Anti racist baby by Ibraim Kennedy

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

It’d be an utter disaster that’d quickly devolve into gatekeeping, excess, and favoritism. It’d also be used as a sort of perceived payback cudgel against whatever group is being targeted in the moment.

Also, Xanax should read this:

https://docs.google.com/document/u/0/d/ ... _BReFc2nPA

- Doc

[Res Ipsa]

“It would establish and permanently fund the Department of Anti-racism (DOA) comprised of formally trained experts on racism and no political appointees. The DOA would be responsible for preclearing all local, state and federal public policies to ensure they won’t yield racial inequity, monitor those policies, investigate private racist policies when racial inequity surfaces, and monitor public officials for expressions of racist ideas. The DOA would be empowered with disciplinary tools to wield over and against policymakers and public officials who do not voluntarily change their racist policy and ideas.”

I do think that racism is a pernicious moral and social cancer, in its conscious personal form ("I hate XXXs"), its unthinking unconscious form (assuming that a black man walking into court is the defendant when he is an attorney), and in its structural form (rubbish schools that are de facto segregated so that bright black kids stay down). And yes, it's overwhelmingly black or brown people who suffer from it,

But having said that, I do think that the proposal that appears to be being set out in the text you quote is simply silly and misguided, and unlikely to achieve anything good if any attempt were made to put it into practice. Fortunately the person who wrote it (of whom I have never previously heard) is extremely unlikely every to be able to get this done. And that's enough said.

Andrew Sullivan’s opinion piece is more of a hit job than an attempt to enlighten readers about Kendi’s views on Racism. It’s typical right-wrong scare tactics. Note the obligatory reference to “critical theory,” one of the right’s current bogeymen, who is with no explanation of what that means or why it matters. Note also how this single university professor is elevated by Sully to become the voice of the left. He lifts one paragraph out of a presentation and cries totalitarianism!!!

Having read his book, I have a hard time believing that what Sullivan quoted was a serious proposal. But it illustrates that Kendi’s theory of racism makes racism a difficult problem to solve. If the source of racism is policy, how does the minority that is disadvantaged wield sufficient power to change the policy.

Kendi’s theory of racism is pretty bare bones, and needs to be fleshed out. But one of the last guys who should be filling in the gaps is Sullivan.

[ajax18]

But having said that, I do think that the proposal that appears to be being set out in the text you quote is simply silly and misguided, and unlikely to achieve anything good if any attempt were made to put it into practice.

Thank for you at least answering the question rather than to simply deny the facts and call for a shutdown to the discussion.

[Gunnar]

and much more likely than whites to be incarcerated and with stiffer penalties for the same crimes committed by whites.

Would you agree with Ibram kendi that we must form an anti racism government department with the authority to strike down all laws that have a disparate impact between different races?

Don't be ridiculous. No one is arguing that we should repeal all or any laws just because racist discrimination in applying the laws still exists. I doubt that even Ibram Kendi is suggesting anything that ridiculous. Certainly laws that are only intended to be enforced against minorities ought to be struck down.

[Res Ipsa]

I should have guessed that context was being omitted. As is too often the case, it was. I found the original of what Kendi published. It was part of a feature by Politico that asked people to post their “boldest” solutions to inequality. In the same feature was a conservative whose solution to inequality included preventing the government from measuring policy outcomes.

It’s collection of fringe brainstorming, full of impractical and bad ideas that possibly could help inspire some out of the box thinking. In my opinion, Kendi’s bold idea is not one I would support. But it does encourage one to think of racism in terms of policies, which I do agree with.

https://www.politico.com/interactives/2 ... n-america/

[Gadianton]

I read the article, Ajax.

The quote provided is unrealistic to say the least, but I think it says a lot that the author wishes to scream the "quiet part" the loudest, and then people like you take it from there. Now that we've established the screamed-part as the new order for American life, how will that work out for the absolute worst case scenarios the screamed-part might affect, murder and rape?

What you're doing, Ajax, is something like a slippery-slope argument but it's not quite that. I don't know if there is a term for it, but what you're doing is putting so much leverage behind a bet that it can never be worth taking on the risk the bet goes south.

You started this conversation about a children's book, and presumably, should we teach children about racism, we risk a constitutional amendment that is doomed to free tens of thousands of rapists and murderers, if not imprison innocent whites just to make sure things are fair.

I wouldn't expect a children's book author to have profound answers for solving a problem as deep as inequality. I wouldn't expect a world-renowned economist to write a great children's book.

Concerning the article you linked, the author pretty well convinced me that Kennedy's (adult) book is a memoir where the author tries really hard to see the mote in his own eye, as much as the beam in the others. It sounds like the book didn't intend to go much beyond the many anguishing scenarios of bigotry that exist out there. It sounds like, somebody really needed to get a thesis statement out of it. There was very little quoted to support the author's contention that Kennedy has a blueprint ready for a new society but if we can't find the dirt there, forget about the book, let's go straight to this revealing quote from an interview.

Have you ever heard of Edmund Burke, Ajax? Burke had this saying that conservatives love, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." You don't need critical theory to account for the "binary thinking" the author attributes to Kennedy, just a familiar impassioned belief that the status quo is the greatest danger to further known societal ills. The author didn't make a good case for Kennedy groping for power, unwilling to compromise, and ready to use extra-legal or democratic means to make society more fair. The author made wild extrapolations to get to these charges.

[Res Ipsa]

Spot on, Dean Robbers. Sully is following a formula that has become mandatory in conservative punditry: find the most extreme thing someone on the left has said, pretend that that one thing represents everything about the person, then claim that the person speaks for the entire left. It’s stupid, it’s trite, and it works on the rubes.

Kendi (not Kennedy) has a theory about what the racism problem actually is. And the way he defines it, there is no easy or clear solution. He’s convinced that the traditional solution of changing hearts and minds in order to change racist policies is strategically backwards: his theory is that changes in hearts and minds come after the change in policy. He uses same sex marriage as an example.

But that leaves him with a problem: existing policies are held in place by a power structure. How do anti-racists gain enough power to change the policy?

He’s pretty young, and he’s just figured out the problem. If he’s influenced by critical theory, then the answer will look like trial and error until something works.

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

Same-sex marriage came about precisely because society evolved - you can probably thank the Internet for that as more straight people were exposed to more LGTBQ+ types. I became an egalitarian because of my proximity to various POCs and Gays and whatever ethnicities thanks to my time in service and the Internet. I think the more integrated we become the more we’ll be inclined toward egalitarian principles. It’s akin how LDS numbers are tanking hard. It’s not because some sort of anti-Mormon legislation was passed, but rather a new culture is emerging - and it’s deeply unsettling to traditionalists. Xanax can keep sticking his head into his brainwashing bubbles, but it’s not going to stop our social evolution, unless, of course, he and his right-wing nutters start killing and deporting, I dunno, probably tens of millions at this point.

- Doc

[ajax18]

Politico that asked people to post their “boldest” solutions to inequality. In the same feature was a conservative whose solution to inequality included preventing the government from measuring policy outcomes

It reminds me of the year I taught high school and they preached that black male children were the most often punished because the teachers and administrators are sexist and racist. There's no room for individual decisions in that analysis. Whatever happened to the idea of people being judged on the content of their character rather than the color of their skin?

The law is either just or unjust. What the race or gender of a person is that chooses to follow it or break it in the final tally should not determine whether the law is just or unjust, at least if you're looking to make laws that aren't racist.

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

This is a good example of what I was talking about above Xanax’s nonsense post:

https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comme ... y/gi05qc1/

It’s that kind of ability to share an experience with a LGTBQ+ type that broadens the general public’s awareness of their lives and their right to equal treatment under the law.

- Doc