppressed/oppressor state of permanent confrontation no matter what conditions actually exist with society as a matter of empirical reality. This permanent confrontation is, of course, part and parcel of the Marxist concept of permanent revolution, which is really what lies at the bottom of the entire cultural Marxist project.
Actually, there are 37 million black Americans in this country, some small fraction of which are actually first generation immigrants. The term "African American," a hyphenated alien created by ideology and the worship of power, has no place in the American experience.
Nor among Latter day Saints.
The NAACP lost all intellectual and moral credibility long ago. For Joanna Brooks to genuflect before it is just one more indication of her own profound insulation from the heart of the American history and experience around her.
You don’t go the NAACP Convention and say “Obamacare.”
You just don’t.
Because we all know that “Obamacare” is a fighting word straight from the lexicon of partisan ugly.
If you want to describe the Affordable Healthcare Act as “Obamacare” in your own house, that’s your business.
Absolutely. A white presidential candidate has to be very careful what he says and how he says it around this most sensitive of the Left's cultural and racial mascots, American black people (oh, excuse me, I meant to say African Americans. As we all no, the vast majority of American blacks are first generation immigrants).
But when you get invited to the annual convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, you don’t say “Obamacare” because you don’t use fighting words when you’re a guest in somebody else’s house. It’s bad manners.
Got that? The NAACP is an exclusive black club, and closed to interlopers, unless otherwise specified (just like the Congressional Black Caucus).
No one imagined Mitt Romney was going to win any votes in that NAACP convention hall in Houston. For so many reasons. For the fact that he is running against Barack Obama.
Notice how Brooks here assumes that blacks qua blacks vote, not on the basis of core principle, critical thinking, and educated comprehension of the issues, but upon the basis of racial solidarity. Again, this is indicative of the unbelievablly alienated, culturally and intellectually isolated contemporary academic world she has inhabited for so long and which she brings to her analysis of every issue.
For the fact that his own record on civil rights is modest, especially in comparison with that of his father, George Romney.
What counts for Brooks as "civil rights" issues upon which one could have a good, poor, or modest record? She doesn't say, and probably for the very salient reason that she understands that here actual criteria is not "civil rights" in any normative, rationally descriptive sense that would be tenable within a self governing, limited government based democratic republic, but racial caste status within a politically and ideologically bifurcated oppressor/oppressed template that sees all human beings, not as unique individuals with their own perspectives, perceptions, and worldviews, but as members of cohesive, lumpen identity groups.
These groups are, of course, reliant, to a great degree on the Anointed to guard and protect them against the raging maelstrom of racism, bigotry, and hate the permeates the Pleistocene world outside the anointed, politically correct halls of academe that is American society.
And for the fact to many black voters Mitt Romney is a stand-in for a faith tradition that did not desegregate its priesthood until the late 1970s. No one imagined Mitt Romney could begin to fix that history of Mormon racism in a speech.
And here Brooks evinces no concept of the lineage aspect of the core doctrine surrounding the "priesthood ban" and assumes, upon the ground of pure politically correct moral rectitude (no critical thinking required here, just the halo) that racism was the central animating principle. She gets to do this, because she is among the anointed, not because she has any actual evidence. But she's already made clear, in many other of her essays, that evidence is an optional aspect of any argument from the Left. As before said, the answers to all questions have already been answered by the ideological template through which the human condition is perceived. All that remains for the Anointed is to cast the standard epithets and congratulate each other for their enlightened moral superiority and riveting intellectual sophistication
But given that Mormon racism was an inescapable backdrop for his speech, Romney might at least have found a way to show a little grace and reflection—qualities essential when dealing with the legacy of race in America, as every president must.
In other words, Romney should bow, scrape, and crawl on his belly in an orgy of white liberal guilt such as fixates Joanna Brooks before black people - any black people, as if he, himself, had ever had anything to do with oppressing any black person, had ever had a racist thought in his life, or been in any way involved with anything of a racial nature that had ever happened to any American black person.
Welcome to the ideological consequences of the concept of collectivism. Romney is white. White people enslaved black people centuries ago. Romney is white, therefore, Romney shares a communal or collective guilt with his "race" for all those past sins, including Jim Crow and defacto segregation. Further, leftist identity ideology stipulates that little has actually changed since Bull Connor and separate water fountains. Romney, as a rich, white capitalist, is not only, like a kind of original sin, still carrying the stigma of the those who imposed the slave collar and the scars of the whip, but is implicated in the continued systematic, institutional oppression of black people as a group by the dominant white ruling class who hold the vast majority of political and economic power.
Romney is not an individual here, but a representative of a group who contains, within himself, the collective attributes, history, and sins of that group. Likewise, each black person in the NAACP, regardless of actual life experience, is a representative of a lumpen mass thought of as unitary and identifiable as a group. Romney is as guilty of slavery, Jim Crow, and racial bigotry - again, irregardless of his actual beliefs and conduct- as were the plantation owners of the old South.
To Brooks and many like here within modern academia, Romney is a member of a tribe, and blacks members of another. As organic collectives, they cannot relate to each other on equal and unique terms, individual to individual, but can only relate as members of identity groups in a Manichean (really, one must think, Hegelian) oppressed/oppressor state of permanent confrontation no matter what conditions actually exist with society as a matter of empirical reality. This permanent confrontation is, of course, part and parcel of the Marxist concept of permanent revolution, which is really what lies at the bottom of the entire cultural Marxist project.
There was no real graciousness today, and there were no risks taken. Except showing up at the NAACP convention, which pretty much every GOP presidential candidate does, and should. After all, there are 37 million African Americans in this country, and the president should show up for them too.
Actually, there are 37 million black Americans in this country, some small fraction of which are actually first generation immigrants. The term "African American," a hyphenated alien created by ideology and the worship of power, has no place in the American experience.
Nor among Latter day Saints.
But to Mitt Romney, it was more important to score a little footage of booing black voters to fire up his conservative donors than it was to risk just a little bit of self-disclosure, or reflection, or humility—just a little bit of honest outreach to a major African-American organization.
The NAACP lost all intellectual and moral credibility long ago. For Joanna Brooks to genuflect before it is just one more indication of her own profound insulation from the heart of the American history and experience around her.