Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race

[Barney]

I'm planning to read this book. I don't know if it's any good, but I had it highly recommended to me by a friend.

racism.png (177.18 KiB) Viewed 56178 times

Anyone want to read it with me so we can talk about it?

[Ondrej]

I failed to take notes on chapter one.

We have collectively recognized and agreed racism is bad and have assigned a high degree of stigmatization to such behavior. But on what grounds? On the grounds that not everyone of a particular race ought to be assumed to be like others of that race. In other words, we recognized that stereotypes, however true they may be generally, are not sufficient justification for treating an individual within that group as though he is responsible for the behavior of the rest of the group. This idea was summarized with brilliant brevity, a man should be judged by the content of his character rather than the color of his skin.

The author briefly mentions power imbalances and that the definition of racism is being pushed to include power imbalances rather than the previous definition. I reject this definition of racism on several grounds: 1) the stigmatization attached to the word “racist” should not be shifted away from where it is, by redefining racism one is able to artificially alter the stigma basically through confusion, 2) this redefinition excuses racism in the person who has less power by just redefining what is racist, 3) it motivates people to focus on all the ways in which they have less power so they have the privilege of being excused for racist claims which I think is unhelpful for the lesser party, 4) it seeks to return to a group identity rather than an individual identity, if one group has power, individuals in any other group cannot be racist. So we are not talking about individual people anymore but their groups and absolving one group of racism because of their group identity. It is also fashionable to condemn the other group based on their group membership. This is precisely the sort of racism that the stigma was meant to address.

So far, I detect a significant amount of racism in this book.

2 The System

“Stephen’s mother and the figurehead of the Lawrence family’s campaign for justice, said, ‘Sir Paul has got fine words. I still have not been given the answer as to why Stephen’s killers are still free.’"

I think this is why we insist that anyone personally involved in cases recuse themselves. The knee jerk reaction seems to be the assumption of guilt and not innocence. The victims are understandably irritated at a lack of conviction but the police have to assume innocence at the outset and then demonstrate guilt. This is supposed to be difficult so that we do not get carried away by a “justice” mob that is thirsty to see someone take the blame.

“It concluded that the investigation into the death of Stephen Lawrence ‘was marred by a combination of professional incompetence, institutional racism and a failure of leadership by senior officers’. This institutional racism, the report explained, is ‘the collective failure of an organisation to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their colour, culture, or ethnic origin. It can be seen or detected in processes, attitudes and behaviour which amount to discrimination through unwitting prejudice, ignorance, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping which disadvantage minority ethnic people.’”

This sounds an awful lot like “we found nothing overtly racist except we do not like the outcome so we will speak in non-specific generalities.”

“Amongst its many recommendations, the report suggested that the police force boost its black representation, and that all officers be trained in racism awareness and cultural diversity.”

Yeah, this is the standard line. People in the US still complain about the behavior of the police even if they (the police officers) are black. I have heard that white police officers are less likely to shoot black suspects than black police officers. The presumption is they are afraid of being called racist.

“In 2005, a change in the law saw an 800-year-old ban on double jeopardy lifted, meaning that it was no longer illegal to try suspects twice for the same crime.”

Oh, wow! This sounds like a very bad idea.

“I used to have a feeling, a vague sense of security in the back of my mind, that if I returned home one day to find my belongings ransacked and my valuables gone, I could call the police and they would help me. But if the case of Stephen Lawrence taught me anything, it was that there are occasions when the police cannot be trusted to act fairly.”

Yeah, I don’t have a lot of faith that the police will be able to rectify things of this nature. Even finally convicting the two murderers doesn’t bring the dead back. The police are perhaps best at creating an intimidating presence that encourages civility. Probably more effective is knowing everyone is armed. Nobody gets into a fist fight at a shooting range.

“If all racism was as easy to spot, grasp and denounce as white extremism is, the task of the anti-racist would be simple.”

Anti-racist, I have seen that word before. Let’s get some context https://newdiscourses.com/tftw-antiracism/

“why and how does racism thrive in quarters in which those in charge do not align themselves with white extremist politics? The problem must run deeper.”

I think she means systemic racism. From the new discourses analysis “Antiracism carries with it a commitment to accept the systemic definition for racism—i.e., that it exists immanently, always and everywhere, regardless of intent—even if there isn’t a single person who is racist in the usual understanding. The system itself can be “racist” even if there are no racists within that system (see also, systemic power). An antiracist has the obligation of searching for instances of racism that confirm the systemic “reality” of racism, internally, with others, and in society and its various forms of representation.”

I think what lies behind much of this thought process is the blank slate fallacy, that everyone is born as a blank slate and it is simply culture that determines how people are. Thus, any inequalities must be the outcome of some cultural norms or processes that, with enough diligent pressure, can be eradicated leading to equal outcomes for everyone. This is why the solution is always cultural awareness training, sensitivity training, bias training etc., and the metrics held up as proof of racism are not specific racist acts but statistically unequal outcomes between different groups. A recent book I found interesting on the subject is “The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature” by Stephen Pinker. In case you’re interested the audiobook is on YouTube:
Part 1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUCs-kdxFH8
Part 2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eb0qhWRYkkQ
Part 3 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oz6u8OkxLNs

“Structural racism is dozens, or hundreds, or thousands of people with the same biases joining together to make up one organisation, and acting accordingly. Structural racism is an impenetrably white workplace culture set by those people, where anyone who falls outside of the culture must conform or face failure.”

Yes, I can see how this would be intimidating. Like moving to another country and feeling awkward but it is not racism in the traditional sense of the word. And it is not obvious that there is anything wrong with this. If I try out anything new or different I will typically feel awkwardness of this sort. I feel awkward all the time as a scientist because there is so much I don’t know and frequently run into other fields of which I am painfully ignorant. Conform or failure is the experience of basically everyone. However, I don’t classify this as racist. Norms have to be established, white people must also conform or face failure.

“This demands a collective redefinition of what it means to be racist, how racism manifests, and what we must do to end it.”

Yeah, the attempt here is to redefine words in order to reposition stigma. If we just redefine racism then we can take a huge social stigmatization and apply it to things for which such stigmatization did not naturally develop. We can then call people or institutions racist who do not fit under the original definition. The general public who is unaware of our word games will fail to make the distinction between various definitions and voice a knee-jerk condemnation of that person or institution. To avoid such public embarrassment as accusations of racism can easily kindle, these people and institutions will make every effort to placate our wishes.

“Given that black kids are more likely than white kids to move into higher education, it’s spurious to suggest that this attainment gap is down to a lack of intelligence, talent, or aspiration. It’s worth looking at the distinct lack of black and brown faces teaching at university to see what might contribute to this systematic failure. In 2016, it was revealed by the Higher Education Statistics Agency that almost 70 per cent of the professors teaching in British universities are white men.10 It’s a dire indication of what universities think intelligence looks like.”

It is also worth looking at the proportion/performance of east Asians. It might temper one’s reflexive desire to cry racism. In reality many universities ARE racist but in the opposite direction. https://www.forbes.com/sites/evangerstm ... 02de163c10 “To be fair to Harvard, it is between a rock and a hard place in some ways. When it relies on objective tests like the SAT’s it is often accused of using an instrument that is biased against African Americans. When it uses a subjective tool such as counselor and teacher letters, it must now contend with the fact that they are biased against Asian Americans.” It seems that everyone is fully aware that they are trying to weigh the scales subjectively to attain an outcome that is simply based on people’s skin color and not their merit as measured by quantitative scores. In order to remove “structural racism”, that is disparate outcomes between groups, we have to be actually racist. Again a blank slate fallacy. We might turn to Thomas Sowell’s “Discrimination and Disparities” or Herrnstein’s “The Bell Curve” for a more detailed examination of such topics.

“The only distinctive difference in the applications were names – they either sounded white British, or they didn’t. The researchers found that the applicants with white-sounding names were called to interview far more often than those with African- or Asian-sounding names.”

Yes, I have heard it is worse still. The bias even persists when the employers themselves are black which gives one pause in assuming that white people are the problem.

“This led the commission to comment ‘. . . we are concerned that the high proportion of black men recorded on the database (estimated to be at least one in three black men) is creating an impression that a single race group represents an “alien wedge” of criminality.’”

But are black people committing disproportionately more crime? The implication is “of course not” but if indeed they are then this impression is uncomfortable but accurate. I believe the American statistics indicate higher rates of criminality.

“Our black man’s life chances are hindered and warped at every stage. There isn’t anything notably, individually racist about the people who work in all of the institutions he interacts with. Some of these people will be black themselves. But it doesn’t really matter what race they are. They are both in and of a society that is structurally racist, and so it isn’t surprising when these unconscious biases seep out into the work they do when they interact with the general public. With a bias this entrenched, in too many levels of society, our black man can try his hardest, but he is essentially playing a rigged game. He may be told by his parents and peers that if he works hard enough, he can overcome anything. But the evidence shows that that is not true, and that those who do are exceptional to be succeeding in an environment that is set up for them to fail. Some will even tell them that if they are successful enough to get on the radar of an affirmative action scheme, then it’s because of tokenism rather than talent.”

Life is hard. I’m sure you could spin any category like this. It doesn’t seem to be very helpful unless you can point to a specific (clear) injustice that we can remedy. I’m sure there are plenty of white people who feel the world is against them too but they have the advantage of not having this narrative preached at them. If you told them that at every turn people were out to get them and take advantage of them and deny them opportunities they would start to see them everywhere, even when they weren’t there. Life goes much better for you if you deal with the world charitably, that is, with forgiveness and benefit of the doubt. This narrative seeks to remove benefit of the doubt and cast everything into the worst possible light. Divide into warring groups (here, races), create the narrative that one group is on the side of good while the other is evil, whip them into a frenzy, and pit them against each other. You only get absolution for being in the evil group if you agree with the narrative and throw your shoulder into the effort. This is not a good direction. This is what the stigma of “racism” is intended to prevent.

“Instead of being seen as a solution to a systemic problem, positive discrimination is frequently pinpointed as one of the key accelerators in rampant ‘political correctness’, and quotas are some of the most hotly contested methods of eliminating homogeneous workplaces in recent years. The method works a little bit like this: senior people in an organization realize their workplace doesn’t reflect the reality of the world they live in (either because of internal or external pressure), so they implement recruitment tactics to redress the balance.”

Either because of internal or external pressure. In other words they did not realize at all. They were pressured via cancel culture to positively discriminate, which is to say, be racist. It is not at all surprising that one would be met with a backlash.

“Then Business Secretary Vince Cable tabled plans to diversify business boards, announcing an aim of 20 per cent black and ethnic minority FTSE100 directors in just five years.”

How is this not “tokenism”?

“With the conversation about boardrooms previously focusing solely on a very white version of gender”

This just makes me want to say ok, start over, they can have everything and we will start again without any blacks or women. Then nobody can complain. They got everything. Everyone else can build in peace (atlas shrugged). But that doesn’t work on two counts, 1) nobody will be rid of them because no matter what you build, as long as it is successful, there they will be, enviously scratching at the door, and 2) it’s not blacks or women that are the problem so taring them is unjust.

“When there are no hard targets behind programmes of positive discrimination, initiatives are in danger of looking like they’re doing something without actually achieving much.”

Haha, it is just on the face of it racist right out in the open.

“to pretend that simple hard work will elevate all to success is an exercise in wilful ignorance.”

To pretend that all white people get to be CEOs and bankers is also willful ignorance. Moreover, to align that picture with “success” is mistaken. It is not at all clear to me that that is success. That is productive, we as consumers are extracting from those people their attention and time and resources to bring us what we want for us, not for them. The moment a competitor serves us better we will stop giving them resources and force them to serve us better or fail.

Simple hard work is not enough to become “successful,” whatever that means. I can do back breaking work to dig a ditch in the wrong location and no matter now diligent I am, no matter the effort spent, it will not serve its purpose if it is in the wrong location. I will reap no reward for my effort. This is the position of Cain. Rather than humbling himself before God and looking to what actions he might take to correct his behavior, he kills Able, the comparison that demonstrates his own lack. Of course this story is not politically correct these days, it is called blaming the victim.

“It is an obsession with bodies in the room rather than recruiting the right people who will work in the interests of the marginalised. Representation doesn’t always mean that the representer will work in the favour of those who need representation.”

I thought we were talking about getting underrepresented people hired. She seems to be saying we need to get activists hired. It’s not about bodies in the room it’s about activists. Some black people are not politically black (i.e. they do not subscribe to our ideological proclivities). These are not the people we want to hire. They are not “representative” of capital “B” Black people.

“And, though many placate themselves with the colour-blindness lie, the aforementioned drastic differences in life chances along race lines show that while it might be being preached by our institutions, it’s not being practised.”

That may be true but this is not making it better. Never before have I been so attuned to the color of a person’s skin. Colorblindness at least has the presumption of not caring what color you are. Wokeness throws it in your face at every turn and forces you to be hyper focused on everyone’s race making it the most important thing. Here she is invoking the blank slate fallacy, the statistical differences between groups = racism fallacy, and advocating praxis as the solution https://newdiscourses.com/?s=praxis

3 What is white privilege?

“And white privilege is an absence of the consequences of racism. An absence of structural discrimination, an absence of your race being viewed as a problem first and foremost, an absence of ‘less likely to succeed because of my race’. It is an absence of funny looks directed at you because you’re believed to be in the wrong place, an absence of cultural expectations, an absence of violence enacted on your ancestors because of the colour of their skin, an absence of a lifetime of subtle marginalisation and othering – exclusion from the narrative of being human. Describing and defining this absence means to some extent upsetting the centring of whiteness, and reminding white people that their experience is not the norm for the rest of us.”

There is the assumption that all white people experience the same thing. That white people don’t get funny looks when they’re out of place, or doing the wrong thing. Surely there are many white people for whom this is true and true of all white people in certain circumstances. Take race out of it and just speak to the injustices. But that is not popular, there is no villain group to blame. This whole narrative seems like it is grasping at straws to try to be a victim. Society is a compromise, we cannot live together and everyone do anything they please so we compromise with each other, accepting certain things and rejecting others. This establishes norms and pressures for everyone. At best one could say that because white people have a large representation in the population these norms tilt toward what “white people” want but at the same time they will certainly tilt away from what some white people want. And it is not obvious to me that white people want anything different from what all people want. It is nothing to do with being white per se but that a majority of people agree, roughly speaking, on how to behave and a majority of them are white. This is not to say that every norm is good or right, this requires continual dialog and updating, but it is not racist or evil in some way.

For context on the term “whiteness” https://newdiscourses.com/tftw-whiteness/ and “privilege” https://newdiscourses.com/tftw-privilege/

“There is an unattributed definition of racism that defines it as prejudice plus power. Those disadvantaged by racism can certainly be cruel, vindictive and prejudiced. Everyone has the capacity to be nasty to other people, to judge them before they get to know them. But there simply aren’t enough black people in positions of power to enact racism against white people on the kind of grand scale it currently operates at against black people. Are black people over-represented in the places and spaces where prejudice could really take effect? The answer is almost always no.”

I think I said this earlier but, the problem with redefining racism in this way is that the term carries with it a large stigma that is intended to rest on the shoulders of those she calls “prejudiced”. That is the reason she tries to say racism doesn’t happen. She doesn’t want that stigma assigned in those places. That racist people with large influence can be more oppressive than racist people with little influence seems to be obvious. The classic definition of racism applies to rich and poor, powerful and weak alike, just as any other moral virtue or vice. One does not say, for example, that poor people cannot be selfish because they are poor, or that skinny people cannot be gluttonous because they are skinny. Likewise, just because someone has little influence or power does not mean they cannot be racist.

“White privilege is a manipulative, suffocating blanket of power that envelops everything we know, like a snowy day. It’s brutal and oppressive, bullying you into not speaking up for fear of losing your loved ones, or job, or flat. It scares you into silencing yourself: you don’t get the privilege of speaking honestly about your feelings without extensively assessing the consequences. I have spent a lot of time biting my tongue so hard it might fall off.”

Yes, because we have all collectively agreed that racism is bad and she is being racist and trying to convince the people she’s being racist toward that they are at fault. It is surprising she gets any support at all.

“In the Weekly Worker in 2014, socialist writer Charlie Winstanley wrote of his utter disdain at an argument about race that had taken place in his activist group. ‘As such,’ he wrote, ‘oppressed groups sit at the centre of every discussion, backed by the unquestionable moral weight of their subjective life experience, reinforced by an unaccountable structure of etiquette, which they can use to totally control the flow of discourse.’
He continued: ‘The total effect is to create an environment in which free discussion of ideas is impossible. Oppressed groups and individuals operate as a form of unassailable priesthood, basing their legitimacy on the doctrine of original sin. To extend the analogy, discussions become confessionals in which participants are encouraged to self-flagellate and prostrate themselves before the holy writ of self-awareness. Shame and self-deprecation are encouraged to keep non-oppressed groups in their place, and subvert the social pyramid of oppression, with oppressed groups at the top.’”

Yes, he has become acquainted with critical theory.

“‘Throughout my childhood and throughout my early adult life I’ve had a feeling of being different, and a bit strange. I could never quite understand why I felt out of place. Now that I’m older and I understand things, I think it was about race. Being the only black child in my class, living in a white town, being surrounded by white family.’”

This sounds an awful lot like ‘I felt awkward growing up and, because of our culture’s continual focus on race, I now see everything through a racial lens. Now I interpret this awkward feeling as though everyone else is being collectively racist toward me.’ I don’t think this narrative helps people.

“Not all white parents take the time to learn. Sadly, I’ve met white parents of mixed-race children who have angrily confronted me, insisting that they ‘just don’t see’ race, and telling me that what I’m doing isn’t helping at all. Of course, I don’t demand that they agree with every point I make, but I do think that it is important that they recognise that we are still living in a racist society, if only so they can counsel their children with some ease.”

I think she would gain much appeal if she would drop the term “raicst”. If she is really worried about “whiteness” she could perhaps delineate what things she thinks is a problem, e.g. being on time for work (https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news ... -whiteness ). Then we could have it clear in our minds whether she is being reasonable or ridiculous. Insisting that your employees show up to work on time should not receive the stigma that the term “racism” conveys. It is not at all obvious that being lax about when your employees show up to work is beneficial or somehow virtuous.

“Opposing positive discrimination based on apprehensions about getting the best person for the job”

One has to make a decision based on something. In the not too distant past we decided that making this decision based on race was a bad idea. We also decided that because he is your friend or relative is also not a very good basis. So we fell back on is he the best candidate for the job. It is not apprehension about getting the best candidate, it is apprehension about treating people unfairly that getting the best candidate is so strenuously adhered to.

“means inadvertently revealing what you think talent looks like, and the kind of person in which you think talent resides.”

Yeah, choosing the best candidate is not straight forward. It is difficult to measure such things. But at the very least the goal is the best approximation of being fair that we’ve come up with, even if it cannot be done perfectly. The author argues for the opposite, to intentionally impose racialized hiring practices!

“Because, if the current system worked correctly, and if hiring practices were successfully recruiting and promoting the right people for the right jobs in all circumstances, I seriously doubt that so many leadership positions would be occupied by white middle-aged men.”

“Seriously doubt” is tantamount to saying she does not know. This is the blank slate fallacy again. It seems to be obvious that culture and even physical location can have profound effects on one’s life. For example, you will be much more likely to be a skilled hockey player if you grew up in Canada. It should not be much of a surprise to find that different racial groups perform differently at different endeavors. Instead of saying “whiteness” is the problem, perhaps one should try to emulate the “white” things that those in leadership are doing. Work hard, stay late, study with diligence, be on time, be meticulous, take responsibility, etc. In Thomas Sowell’s “Migrations and Cultures” he details all sorts of peculiarities of different groups of people who are successful or unsuccessful at all kinds of different endeavors. Does she also think that American basketball is dominated by black people because of unfair hiring practices, or Jazz, or hip-hop?

“When pressed on lack of representation, some like to cite the racial demographics in Britain, saying that because the minority of the population isn’t white, that percentage and that percentage only should be represented in organisations.”

No, this too operates on the assumption everyone will be equally skilled at everything. This is not true and I don’t think the goal of every profession having exactly the same racial demographics as the population is a good goal.

“This mathematical approach is the true tokenism. It is an obsession with bodies in the room rather than recruiting the right people who will work in the interests of the marginalised. Representation doesn’t always mean that the representer will work in the favour of those who need representation.”

Right, it is not actually fairness that is desired. What is desired is agreement with and continued activism for the underlying critical theory. It doesn’t really matter your race so long as you profess the correct opinions.

“It was in that moment that I had to reluctantly accept that pushes for positive discrimination were not about turning the whole place black at the expense of white people, but instead were simply about reflecting the society an organisation serves.”

The ends do not justify the means. There is no end. How you conduct yourself in life is the only thing that matters. Positive discrimination is just racism.

“Repeatedly telling ourselves – and worse still, telling our children – that we are all equal is a misdirected yet well-intentioned lie.”

I agree, this is a lie. We are not all equal. We are of equal value to God and should be treated equally by the law. But we are not all equal. I certainly cannot do what Elon Musk does and it is not helpful to me to compare myself to him and judge that I will never be successful by that standard.

“But indulging in the myth that we are all equal denies the economic, political and social legacy of a British society that has historically been organised by race. The reality is that, in material terms, we are nowhere near equal. This state of play is violently unjust.”

Not necessarily. You have to actually demonstrate the injustice specifically not simply point at disparities and infer injustice. It is also not violent. And it also depends on how you define your groups. In America if we group Appalachia together we will find high levels of relative poverty and overwhelmingly white people. If we were to focus on this grouping I have no doubt that we could drum up all kinds of stories about their underrepresentation and how society must be oppressing them.

“Not seeing race does little to deconstruct racist structures or materially improve the conditions which people of colour are subject to daily. In order to dismantle unjust, racist structures, we must see race. We must see who benefits from their race, who is disproportionately impacted by negative stereotypes about their race, and to who power and privilege is bestowed upon – earned or not – because of their race, their class, and their gender. Seeing race is essential to changing the system.”

It depends on what your objectives are. If you want incremental improvement, making the system better by degrees then this seems entirely counterproductive. Making everything about race will make racial problems disappear? No, this is by design intended to inflame racial tensions and division to promote critical theory’s own agendas. Racial tensions are harped on to get pity and support for critical theory but the underlying motive is the destruction of the west that everyone wants to move to and the creation of a new Marxist utopia. If these are your ends then one might concede that seeing race might indeed be essential to changing the system.

One might object that I am making a mountain out of a mole hill. The author has not spoken of a Marxist revolution. But let us dig a little into the origins of critical theory and find out what the aims are.

Here is Herbert Marcuse from An Essay on Liberation (1969) lamenting that the working class make too much money to invoke a Marxist revolution: https://www.marxists.org/reference/arch ... ration.htm

“The narrowing of the consumption gap has rendered possible the mental and instinctual coordination of the laboring classes: the majority of organized labor shares the stabilizing, counterrevolutionary needs of the middle classes, as evidenced by their behavior as consumers of the material and cultural merchandise, by their emotional revulsion against the nonconformist intelligentsia. Conversely, where the consumer gap is still wide, where the capitalist culture has not yet reached into every house or hut, the system of stabilizing needs has its limits; the glaring contrast between the privileged class and the exploited leads to a radicalization of the underprivileged. This is the case of the ghetto population and the unemployed in the United States; this is also the case of the laboring classes in the more backward capitalist countries.”

He picks out the underprivileged, ghetto population and unemployed as possible targets for radicalization. I submit this is exactly what is going on.

He goes on

“By virtue of its basic position in the production process, by virtue of its numerical weight and the weight of exploitation, the working class is still the historical agent of revolution; by virtue of its sharing the stabilizing needs of the system, it has become a conservative, even counterrevolutionary force. Objectively, “in-itself,” labor still is the potentially revolutionary class; subjectively, “for-itself,” it is not. This theoretical conception has concrete significance in the prevailing situation, in which the working class may help to circumscribe the scope and the targets of political practice.
In the advanced capitalist countries, the radicalization of the working classes is counteracted by a socially engineered arrest of consciousness, and by the development and satisfaction of needs which perpetuate the servitude of the exploited. A vested interest in the existing system is thus fostered in the instinctual structure of the exploited, and the rupture with the continuum of repression a necessary precondition of liberation – does not occur.”

So, he is unhappy that capitalism is satisfying the needs of the working class so they do not become revolutionary.

He also mentions

“We would have to conclude that liberation would mean subversion against the will and against the prevailing interests of the great majority of the people.”

In part 2 The New Sensibility he says

“The new Sensibility has become a political factor. This event, which may well indicate a turning point in the evolution of contemporary societies, demands that critical theory incorporate the new dimension into its concepts, project its implications for the possible construction of a free society.”

Note the reference to critical theory.

And a little later

“The new sensibility has become, by this very token, praxis: it emerges in the struggle against violence and exploitation where this struggle is waged for essentially new ways and forms of life: negation of the entire Establishment, its morality, culture.”

Here we note his linking of critical theory to praxis which is the activity of the “negation of the entire Establishment, its morality, culture.”

“This new consciousness and the instinctual rebellion isolate such opposition from the masses and from the majority of organized labor, the integrated majority, and make for the concentration of radical politics in active minorities, mainly among the young middle-class intelligentsia, and among the ghetto populations.”

Again, the new consciousness and radical politics concentrating in the active minorities, young middle-class intelligentsia, and "ghetto" populations.

Commenting on how one might bring about a revolutionary state he writes

“It is precisely the preparatory character of this work which gives it its historical significance: to develop, in the exploited, the consciousness (and the unconscious) which would loosen the hold of enslaving needs over their existence – the needs which perpetuate their dependence on the system of exploitation. Without this rupture, which can only be the result of political education in action, even the most elemental, the most immediate force of rebellion may be defeated, or become the mass basis of counterrevolution.
The ghetto population of the United States constitutes such a force. Confined to small areas of living and dying, it can be more easily organized and directed. Moreover, located in the core cities of the country, the ghettos form natural geographical centers from which the struggle can be mounted against targets of vital economic and political importance; in this respect, the ghettos can be compared with the faubourgs of Paris in the eighteenth century, and their location makes for spreading and “contagious” upheavals.”

On getting critical theory in the university

“The development of a true consciousness is still the professional function of the universities. No wonder then that the student opposition meets with the all but pathological hatred on the part of the so-called “community,” including large sections of organized labor. To the degree to which the university becomes dependent on the financial and political goodwill of the community and of the government, the struggle for a free and critical education becomes a vital part in the larger struggle for change.
What appears as extraneous “politicalization” of the university by disrupting radicals is today (as it was so often in the past) the “logical,” internal dynamic of education: translation of knowledge into reality, of humanistic values into humane conditions of existence. This dynamic, arrested by the pseudo-neutral features of academia, would, for example, be released by the inclusion into the curriculum of courses giving adequate treatment to the great nonconformist movements in civilization and to the critical analysis of contemporary societies. The groundwork for building the bridge between the “ought” and the “is,” between theory and practice, is laid within theory itself. … The educational demands thus drive the movement beyond the universities, into the streets, the slums, the “community.” And the driving force is the refusal to grow up, to mature, to perform efficiently and “normally” in and for a society which compels the vast majority of the population to “earn” their living in stupid, inhuman, and unnecessary jobs, which conducts its booming business on the back of ghettos, slums, and internal and external colonialism, which is infested with violence and repression while demanding obedience and compliance from the victims of violence and repression, which, in order to sustain the profitable productivity on which its hierarchy depends, utilizes its vast resources for waste, destruction, and an ever more methodical creation of conformist needs and satisfactions.”

Just in case you missed the Marxist revolution:

“Revolutionary forces emerge in the process of change itself ; the translation of the potential into the actual is the work of political practice. And just as little as critical theory can political practice orient itself on a concept of revolution which belongs to the nineteenth and early twentieth century, and which is still valid in large areas of the Third World. This concept envisages the “seizure of power” in the course of a mass upheaval, led by a revolutionary party acting as the avant-garde of a revolutionary class and setting up a new central power which would initiate the basic social changes. Even in industrial countries where a strong Marxist party has organized the exploited masses, strategy is no longer guided by this notion – witness the long-range Communist policy of “popular fronts.”

Envisioning the breakdown of society and “directing the struggle”:

“The dissolution of social morality may manifest itself in a collapse of work discipline, slowdown, spread of disobedience to rules and regulations, wildcat strikes, boycotts, sabotage, gratuitous acts of noncompliance. The violence built into the system of repression may get out of control, or necessitate ever more totalitarian controls. Even the most totalitarian technocratic-political administration depends, for its functioning, on what is usually called the “moral fiber”: a (relatively) “positive” attitude among the underlying population toward the usefulness of their work and toward the necessity of the repressions exacted by the social organization of work. A society depends on the relatively stable and calculable sanity of the people, sanity defined as the regular, socially coordinated functioning of mind and body – especially at work, in the shops and offices, but also at leisure and fun. Moreover, a society also demands to a considerable extent, belief in one’s beliefs (which is part of the required sanity); belief in the operative value of society’s values. Operationalism is indeed an indispensable supplement to want and fear as forces of cohesion.
Now it is the strength of this moral fiber, of the operational values (quite apart from their ideational validity), which is likely to wear off under the impact of the growing contradictions within the society. The result would be a spread, not only of discontent and mental sickness, but also of inefficiency, resistance to work, refusal to perform, negligence, indifference – factors of dysfunction which would hit a highly centralized and coordinated apparatus, where breakdown at one point may easily affect large sections of the whole. To be sure, these are subjective factors, but they may assume material force in conjunction with the objective economic and political strains to which the system will be exposed on a global scale. Then, and only then, that political climate would prevail which could provide a mass basis for the new forms of organization required for directing the struggle.”

Now, I do not know if the author of the no-longer-talking-to-white-people book intends to bring about a Marxist revolution and I don’t mean to put words in her mouth. What I intend to point out is that critical theory is intended to be used in the universities to train youth, minorities, and the “ghetto” population to “raise consciousness,” train activists, not “grow up” or perform efficiently and “normally” and earn a living. This is not because this is what is best for them. This is to disenfranchise them from the current society and spark a new Marxist revolution. The hyper-focus on race is intended to sow division and discontent. It is not intended to bring peace and reconciliation but animosity and violence.

“white privilege is an absence of the consequences of racism. An absence of structural discrimination, an absence of your race being viewed as a problem first and foremost, an absence of ‘less likely to succeed because of my race’.”

And so the solution is to make sure that the structure discriminates in the opposite direction? In this statement she seems to look down upon discrimination.

“It is an absence of funny looks directed at you because you’re believed to be in the wrong place, an absence of cultural expectations, an absence of violence enacted on your ancestors because of the colour of their skin, an absence of a lifetime of subtle marginalisation and othering – exclusion from the narrative of being human. Describing and defining this absence means to some extent upsetting the centring of whiteness, and reminding white people that their experience is not the norm for the rest of us. It is, of course, much easier to identify when you don’t have it, and I watch as an outsider to the insularity of whiteness. I coveted whiteness once, but I knew in the back of my mind that conning myself into assimilation would only ever make me a poor imitation of what I would never be.”

Yes, it is not whiteness that she despises, it is western culture. She actively tries to see racism in it and feel oppressed because of her race. And is now selling that message to other people and we are gobbling it up. It’s not good.

“We could all do with examining how the system unfairly benefits us personally.”

The system is supposed to benefit us. That’s why we build a system. I realize that she put the qualifying word “unfairly” there but she needs to unpack that and specify how we should measure such a thing. Is any benefit conferred to us unfair? Is it only fair if it benefits minorities? What exactly is the “system”?

“A few years back, confronted with a four-hour round trip of a commute, I found that the only way to keep costs down and still make it to work was to get the train halfway, and cycle for the rest of the journey. An uncomfortable truth dawned on me as I lugged my bike up and down flights of stairs in commuter-town train stations: the majority of public transport I’d been travelling on was not easily accessible. No ramps, no lifts. Nigh-on impossible to access for parents with buggies, or people using wheelchairs, or people with mobility issues, like a frame or a cane. Before I’d had my own wheels to carry, I’d never noticed this problem. I’d been oblivious to the fact that this lack of accessibility was affecting hundreds of people. And it was only when the issue became close to me that I began to feel infuriated by it.”

This is exactly the sort of situation that makes me more thankful. The proper response is not to be infuriated. The proper response is to think to youself, your transportation is being paid for by everyone else’s tax dollars. The whole point of you taking that bicycle and the public transport is because you cannot afford the commute yourself. You do not deserve this, it is God’s grace upon you that you can get to work with a subsidized ride. I would look at all of the engineering and materials and back breaking work that went into letting me ride to work with such ease. How lucky am I? As I carry the bike up the steps I will think, “boy! Stairs are nice”. There is probably not a more efficient way to climb a hill than to have a set of stairs. Someone spent hours on each of these steps and they are flat and true and solid. Hundreds, maybe thousands of people step on these stairs every day and they hold up. Someone probably cleans them every day too. So they are not laden with trash. This bicycle is sure getting heavy! But I own a bicycle and it gets me to work. What if I didn’t have this bicycle and this public transport, where would I be? There is no thankfulness, in her assessment it is ‘infuriating’. Better for the tax dollars not to have been spent! Leave it to the people who earned it and are grateful for it.

“Racism is often confused with prejudice, and is sometimes used interchangeably.”

Trying to redefine racism.

“This is the difference between racism and prejudice. There is an unattributed definition of racism that defines it as prejudice plus power.”

I reject this definition. That is not what I mean when I use the word. I think that is not what most people mean when they use the word. You can be racist and completely powerless.

“Everyone has the capacity to be nasty to other people, to judge them before they get to know them. But there simply aren’t enough black people in positions of power to enact racism against white people on the kind of grand scale it currently operates at against black people. Are black people over-represented in the places and spaces where prejudice could really take effect? The answer is almost always no.”

If there were, would she call it out? Does it take just bodies in the room, i.e. black people, or what if it was just people who champion critical theory causes? Because critical theory is being preached in every institution and corporation, almost always the answer is yes. Not that black people are over-represented but that racism against white people is being enacted in order to achieve “proper” representation. There are even laws on the books in the US about the proper diversity requirements of boards of directors. Justin Trudeau’s cabinet was picked based on diversity https://policyoptions.irpp.org/2015/12/ ... ed-extent/. This happens all over the place these days.

“I told her about an experience of being passed over for a job I’d interviewed for and finding out through mutual friends that the position had gone to a white woman my age with almost identical experience to me. I had felt the slap in the face of structural racism, the kind of thing you only hear about in statistics about black unemployment, but never hear about from the people affected by it.”

But she only asserts racism. How do you demonstrate? Even the girl she is talking to is skeptical and she is otherwise sympathetic. It seems she did not demonstrate even enough to convince someone who would side with you if had a scrap of evidence.

“It scares you into silencing yourself: you don’t get the privilege of speaking honestly about your feelings without extensively assessing the consequences.”

welcome to the internet

“(I locked my Twitter account after that incident, and didn’t let any conversations go beyond small talk in all other jobs)”

welcome to the internet

“White privilege is the perverse situation of feeling more comfortable with openly racist, far-right extremists, because at least you know where you stand with them; the boundaries are clear.”

I’m not sure if she is referring to real racist people or just normal people who reject critical theory. Yes they are open and honest and you know where you stand with them. The people who are trying to be woke and follow the next wind of doctrine that comes down from wherever, well of course they don’t make it clear where you stand. They don’t know. They are just as clueless as you are. They do not stand on any principles they have, they are waiting on someone else to tell them what is the next thing to be outraged about to signal that they are on the “right side of history.”

“ever come to a national conversation on the insidious nature of structural racism, and how it manifests as a collective mindset – partly through malice, partly through carelessness and ignorance – to quietly assist some, while hindering others. But by flipping the debate to one that focused solely on racism against white people, that national conversation was swiftly stopped. No longer was there potential for us as a nation to examine the impact of the legacy of Britain’s racism. Instead, we were reminded by lots of very important people that racism goes both ways. In snatching away the possibility of a long overdue conversation, the resulting warped debate revealed an obsession with stopping discussion about race in Britain. The effect was as old as colonialism.”

She wants a “discussion about race” but it didn’t go they way she wanted and so she concludes it was prevented from happening. Obviously if the discussion were permitted to happen then everyone would agree with her so she must continue to claim that no discussions have happened to justify continually bringing it up. Then the dig at the end about colonialism is a way to instill a bit of negative sentiment toward Britain as a whole but has nothing much to do with the discussion.

“Pointing out how this country has wielded divide and rule as a political strategy is then considered an attack on the very fabric of British sensibilities.”

Divide and rule is exactly the strategy that Marxism and critical theory employs. You’ve heard of “the iron law of woke projection?”

“We could have had a conversation about riots and race, about accountability, about how to move forward from Britain’s most famous race case. We could have had a conversation about how to start eliminating racism. We could have started asking each other about the best way to heal. It could have been pivotal. Instead, the conversation we had was about racism against white people.”

I don’t know anything about these cases she cites but it seems like they were eventually handled. The conversation to be had there should surround the specific case and the details and people involved. When one attempts to shift it and say that all of Britain is culpable for the actions of several police officers, clearly the conversation shifts, and rightly so, to a discussion about whether such a blanket of culpability is justified. The proper decision is, no, this is not warranted. Why? Because this is exactly the sort of racism we have meticulously stigmatized. This conclusion is not what the author wants to hear so she complains that no conversations about race take place. They do, she just does not like their conclusions.

[Ondrej]

Apparently there's a character limit and I hit it... Here's the rest

4 Fear of a Black Planet

“In a 2014 speech, he said, ‘The fact [is] that in scores of our cities and market towns, this country in a short space of time has frankly become unrecognisable. Whether it is the impact on local schools and hospitals, whether it is the fact in many parts of England you don’t hear English spoken any more. This is not the kind of community we want to leave to our children and grandchildren.’”

This sounds like a sensible concern. It is one thing to allow some immigration. It is quite another to allow so much immigration that one’s country is essentially given away to foreigners by virtue of the fact that it was so well managed that all the foreigners wanted to come.

“In the US, the phrase ‘anchor baby’ is used in the pejorative sense to admonish US-born children of immigrants.”

Yes, people take advantage of the laws, come to the US while they are pregnant and “accidentally” give birth while they are here. Because they were born on US soil, they are American. I’m not sure the details of how that help them get here but I’m assuming if their child us a US citizen there are much less stringent requirements for immigrating. It is used pejoratively because everyone is well aware that the compassion out of which the law was written is being entirely taken advantage of not for its intended purpose. I have heard of big Russian parties where they rent out a whole hotel and bring all their pregnant wives and just have a vacation long enough to have American babies. Not illegal but certainly not in the spirit of the law.

“He continued: ‘The indigenous people of these islands, the English, the Scots, the Irish and the Welsh . . . it’s the people who have been here overwhelmingly for the last 17,000 years. We are the aboriginals here . . . The simple fact is that the majority of the British people are descended from people who’ve lived here since time immemorial. It’s extraordinarily racist, it is genuinely racist when you seek to deny the English. You people wouldn’t even let us have our name on the census form. That is racism. And that’s why people are voting British National Party.’”

Good point.

“The campaign’s opponents – who included Lord Patten, the Chancellor of Oxford University – said that by exercising their democratic right to protest, the students were actually impinging on freedom of speech. By making a fuss, disrupting the everyday, and pointing out the problem, they had become the problem. Somehow, it wasn’t believable that Lord Patten simply wanted free and fair debate and a healthy exchange of ideas on his campus. It looked like he just wanted silence, the kind of strained peace that simmers with resentment, the kind that requires some to suffer so that others are comfortable.”

Yeah, we’ve had these protests as well. The way she describes it makes it sound like Patten prevented calm and reasoned debate but I am guessing it was the other way around and when no debate could be had because of the unruly uproar, then Patten claimed they were impinging on free speech.

“This line of thought demonstrates a real struggle to identify with black humanity in any conceivable way. To them we are an unidentifiable shifting mass, a simplistic, animalistic herd. They don’t believe that black characters have the capacity to be sophisticated like James Bond, or intelligent like Hermione Granger.”

No this is all wrong. What people are irritated with is that they rewrite existing characters for the sake of wokeness not for the sake of the story. If you want other characters, write stories about other characters, don’t take existing ones and swap the sex and race and sexual orientation to stuff in wokeness and then claim bigotry and racism when people protest. They are not protesting the race so much as the ideology driving it all. They don’t want their beloved characters turned into the mouthpiece for an ideology they detest.

5 The Feminist Question

“I’d been assigned a stack of books to read for a module on critical theory, which led me to Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex.”

Why am I not surprised.

“The feminist circles I’d thrown myself into were almost all white. This whiteness wasn’t a problem if you didn’t talk about race, but if you did, it would reveal itself as an exclusionary force.”

Yes, because you are gathered together in unity. The moment you throw race into the mix you are sowing division where there was unity. It is not surprising you get push back for doing that.

“There are other places you can go to for that. But that wasn’t a choice I could make. My blackness was as much a part of me as my womanhood, and I couldn’t separate them.”

She just needs a few more divisions and then we will be down to the individual, recognizing that we all have strengths and weaknesses, that we all feel outnumbered by society from time to time and that everyone deserves grace. Of course this will undermine her claims on whiteness. She needs an evil group to oppress her.

“Whiteness is a political position, and challenging it in feminist spaces is not a tit-for-tat disagreement because prejudice needs power to be effective.”

If whiteness is a political position why attribute it to white people? Why not describe the position without recourse to race? If a black person subscribes to these political positions are they white then? The morphing from people who happen to be white to whiteness is a political position is so imprecise as to be meaningless. I suspect this is partially by design. It still evokes feeling but it’s hard to make heads or tails of what is actually meant.

“Feminism, at its best, is a movement that works to liberate all people who have been economically, socially and culturally marginalised by an ideological system that has been designed for them to fail. That means disabled people, black people, trans people, women and non-binary people, LGB people and working-class people. The idea of campaigning for equality must be complicated if we are to untangle the situation we’re in. Feminism will have won when we have ended poverty.”

Feminism is Marxism.

“Feminism must demand affordable, decent, secure housing, and a universal basic income.”

Feminism should not demand, but provide these things if they are desired.

“After a lifetime of embodying difference, I have no desire to be equal. I want to deconstruct the structural power of a system that marked me out as different. I don’t wish to be assimilated into the status quo. I want to be liberated from all negative assumptions that my characteristics bring. The onus is not on me to change. Instead, it’s the world around me.”

Ah, she finally got there.

6 Race and Class

“Because we are a nation that loves to think of itself as the underdog, it wasn’t surprising that a 2016 British Social Attitudes survey found that 60 per cent of the British public identifies as working class. The most interesting part of the survey was that 47 per cent of those who considered themselves working class were actually in managerial and professional jobs – hardly working class at all.”

I think the point is that many managers and professionals are also not making much money. Just because you have a title that sounds fancy doesn’t mean anything. It’s not like managers at Starbucks or MacDonald’s have “made it”. They may make a bit more than the cashiers but in their own estimation they are not middle class.

“The elite are the wealthiest people in the country, scoring highest economically, socially and culturally. The established middle class are the next wealthiest. They love culture. They’re followed by the technical middle class, who have money, but are not very social. New affluent workers score middle-wise on income but high on socialising and culture. They’re coming from working-class backgrounds, and are less likely to have gone to university. The traditional working class are, on average, the oldest group. Emergent service workers lag behind them in terms of financial security. Lastly, there’s the precariat – the most deprived group.2
Unlike many other”

This is interesting. Perhaps the most interesting thing in the book yet.

“The reality is, if you are born not white in this country, you probably haven’t been born into wealth.”

The reality is, if you are born in this country, you probably haven’t been born into wealth. There I fixed it.

“Research from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation has shown that black and minority ethnic people are much more likely to live in income poverty than their white counterparts.”

What is rather astounding is that there is no room for an explanation other than racism and “whiteness”. If this “whiteness” thing is working so well for white people and it’s a “political” thing, meaning it’s not because they are white, perhaps it would be helpful to take notes rather than claim racism (i.e. show up to work on time, be presentable, have a firm handshake, take pride in your work, put in more work than they pay you for etc. you know all the “white” things (to be honest it is racist to suggest that only white people are capable of these things).

“These are not exactly middle-class jobs.”

Yeah, that’s what I was saying earlier. Plenty of jobs might carry a title of “manager” or “professional” but that doesn’t mean they make a ton of money.

“In the capital, the invasion of luxury flats built for people on extraordinarily high incomes appeared to start in the east and quickly began to spread north. Construction was alarmingly swift. I spent half of my childhood in Tottenham, north-east London. When I go back to visit friends and family, I see the area changing.”

Ah, she now resonates with the anti immigration folks when they see their communities changing around them due to the influx of people. And below:

“The reading really depended on who caught a glimpse of it at the time. ‘Enjoy a more urban side to living in the heart of north London,’ the lettering read. This was an invitation that was not aimed towards people already living in Tottenham, but to newcomers”

“worried that they might begin to usher in an era of gentrification – with huge implications for the class and racial make-up of the area.”

Get out the popcorn.

“The 250 homes available at affordable social rent that Haringey planned to build by the year 2018 accounted for just 5 per cent of the number of people waiting to be homed, the EQIA concluded. It was damning. But at the time, Haringey Council argued that they needed to sell some homes privately because the funding available from central government wasn’t enough for the whole project.”

So giving homes away does not make money? I’m shocked.

“To truly understand what happened here, you need to think about these housing plans in the context of Tottenham’s history of race and class.”

I highly doubt it. To understand how one could twist this situation into one in which they are racist, let me spin a story for you, is more like it.

“When I pressed Haringey Council for an explanation on the racially exclusive nature of the housing plans”

But she has just explained that it is not racially exclusive.

“When I pressed Haringey Council for an explanation on the racially exclusive nature of the housing plans, Alan Strickland, Haringey Council’s cabinet member for housing and regeneration, told me: ‘Where people are struggling to access different types of homes because of their incomes, clearly what has to be done is address their incomes. That must come through skills and jobs and training and employment. Through our economic development and jobs work, we want to make absolutely sure that we’re improving life chances so that everybody can access these new homes.’ It seemed like an unrealistically ambitious cop-out answer in the context of systematic racial economic disadvantage.”

It may seem so, but how else does one provide more value so as to get paid more so they can buy more?

“‘If I have a white, working-class constituent who wants that opportunity . . . why should they be deprived because you’ve set these politically correct targets?’8 Again, the implication was that race and class are two separate disadvantages that are in direct competition with each other. The phrase white working class plays into the rhetoric of the far right. Affixing the word ‘white’ to the phrase ‘working class’ suggests that these people face structural disadvantage because they are white, rather than because they are working class. These are newly regurgitated old fears of white victimhood, fears that suggest that the real recipients of racism are white people, and that this reverse racism happens because of the unfair ‘special treatment’ that black people receive. When Philip Davies MP intervened against positive action at the BBC, he seemed to interpret the work as an attack on his white and working-class constituents rather than a challenge to the BBC’s white and middle-class managers and executives.”

I think she misses the argument here. She is trying to represent Davies’ argument from within critical race theory (CRT). That is, given all of these groups, what is the group of “white working class” and are they victimized and suffering? I think Davies is arguing from traditional principles of non-discrimination. It doesn’t matter who you are, you should be evaluated on yourself not on some politically correct targets. Doing otherwise is discrimination of the sort we have been meticulously trying to remove. As soon as a person does not get the job because of a politically correct target they are indeed the victim of structural disadvantage. The structure of the system is being specifically designed to put them at a disadvantage because of what group they belong to. It is the CRT people who are trying to insert structural racism. Iron law of woke projection.

“The class privilege of middle- and upper-class people in Britain is not challenged when we focus on the plight of the white working classes.”

It is not obvious to me that the class privilege of middle- and upper-class people needs to be challenged as such. And that there exists a white working class indicates that it is not just skin color that confers this privilege. There is much more nuance than that. Surely there are also non-white participants of the middle- and upper-class. Don’t they also have this class privilege? What is it beyond a larger buying power? She seems to be admitting that the white working class as a group may have their struggles, but it is not helpful to recognize this because it doesn’t work to challenge the white upper-class. Yes, I think she has gotten the point.

“This feeling of scarcity has been fuelled by government policy. Policies like right to buy, which gave council- house tenants the option to buy the property they were living in with a big discount in the 1980s, reduced the amount of Britain’s social-housing stock. Even now, councils are struggling to replace property sold. Information tracking sales between 2015 and 2016 showed that for the 12,246 council homes sold to tenants in England under right to buy, just 2,055 replacements began to be built.9 This is a consequence of government direction, not grasping immigrants hoarding housing.”

No this “feeling of scarcity” comes from actual scarcity (assuming she has accurately described the situation) as a result of the government interfering with pricing and putting housing on the market below market value. It is not immigrants fault. It is governments fault. But that the government should be expected to build houses for them and then sell them below market value is ridiculous. Of course houses do not get built if they are priced below market value.

“We must ask why politicians only ever approach class and poverty issues when it is in relation to whiteness. When race isn’t mentioned, working-class people aren’t considered deserving of targeted policies at all.”

Because the left traditionally argues on behalf of the working class. The left has now abandoned the working class for CRT and is entirely consumed with other underprivileged minorities. In America at least, the working class is rapidly switching political affiliation because the left no longer represents them.

“When it comes to talking about race, diversity, or even the faintest liberally minded hint of inclusion, self-interested white middle-class people seem to find a renewed interest in the advancement of their white working-class counterparts.”

I think this is because they are arguing against CRT and pointing out that just because someone is white does not make them privileged. This is an opportunity to agree that perhaps we could do away with the racism and approach the problem as though all working class people are in a similar challenging position. But the author will not let go of division by race, simply creates another group of white working class, and then argues why they do not need consideration.

“This myth of grabby immigrants angling themselves to snatch opportunities from white working-class people couldn’t be further from the truth. A report from The Economist, combing through data from the Office of National Statistics, found that some of the richest in Britain benefit from services like public transport and the NHS at a significant advantage than their poorer counterparts,11 proving that those with wealth already do a very good job of hogging resources.”

Notice the qualifier “some” and then that they take advantage of public transport and NHS. I would not be at all surprised to find that this was indeed true despite a much larger monetary expenditure going to immigrants. But where did those resources originate? Far from “hogging resources” the richest in Britain supply the resources through coercive taxation that everyone else enjoys. And then she has the audacity to claim the opposite. Iron law of woke projection.

“It feels like a cliché to say, but if anyone feeling resentful about their immigrant neighbours took the time to talk to them and find out a bit about their lives, they would almost certainly find that these people do not have everything handed to them on a plate, but instead are living in poor, cramped conditions, likely having left even worse conditions from wherever they’ve moved from.”

These two are not mutually exclusive. One can be handed everything and also be living in poor, cramped conditions. That we agree conditions are likely even worse where they moved from suggests that they well qualify for government support and that this will come from other taxpayers. What prevents people from immigrating simply to get the government support because they will be better off? If there are no checks on immigration surely there are a billion people who would take that opportunity. There is clearly not enough taxpayer money to support such an arrangement. Which is why the argument circles back to, we need to take care of our own citizens before we can save the world. This is a way of drawing the line somewhere reasonable which the author is trying to pass off as racism.