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It's going to take a while to think of just the right obscenitiesSubmitted by Prometheus 6 on September 29, 2005 - 4:24pm.
on Race and Identity Addressing a caller's suggestion that the "lost revenue from the people who have been aborted in the last 30 years" would be enough to preserve Social Security's solvency, radio host and former Reagan administration Secretary of Education Bill Bennett dismissed such "far-reaching, extensive extrapolations" by declaring that if "you wanted to reduce crime ... if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down." Bennett conceded that aborting all African-American babies "would be an impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do," then added again, "but the crime rate would go down." Bennett's remark was apparently inspired by the claim that legalized abortion has reduced crime rates, which was posited in the book Freakonomics (William Morrow, May 2005) by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner. But Levitt and Dubner argued that aborted fetuses would have been more likely to grow up poor and in single-parent or teenage-parent households and therefore more likely to commit crimes; they did not put forth Bennett's race-based argument. From the September 28 broadcast of Salem Radio Network's Bill Bennett's Morning in America:
Bill Bennett's Morning in America airs on approximately 115 radio stations with an estimated weekly audience of 1.25 million listeners. — A.S. Well, folks, maybe we should take Br. Cobb at his word and begin posting our own hypothetical projections of various social benefits that would accrue to the Republic if the compulsory pregnancy fanatics in our midst were put on a short leash and abortion on demand during the first, second or third trimesters became the right of every red blooded American. Could we achieve, for example, with careful planning and 24/7 abortion clinics, a tolerable reduction in the absolute number of people who tune in and listen to Rush Limbaugh, Don Imus or Bill Bennett? You betcha. Think how the American heartland, which is being plagued right now by the scourge of hillbilly heroin and the growth of methamphetamine factories, could be restored to its rumored paradisical past by the prudent and frequent use of suction devices. How many abortions would it take to guarantee that control of our government is taken away from people like Tom DeLay, Bill Frist, Bill Clinton, Condi Rice, John Kerry, Michael Chertoff, Joe Lieberman, Antonin Scalia and Br. Clarence Thomas? Would encouraging abortions among what's left of New England's WASP elite ensure that people like George and Jeb Bush would never stand for public office again? These are all important questions that deserve to answered as we look for ways to create a stronger America capable of meeting the challenge of 3.5 billion Chinese, Indians and Muslims. In the middle of the 20th Century Dupont promised us better living through chemistry. Now at the dawn of the 21st Century, we have the ability to create better living through planned eugenics and intelligent design. "I know Bennett well enough to know that he was speaking hypothetically." The amazing Negrodamus! Prognosticator and psychic mind-reader to white racists. Is there no insult by these white bigots that "black" conservatives won't explain away with their little rhetorical magic wands? A conservative kneegro columnist in the New York Post offers up a similar shufflebutt response, all but canonizing Bennett in the process. Where is the collective bitch slap from the black community? Then again, fuck Bennett and his ilk, they are what they are. The bitch slapping needs to commence at home. Every time a kneegro conservatives crawls out from under a rock to defend the scumbag racists who pay them or play them, they should be exposed as the lawn jockeys for white supremacy they are. BTW, the Republican Party (and their Democratic enablers) comprise the largest criminal class and organization in the country. Their minions orchestrated the criminal invasion and occupation of Iraq and are thus responsible and accountable for the 100,000 civilian deaths that have occurred and the continuing death toll. And they are overwhelmingly "white." Interesting how cnulan refers to the Freakonomics quote. The problem with that is that it was referring to abortion as a whole. NOT abortion of a particular segment of population. The meaning changes dramatically when you add qualifiers. I just saw this in the Richmond Times Disapatch. While the quotes made me ill -- they did not surprise me coming from Bennett. The man claims to be a authority on In addition, what specific crimes are they looking at? I had an argument with someone 2 years ago and went to crime stats maintained by the FBI. White people were found guilty of "white collar crimes", such as extortion, embezzlement and blackmail. In addition, they comprised a larger segment of murder not related to burglary/robbery. Blacks seemed to be found guilty of drug related crimes (something that can be explained by both socio -economic realities and inequalities of the justice system) and crimes of desperation such as prostitution, burglary and armed robbery. Why is it that the person that kills the ex is seen as less criminal than the hold up man that kills the store owner? Even in middle america where the population is overwhelmingly white, many believe that blacks are responsible for crime. I never will understand how that concept takes root in a community that is 90% while and who's criminals are overwhelming white poor people. *sigh* Reasons that abortion rates affect crime rates are most likely socio-economic. I haven't read the book so I'd be interested to know what *kind* of crime is affected by the legalization of abortion? Sometimes "crime rates" will increse or decrease because actions are criminalized or decriminalized. In the interests of setting this house on fire, let's take a look at the transcript of Dr. Bennett's interview on Hannity and Colmes:
which Dr. Bennett condensed to a 'hypothetical' argument saying genocide against Blacks is the solution for reducing the crime rate. even better...as Hannity puts his nose deep within Bennett's ass, Bennett takes advantage to discuss how he knows black people:
...later on...
I often end up smacking people around logically because they insist that racism is an individual aberration as opposed to a systemic pattern. Bennett is a major player in the Republican party (and government); the fact that he can openly say these things in the media does not make him a radical, deviant individual - it means that this is standard dogma for the Republican party. How do Black Republicans/Conservatives live with themselves? How do they justify their participation (and defense of) a party which puts people like this on the front lines - people who make no bones about the contempt they hold for Black people? "How do Black Republicans/Conservatives live with themselves? How do they justify their participation (and defense of) a party which puts people like this on the front lines - people who make no bones about the contempt they hold for Black people?" The simply deny that these people have contempt for black people and, if pressed, they adopt the pose of folks like Armstrong Williams who routinely defended the likes of Strom Thurmond and Jesse Helms by claiming that he was personally acquainted with them and knew them to be honorable, stalwart, upstanding sorts with nary a racist sentiment in their bodies. "The simply deny that these people have contempt for black people and, if pressed, they adopt the pose of folks like Armstrong Williams who routinely defended the likes of Strom Thurmond and Jesse Helms by claiming that he was personally acquainted with them and knew them to be honorable, stalwart, upstanding sorts with nary a racist sentiment in their bodies." Yep. That sums it up perfectly. They'll stand with nooses around their necks and crosses burning in the background, defending the status quo of white supremacy until their last breaths. Most are not true believers or true "conservatives" (whatever that means). They're just getting paid. Selling out has become a popular career choice for some folks in our community (especially since the Republicans discovered a new recruiting pool amongst the black clergy), but no matter how they dress it up (arguments about morality, personal responsibility, etc.), it's still comes down to the same old shit warmed over. Bennett is a major player in the Republican party (and government); He has no government post. it means that this is standard dogma for the Republican party. Republicans say that about Al Sharpton's ranting. == For people who thought huh?! instead of seeing deeply sinister intent here... Bennett picked an atrocious way to make a point which is exceptionally difficult for most people to follow. The original caller suggested that legal abortion was causing underfunding of Social Security. I find that absurd. Most people find that absurd. Bennet didn't find it absurd, rather he found it perilous, and set out to explain that such arguments were perilous. He brought up the claim that legal abortion reduced crime. I find that claim, the causual relationship between legal abortion and reduced crime, to make good sense. Bennett found that claim absurd, and assumed that his caller and his audience did too. Since none of us are Benett's audience, it is nearly impossible to get to this context. It's totally twisted. Bennett then leaped (in his mind) to a totally absurd example; he was attempting a reductio ad absurdum, and offered it to the audience to make the point that arguments from projections of the effects of legal abortion are perilous. The black abortion thing was expected to be parsed as patently absurd. We can note the example which he didn't use: "if all we wanted to do was to reduce crime, we should abort all babies born to single welfare mothers". The reason he chose the racial example was because he found it patently absurd, as compared to the single welfare mother example, which he found more plausible. == Worthy of note: p6 quoted the entire context. Some others weren't so ethical.
PT, i disagree with you slightly - i think many Black Conservatives/Republicans, like many other middle-class Blacks, hold their own people in contempt as well. I can't tell you how many Black people around my town (and on the web, too) were publicly excoriating the behavior of Blacks in New Orleans because they were all too eager to believe the allegations about looting, rapes, and murders. This racialized contempt is often disguised as commentary on the 'laziness' or 'moral poverty' of poor Blacks and predates Moynihan's reports by at least a century. It's funny to me...everyone knows "someone" who cheats on welfare or doesn't work - but those people are never in their OWN family. And as for the moral decay of the Black community - some of our people need to check out the campus drinkeries/parties at this major midwestern university. The alcohol-induced sexual aggression of drunken white guls and boys is outrageous AND not ever remarked upon in any kind of media. if young black sistahs conducted themselves like that they would be sent home or arrested - b'lee dat. "Selling out has become a popular career choice for some folks in our community..." The writer James McPherson noticed this sad development nearly 20 years ago in an essay entitled "Junior and Jane Doe". He attributed its appearance in the black community to people having lost contact with the traditional idioms and folk meanings of their community. What brought it home to him was watching the Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill hearings and receiving a telephone call from one of his sisters who told him that Thomas apparently didn't attend the same Catholic schools in Savannah, Georgia that McPherson and his sisters had gone to because Thomas seemed to have lost any true sense of himself. *shaking my head sadly* DW. This is already starting to sound like your defense of Thomas and you barely even started. Bennett is not in government NOW. Neither is Joe Allbaugh and look at how that's worked out for him! This is like your reluctance to consider the cultural dimensions of Jim Crow and only focusing on the legal structure; you attempt to invalidate by only focusing on one dimension of the problem. Bennett is a major player in the Republican party - the Republican party is effectively in control of the government - therefore, Bennett has influence on Republican-led governance and in fact, many of the current social policies are ones that he actively promoted at the apex of his 'official' political career during the 80's. If Republicans say that Al Sharpton's ranting is indicative of Black people (is that what you meant?), that's more evidence against their lack of understanding of the Black community than a credible rebuttal against what i wrote. BTW - didn't the Republicans fund Al Sharpton during the last presidential campaign? Jonathan Swift, who Bennett compared himself to, would have been considered a racist today. The only reason he wasn't considered one during the 17th century was because then racism was socially sanctioned and openly encouraged. I know that you consider logic to be a neutral device but it is much more of a rhetorical device, dependent upon the belief system of the party(ies). You might as well have told me that he just "happened" to use Black people instead of poor people as an example - his word choice tells me much more about his logical framework than your defense can ever convey. The absurdity was not the fact that he used an outrageous example; t's the example that he used - one that came easily from his tongue and even defended in later interviews. Again, re: the Thomas discussion - if the premises that the 'logic' is based on is flawed, then the logic itself is flawed. Logic is not independent of cultural values. Bill Bennett has long been an opponent of Black communities, and his statements reiterate that fact. "Worthy of note: p6 quoted the entire context. Some others weren't so ethical." The context to be considered is far larger than Bennett's racist remarks. The context is the racially constructed climate and landscape in this country with which black folks and other so-called "non-whites" must contend every day. That's what you obviously have a hard time grasping, DW. We are not dealing with these issues in the abstract. We live with this shit every fucking day of our lives, from the snide remarks or overt insults in the media, to the sheriffs in Bohunk East Texas preventing buses full of black folks evacuating from Rita from stopping in their little KKK fiefdoms to use the bathrooms or get food. White folks should get down on their knees everyday and thank the great white santa-claus-in-the-sky they worship that black folks have imbibed the kool aid that is the American Dream and refrained from suicide bombing this country back into the stone age. That we have not resorted to "terrorism" to defend ourselves is more a tribute to our humanity as a people than a true measure of the inhumane and even genocidal treatment (Bennett's prescription) we have had to endure to reside in a nation that could not have been established or maintained without us. If Republicans say that Al Sharpton's ranting is indicative of Black people (is that what you meant?), I meant that they say Al Sharpton's ranting is indicative of Democrats. I suspect such crap will always be part of politics, but it's crap from either side. Bill Bennett is not definitive of Republicans, not even close. No single person is. GW Bush, as president, comes closest.
"Again, re: the Thomas discussion - if the premises that the 'logic' is based on is flawed, then the logic itself is flawed. Logic is not independent of cultural values. Bill Bennett has long been an opponent of Black communities, and his statements reiterate that fact." ConPermiso has opened the woodshed door. I see another can of ass whupping being opened up on your ass, DW, if you continue to spout your abstract notions about our existential reality. DW, you grew up in the belly of the beast of white privilege. You may not be conscious of how you assert that privilege in these discussions, but in my opinion you think you have a license to speak authoritatively on issues of race and racism because you have a mind to speak. That you wrestle with these problems is commendable. That you fail to see the difference between opinions about racism and the direct experiences of racism is a product of your socialization in white America. And while you may have learned some things from the brilliant black minds engaged here, you still haven't mastered the basic skill of looking before you leap. In other words, you tend to give lip service to the status quo of white privilege, while refusing to give credence to the "other" perspectives you claim to be seeking. Of course you are free to do as you choose. I am not the forum police. I'm just trying to prevent the inevitable drive-by (trust me, I'm frequently the one leaning out the window with the Glock). But if you truly want to understand what is going on here, give some thought to what I said about the difference between the abstract discussion (the one taking place in your mind) and the existential reality--the real obstacle course of racism we negotiate for our whole lives--that we are helping each other confront, challenge and endure. if the premises that the 'logic' is based on is flawed, then the logic itself is flawed. Logic is not independent of cultural values. While I can't buy it as written CP, I think you're trying to say something different. If the premise is flawed, then we cannot draw any logical inferences. It's perfectly logical to assert that someone is using a flawed premise, and thus their conclusions are invalidated. However, you're expected to show what is flawed regarding the premise. So I take it you believe that I presume a few flawed premises, and I don't dispute that I've concluded that myself at times. The resolution was to work on improving the flawed premise.
but in my opinion you think you have a license to speak authoritatively on issues of race and racism because you have a mind to speak. You'll not see me claiming to speek authoritativly on issues of race and racism, O. To the broad question, I have one conclusion: black and white experience are profoundly different. I agree with you, blacks suffer. Whites don't. It seems to me that for blacks to understand white experience would be progressive. I don't understand all white experience, nor speak for all white people, but I do believe my perspective is common.
Those of us who have survived and thrived to the present day DO understand it. COMPLETELY That we choose - consciously or otherwise - to criticize, eschew, and even actively oppose it - is what you would profit most by considering - and possibly even coming to understand. "To the broad question, I have one conclusion: black and white experience are profoundly different. I agree with you, blacks suffer. Whites don't." No, you don't understand me, DW, if you think that is my position. Whites do suffer from racism. It is, after all, a pathology they created, nurtured and sustained in their own hearts and minds. In their perversion and denial of the unity of humanity (their brutalization and dehumanization of blacks to justify slavery and discrimination), they become the beasts they imagine us to be. One need but look at all the tools, laws, policies used to enslave and oppress blacks to see how much time, energy, money, genius has been wasted and lost. It has crippled white folks; it has severely retarded their growth as human beings. "It seems to me that for blacks to understand white experience would be progressive." Again, the blinders of white privilege prevent you from seeing clearly. Black folks know and understand every initmate detail of white folks' lives. You are not a mystery to us. You have no secrets. For generations our mother and grandmothers fed you at their breasts, wiped your asses, taught you how to be ladies and gentlemen. They brought us leftovers from your tables, your hand-me-down clothes, the detritus of your lives landed squarely in ours. Even today you can see the black women with shopping bags waiting to catch the busses to the burbs to care for white folks and clean their houses. We know everything about you. And you fail even to recognize this. The little episode with Bennett has been instructive. People's reactions to his remarks reveal quite a lot. There are two common responses: 1) His remarks aren't offensive because he didn't actually advocate aborting black babies. 2) His remarks are offensive because he equates blackness with criminality. Those who offer the first response accept the underlying premises in Bennett's hypothetical. I think I follow Bennett's interpretation of Freakonomics. He starts with the link between abortion and crime. Leavitt proposes that abortions are sought predominantly by poor, single mothers and that children of those mothers are more likely to become criminals. Separately, one can find statistical support for the proposition that the rate of births to teenage, unmarried mothers is higher among black women than white women. Bennett, for reasons unspoken, runs these two together and comes up with his astonishing premise. So the relevant question about Bennett's state of mind is: "Why did he make the series of leaps from abortion to poor-and-unmarried to black to criminality?" A much simpler and more direct correlation was available in the source he was quoting. He had to consciously choose to introduce race into the question. And he did. I think I follow Bennett's interpretation of Freakonomics. He starts with the link between abortion and crime. Leavitt proposes that abortions are sought predominantly by poor, single mothers and that children of those mothers are more likely to become criminals. What most people miss is that Bennett rejects that conclusion. "Leavitt proposes that abortions are sought predominantly by poor, single mothers and that children of those mothers are more likely to become criminals." Thanks QB for your analysis. In parsing this debate you reveal the crucial hinge that supports the entire flawed framework: what is meant by criminal? I have argued elsewhere in this forum that a free black person is an anathema to the advocates and supporters of white supremacy. For them "free black" is an oxymoron. This mind-set explains the crime of DWB (driving while black). Driving is a privilege, and in the land of white supremia only whites have privileges. Blacks on the other hand have rules that must be obeyed. The first rule of white supremacist ideology is: be white. The second rule is: don't be black. That leaves black folks in violation of the natural order. Hence black folks by nature are out of order: i.e. criminals. What I'm getting to here is why Bennett made the leap in logic: criminal=black. That equation is not code or cant, it is an explicit statement of of white supremacist ideology. Blacks have no rights a white person is obligated to respect. Black cannot be free despite legislative acts because black folks lack intellect and are inherently inferior. Black folks refuse to abide by these strictures so black folks are criminals. White folks on the other hand can invade other folks' land, enslave other folks, annihilate other folks and this is called spreading civilization. This is viewed as within the natural order, so no crime has been committed. I would argue that this is the mind-set common to Bennett and others who see the world through the lens of antiblack racism. Black folks know and understand every initmate detail of white folks' lives. Given the widespread mis-analysis of white people I see here, that wouldn't apply to all black people. Further, such a belief blocks actual wisdom.
Evidently G-Dub didn't get it either
"What most people miss is that Bennett rejects that conclusion." Given this claim on your part regarding what Bennett actually believes, then it is incumbent on you to explain what conclusion Bennett actually draws from Leavitt's analysis. Make it good now. And if you can't make it a good one, then at least make it plausible. And if you can't do that, then at least tell us a good logically coherent story about what Bennett believes.
Pray tell DW, what have we gotten twisted?
ROTFLMBAO!!!! at least tell us a good logically coherent story about what Bennett believes. Bennett, and his audience, believe that abortion is wrong, always. They reject any possibility that good could come from abortion.
You're right, O. I've had that question floating around in my head and hadn't been able to pin it down. I wonder if there are any statistics available on the number of people in the U.S. who have criminal convictions? (That is, not the number of convictions or the number of people in jail, but the total number--incarcerated or not--who have, for want of a better term, a criminal record.) Pray tell DW, what have we gotten twisted? The interpretation of common white behavior as betrayal of deeply held racist white belief. I'll agree with you cnulan that most white people, myself included, might have racist reactions. But very few white people hold any general animosity toward black people at all, nor do they assert any form of superiority. When black people try to analyze white people thought such a filter, they come to the wrong conclusion. When they stick with that conclusion, it forces them to believe that white people are lying to them, and we spiral further apart. Aim at racism based on poorly thought out behavior, comments, or reactions, and you may well connect. Aim at deeply held animosity, and you're way off target.
DW, here's the nut of Bennett's statement:
If you take the abortion - crime link out of his reasoning, how else can he get black abortions = lower crime rate? "Given the widespread mis-analysis of white people I see here, that wouldn't apply to all black people." Please elaborate. Can you provide an example of such mis-analysis? "Further, such a belief blocks actual wisdom." Only someone fully invested in white privilege would make such a statement. Again, you reveal your inability to grasp the nuances of these discussions. I don't think anyone here (except you) believes in "white" people any more than they believe in the tooth fairy. The notion of "whitness" is a social construct. It is a false consciousness reified by those who needed a means to justify their enslavement and exploitation of peoples with different physical features. It is the height of idiocy to believe that any "wisdom" can come from the monstrous fallacy of race in any form. You should also understand that "blackness," as a referent, is a tool and weapon of survival. Fanon said: the white man invented the Negro and the Negro invented Negritude. What he meant is that racism invented a human commodity, labeled it black, and sold it to the world. Those who were thusly labeled and distributed as cargo took that label and used it to unify, organize and liberate themselves. I don't have time to give you a lesson in Race and Slavery 101, but you should know that there were no Negroes in Africa until outsiders arrived. There were Yoruba, Ga, Fon, Ashanti, Mande, etc., but no Negroes or blacks. There weren't even any "Africans" until all those diverse ethnic groups wound up in the belly of slave ships and discovered they were suddenly "united" in their enslavement and exploitation. A similar analogy can be provided to illustrate how the English, French, Spanish, etc. became white through their common exploitation of so-called non-whites. Given its etiology and pathology what "wisdom" can whiteness offer? Now, if you are taking about the cultural wisdom of ethnic Brits or ethnic Irish or ethnic Swedes, that's an entirely different matter. But I don't think you meant that because your rhetoric suggests you are still wedded to the notion of biological race. Evidently G-Dub didn't get it either
Evidently G-Dub didn't get it either Check your posting out, cnulan. See again who didn't get it. The president, through McClellan said the comments were not appropriate. (they weren't) Yahoo said that Bennett had linked the crime rate and the abortion of black babies. If you take the abortion - crime link out of his reasoning, how else can he get black abortions = lower crime rate? His statement is of the form "if all we wanted to do was eliminate bombings in Iraq, we could kill every single Iraqi". True, but patently absurd. He goes on to point out why it is absurd.
I aim at a centuries old cultural governance infrastructure in which individuals are embedded - and which very few have the power to resist. It is my carefully studied opinion that in this culture, the majority of people have been subconsciously conditioned to be racist. The unquestioning willingness of most whites to accept every unfounded suggestion coming from MSM concerning the bestiality of poor black refugees in N'awlins is a fine demonstration of this cultural proclivity. Black people didn't construct this culture, and having been the subject of its insidious perogatives, have developed adaptive sensitivities for detecting, critiqueing, and resisting its constant assaults. A fine example of such an assault would be Bennett's article on Grievance Culture;
It's his own version of Michael Savage's Enemy Within screed..., basically projection from the collective unconscious. I believe this is what Michael Moore was on about in Bowling for Columbine. It seems to me that Bennett is less concerned with the morality of abortion than he is with constant projection of his own subconscious fears of black men, a fear he was first empowered to instantiate in the neologistic War on Drugs which is really nothing other than a systematic War on Black Men having much in common with the raging neoconservative neologism du jour, the War on Terra. No, his statement doesn't take that form. His statement takes the form:
Now either his reasoning is like I suggested:
or else he followed a different line of reasoning to reach his conclusion that aborting black babies would lower the crime rate. Which do you think it is?
Every time we do the former, we are accused of the latter.
There. That's so right. Please let me add: "Every time you do the former, many people think they hear the latter." Every time we do the former, we are accused of the latter. So that's how it seems. I believe you.
I don't believe you. Why not? "Bennett, and his audience, believe that abortion is wrong, always. They reject any possibility that good could come from abortion." Abortion or how one may feel about abortion is emphatically not the issue. Please explain why Bennett felt it necessary to draw a causal connection between the incidences of natality in the b lack community and crime rates in the United States? Please explain why Bennett felt it necessary to draw a causal connection between the incidences of natality in the black community and crime rates in the United States? Necessary? I have no idea. It was a mediocre argument even in context, because it required far too much subtle context to communicate what Bennett was trying to say. Abortion or how one may feel about abortion is emphatically not the issue. Abortion and a feeling shared among Bennett, the caller, and the audience, that abortion is always wrong, was the context of Bennett's comment. Look at the caller's comment. That's what Bennett is responding to, and it has nothing to do with racial issues. Bennett's response is about "extrapolating" (to use Bennett's word) the results of legal abortion. Bill Bennett claims to be a reasonably intelligent fellow. He, in fact, believes that he has a duty to instruct all of us in the vituous arts and the uplifting aspects of Western culture. Despite his gambling addiction and the faint hauteur he projects of being a pugnacious drunk when aroused, he seems eminently capable of expressing his views on a wide variety of issues and subjects. Nonetheless, you want to grant him a pass on the grounds that the argument he actually wanted to make required "too much subtle context" to adequately convey what he intended to say. Bennett's caller didn't raise the issue of race and abortion. Bennett injected the issue of race. He could just as well claimed that an increase in abortions would result in a decrease in crimes and explained what he meant. He chose, however, to raise the alleged issue of black natality rates and crime and to draw a causal connection between the two. P6 should begin to monitor your postings because I don't think you are seriously interested in having a discussion with us about race or other related matters. We have all cut you more slack than you have earned or now deserve to receive. I wish you could know me PT. You wouldn't agree with my politics any more than you do now, but you'd be a lot more at ease with me the person. In particular, you wouldn't be doubting my sincerity. The issue is not your sincerity. It is what you are serious about. Several weeks ago, for example, you took strong and repeated exception to my equally strong assertions that the young Brazilian man who was killed in the subway by special agents was in fact murdered. You presented one argument after another and included legal definitions of murder etc. In short, you actually defended the shooting of this poor young man based on the information (I considered them lies) that Scotland Yard and the British government presented. Since that time the official board whose express duty it is to investigate incidents of this type has released a report rejecting every single claim offered by the police agents as to why this young man was shot. He wasn't wearing a heavy coat. He wasn't acting in a furtive suspicious manner nor did he jump the turnstile as had been alleged. In fact, videotapes showed that he casually entered the tube station, picked up a free newspaper that he began reading before paying his fare and taking a seat on the train. Despite the scope of this report and its damning findings you did not revisit this issue and admit that you were mistaken. Worse, it seems as if this incident has made no imprint whatsoever on your conciousness because you still continue to believe in things that are manifestly not true such as your claim that Bill Bennett was talking about abortion, not race. This is palpably untrue. Worse, it is deceitful and is intended to distort and obfuscate what is the real issue here. P6, in my opinion, needs to monitor your postings. You are not serious.
It's a thought. It was really interesting watching him earn the extended bullshit award. A bit wondering if I was alone in the world in my interpretation, I went out to see what others had said (when I posted here this morning, it was my own analysis). Not that surprisingly, others agree. Here's Brad Delong, who I don't often read, so I don't know if I endorse him in general or not, but we came to a similar conclusion on this question. Quote:
I'm personally surprised at how patient everyone has been to dw for so long. I would have been calling him every name in the book with his first post. Shannon: think object lesson. If we could figure out how to get him to accept the real deal, it would be valuable. Knowing we can't is equally so...and the proposition has been thoroughly tested. Quoting Brad Delong (I have no idea who he is and I don't really care) as a means to support your arguments leaves me cold. I could have made the same argument that Bennett allegedly intended to make without making a single reference to black people. I could have made this argument on radio, television or before an audience of bible-thumping Methodists or foot-washing Baptists without referring once to black people, illegal immigrants, Native Americans in the Great Plains states or poor whites living in the greater Appalachia regions. There was no need on Bennett's part to draw any inferences or relationships between crime rates in the United States and the birth of black babies. Your continued defense of his remarks (and you are implicting defending his remarks by denying their racist intent) tells me that you are either extremely obtuse, morally purblind or, worse, derive a perverse thrill from making incendiary remarks on race and other related matters to black folks. I am still of the opinion that your comments should be monitored and if I owned this list I would exclude you from participating at all. It has taken me many months to come to this conclusion but your attitude and resistence to accepting any contrary views about race from people who are more than intimately familiar with these issues leaves me with no other choice.
This is a common problem. In fact, it was a major obstacle to Black folks creating a public presence on the web in the early days. It's also had several nasty side effects on the way Black folks present online to this day. When the web first went public, every Black-oriented site I found was flooded with racist comments. I know for a fact some folks just got off on pissing people off and found Black folks easy to enrage. Most serious Black discussion fell back to email discussion lists that required registration. And Black folks went into "strong Black man" mode, in which your analysis is supposed to be dispassionate and you are unaffected emotionally in any way. heh. Right wing online efforts are rather organized. You'll notice that any progressive site with a following has right wing commenters that challenge so consistently it seems they are assigned to work the site. In my opinion, this is why DW hangs around. One technique I think I want to draw particular attention to, because it's really subterranean. Check here
and here
This affiliation of self with Thomas was intended to make anyone who likes DW hesitant to attack Thomas. It's not rational, but it works. Unfortunately for him, he convinced me to consciously accept that identification. The reason he hasn't been put on probie status is I've never done that because someone stubbornly to the point of stupidity pushed a political agenda. Being a dick is an entirely different thing. The reason I'm considering it is he's a sizable irritant to me at this point. I believe you all have slightly unrealistic expectations of DW. He does a damn fine, and I believe sincere job of representing. Most folks whose politics are in sync with DW's are incapable of subjecting themselves to protracted scrutiny. DW has exhibited no such compunctions. I consider DW a damn near perfect logical foil for discourse hereabouts, and I for one, would miss his finely tuned, though obstinately mechanical expressions. Steven Barnes does a nice job of delineating the situation..., If you'd like me gone, just ask. Nothing subterranean about me. Clarence Thomas is the public figure who most closely matches my thinking, and I'm motivated to explain Thomas. That said, my real goal here was never political. There's lots of people I talk politics with. It was developing an understanding racial issues, and in my periods of euphoric optimism, it seemed possible to develop bridges across the gap. The time has come to distance myself from politics on this forum. Secondly, it wasn't about explaining the news from a common white perspective, although this is closer. The intent was a view into white analysis. However, if explaining the news is a barrier to the real goal, then it's time to drop explanations of the news. I'm not sure exactly what is left. But I really want to make peace with PT. "I consider DW a damn near perfect logical foil for discourse hereabouts, and I for one, would miss his finely tuned, though obstinately mechanical expressions." I once described him as the rabbit on a greyhound track.
"Nothing subterranean about me. Clarence Thomas is the public figure who most closely matches my thinking, and I'm motivated to explain Thomas."
DW, jungle love is a powerful thing. I only hope one day you and Tomass Clarence can find true happiness in Massachusetts where those kind of unions are legal.
As I said, I was considering it. cnulan's point is valid and I'm acting as a Black partisan here...the question is what does my partisan activities gain or lose by either choice. So far, publically addressing your points has brought more benefit than the annoyance I currently feel takes away.
It seems this means understanding how white folks are blamed for racial problems and how to explain why that should not be. If you were actually trying to learn you might take what you acknowlege in one discussion into account in the next discussion. That's just the way it seems to me. I have no problem just banning assholes, but that ain't you. Setting your account so that your comments are reviewed for these reasons seems a significant step, in a direction I don't like. Making my understanding clear, and behaving as though it is, indeed, my understanding of things is fine. "But I really want to make peace with PT." There is not going to be any peace with me in the sense that you mean. I do, however, strive not to be petty or vengeful although I don't ever excuse or pardon my enemies. I don't consider you to be an enemy. Our problem, that is, between you and I, is not that you have crossed a line but that you refuse to step over the line of your own orthodoxy and ideology and make a strenuous effort to be part of a serious discussion about some serious matters. You keep throwing out partisan cliches as if they have some totemic power to ward off reality. We can disagree about Br. Thomas and still maintain a degree of comity, but we can't do that about William Bennett's racist remarks no matter how often people like you and Shelby Steele attempt to defend him. And your inability or unwillingness to see that the stakes are different is more than just dismaying because it indicates an inability to empathize with others. I no longer think that you should be frozen out of this list and I apologize to you and others for having expressed that viewpoint. I wasn't angry when I wrote those sentences and I am not angry at this time. We don't have a great deal in common and I need to be more mindful of this fact. I should have understood and accepted this when you wrote that you considered Miles Davis' album "Kind of Blue" to be, perhaps, good background music. Our differences comes to this: the first time I heard Hank Williams singing "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" I knew that I was hearing a consummate artist. You either get it or you don't. Our differences comes to this: the first time I heard Hank Williams singing "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" I knew that I was hearing a consummate artist. You either get it or you don't. On my car CD with MP3s, of the 160 songs or so, sort of my favorites of the moment, two are by Hank Williams. "I'm so Lonesome I Could Cry", and "Kaw-Liga". None are by Hank Jr. Life is good when PT explains music. So tell me PT what you thought of white British guys playing black music. Did it bother you? My long time favorite from all of Led Zeppelin has taken on a modern relevance. "When the Levee Breaks". Written by Memphis Minnie (Lizzie Douglas) in 1929. When the levee breaks, have no place to stay. I wonder if she heard it (she died in 1973, Led Zep's Levee was recorded in 1971), and if she did, what she thought of it. I had imagined it was set in Texas, but I see where Memphis Minnie was born in Algiers, LA.
If you were actually trying to learn you might take what you acknowlege in one discussion into account in the next discussion. That's just the way it seems to me. Before I said that during my periods of euporic optimism I hope to build bridges. But I sometimes dream bigger than that (and get quickly crashed back to earth). I believe racism is badly analyzed, by everyone. I believe you P6 have the potential to write the book (it has to be written by a black person), and I believe our discussions have the potential to develop interesting insight. But, as stated, that idea doesn't last very long. In seconds I come down from that high to the reality that I'm perceived as actually hostile to the interests of regular posters. Moments apparently of great value (as occurred earlier in this thread regarding inadvertent racism vs animosity) end up with their own gap instead of a high five. I get it, from y'alls perspective, I'm obstinate. I don't obviously listen. That, for sure, is the nature of the problem. Whites look obstinate to blacks. Blacks look obstinate to whites. No one listens. Everyone already knows. We're doomed .... And yet, from time to time we get these momentary flashes, where we can all see it from both sides, and that point in a complex space doesn't look much like either side thought it looked like. QB added a comment to P6's illumination of one such point. P6 explains "when we point out inadvertent racism, we're accused of claiming animosity". QB added "white people think they hear such a claim". So there we have an illuminated point. We can see it from the black perspective and from the white perspective. I hope we can find a few more.
Possibly. However, it will not be due to lack of dedication on Black folks' part. WE ARE NOT THE OBSTACLE AND HAVE NEVER BEEN. And if white people insist on acting otherwise, yes you all are doomed.
Okay, insight. Who would be the target audience of this book? What would it explain? And why does a Black person have to write it? We'll skip the practical issue of who will publish it for this discussion. I'm sure any book I would write, regardless of the target audience, would have to be self-published. The Isbell Theory - Charles Isbell October 1995 There is a Black Leadership vaccuum... but it's not for Black folks, it's for White folks. The leader and messiah being sought is *not* being sought by Black people, but by White people. The mainstream wants a national Black leader--a spokesperson really--so they can have someone to point to, someone to reason with, be angry at, hold onto, respect, hate or whatever, but make no mistake, it is a leader for *their* sakes, not for the sakes of Black people. By contrast, Black America is happy to go on being the non-monolithic people we've always been and to address our issues locally, individually and internally. I don't think we have a messiah fixation or a particular desire for a national leader.
Cobb has made quite a few noises about writing a book, perhaps even this book. I suspect it has a lot to do with this moment. Personally, I'm too enamoured of my vision of orthodox blackness c. 1957 and thus much more interested in crafting an alternative and unassimilable black consensus reality. Dammit, I just can't fathom why you black libs have gotten it sooo twisted. Why can't you feel the love, and accept the love and come around to the fact that Bill Bennett loves you so much, that he gave up our only begotten black babies to produce a reverse Sister Souljah moment. Stop hating and just work with him black people! Bennett's Glorious Example Bennett is a genius. He was able, with just a few short sentences to bring a level of uproar so powerful, so resonant with the American psyche that people still can't get the idea out of their heads. The concept encapsulated in those seven small words is so powerful, so earthshatteringly dangerous that it has turned our world upside down. It is so morally contemptuous that people have come out of their homes screaming in the streets. By simply naming it, he has brought the public to attention to a concept which is universally reviled. There's "Colleen" from Laguna Hills. All grown up, minus the Jonathan Livingston Seagull earrings, and spouting white-identity politricks under a pseudonym spoofing Sistah Souljah. 30 plus years since that radiant puppy love week and I got to say DAYYUM - she put it on a brother something fierce didn't she? Mike is such a skilled satirist...
Jungle Fever dulls all sharp edges...,
I'm going to say Armstrong succumbed to money and jungle fever. Now I know about Brock, but I'm wondering what the intern Armstrong had to pay off looked like? Whaddaya bet it wasn't a brother? Don't drive too far from this book thing. It could be useful. I believe it's nothing short of essential, thus my drive to approach it satyrically. (^;
In other words, fuck that... Okay, I ask you the same questions I asked DW about writing this essential book. On the face of it, we're in agreement. I've suggested Methinkst you need a few hundred more miligrams of caffeine in your system. I'm certainly not the one. You'd sooner find me writing the ergodic magnum opus on Supreme Mathematics to objectively undergird an alternative and unassimilable black consensus reality. "Go ahead and tell me that's not the point." Bennett's point may have been grounded in a discussion of economics but took a decisive turn toward genocide when he injected race into the conversation. The fucking point is all he could imagine is a "hypothetical" that involved the mass murder of black people. Once again Negrodamus tries to defend the indefensible. Let me make a prediction here for Negrodamus. I see a well paid job in your future: the official Elephant Boy of the Republican Party. You will surpass Underarm Williams and the other kneegros vying for the position because no one is better than you at following and worshipping conservative ideologues and managing the seemingly endless supply of shit they deposit daily. Get yourself a shovel Negrodamus. The future awaits.
We'll skip the practical issue of who will publish it for this discussion. I'm sure any book I would write, regardless of the target audience, would have to be self-published. Yes, skip that entirely. The book remains purely a concept until you have something to say. I observe P6 that when you have something to say you can say it pretty well. Now you might well have other things to say, but we're stalled at pretty much the same place everyone else is when it comes to racism (with a couple of important cracks showing potential). The book thing, the concept, is that people who come at the problem from somewhat hostile perspectives might be able to develop ideas which really do constitute something to say. Since it's a concept, aim high. Aim at making a difference in America. What would it explain? It would explain racism as experienced by blacks to whites. It would explain the same events as experienced by whites to blacks. It would point out techniques to make the experiences more similar. And why does a Black person have to write it? I don't believe a white person can credibly write a book on racism. Out out angry spot!!! Resistance is futile. If only you could've witnessed the dewy sweetness of tender, nubile, young Colleen, all that pent up anger would "poof" be gone with the wind...,
ahem, not picking nits or anything O, but once again satyrically speaking..., it may be more technically accurate to describe this particular type of kneegrow as "undernutsack" williams ROTFLMBAO!!!! ""undernutsack" williams" That and "satyrically speaking" made my day!
Bulworth (1998) said it satyrically; Senator Jay Billington Bulworth: All we need is a voluntary, free-spirited, open-ended program of procreative racial deconstruction. Everybody just gotta keep fuckin' everybody 'til they're all the same color. Though Sarita showing Lyedecker that important crack is easier for me to believe than Beatty's fantasy of Nina showing Bulworth. But hey, that's why Nixon, Bennett, et al launched their war on black men. You realize that things didn't kick up in earnest until Bennett's tenure. "Just say no!"
Do we all get it now? Mostly, I think, but not deeply. We haven't worked through the implications, we haven't confirmed it in those times it reappears out of the blue. But let's check out what we have here. We have two very different experiences of the same event. That seems a problem, but the interesting thing about it is that it seems a tractable problem.
You realize of course that if I don't elevate my game, P6 will definitely be putting my blakazz on probation before close of binnis today. ROTFLMBAO!!!! although I've been cracking myself up this morning, be assured that I am completely serious about what I'm saying..., now i'm gonna take my chirrens out for a massive gut blowout and let the telencephalic race men get back to their studious deliberations. "I don't believe a white person can credibly write a book on racism." Well, Duh? I don't suppose the inventor of toothpaste could write a book about it either. Okay, it's a strain for me but I will attempt to stop speaking "satyrically" for a moment. Two categories of "white" authorship can de defined here: (1) books like the Bell Curve, The Turner Diaries, etc., that are racist in intent, content or ideology. And (2) books that deconstruct and analyze racism and document its history and consequences. While abundant examples exist that fall into category (1), category (2) includes notable scholars and texts that are must reading for anyone seriously interested in this subject. The number of excellent studies on racism that have been written by Europeans and Americans of European ancestry (see I didn't call them "white" people because they recognize "whiteness" for what it is) grows every year. Read works by Ivan Hannaford, George Frederickson, Alexander Saxton, Noel Ignatiev, Matthew Frye Jacobson, David R. Roediger and Theodore W. Allen to acquaint yourself with current Euro-American scholarship in the field. Perhaps then, DW, you can have an "informed" discussion on the subject and stop spouting this inane rhetoric about "white" peoples' inability to experience or intellectually critique racism.
"Senator Jay Billington Bulworth: All we need is a voluntary, free-spirited, open-ended program of procreative racial deconstruction. Everybody just gotta keep fuckin' everybody 'til they're all the same color." Beatty's invitation to Amiri Baraka to be in the film, and his acceptance of Baraka's condition that he (Baraka) could write his own lines, demonstrates how a subversive meme can infiltrate the body politic before the thought police can shut down the neuro-nets. "WE DON'T NEED NO GHOSTS. WE NEED SPIRITS."
Read works by Ivan Hannaford, George Frederickson, Alexander Saxton, Noel Ignatiev, Matthew Frye Jacobson, David R. Roediger and Theodore W. Allen to acquaint yourself with current Euro-American scholarship in the field. I'm not going to claim to be an expert on all those guys O, so see this as an invitation to straighten me out. The reason these guys don't connect with white people is that white people see contemporary racial relationships as being defined by two events: emancipation and the civil rights era of the '60s. In other words, racism is something of the past, slavery of the far distant past. We're the good guys. We led the world, twice, in making racial progress. A thousand pages of scholarly history is chopped off clean at 1964, and the majority of white people living today have little or no personal recollection of life before 1964. If you're (collective, includes me) going to connect with white people in a discussion of racism, that's your audience. It might make you mad. It's definitely not fair. But if you're going to aim a message which has a chance of making a difference, there's the white half of your target. Looks like Spence may write the book.
Judging from the 4th whitest thing said recently on these interrelated threads;
and what Spence said on the VC post about the fakelore of white supremacy, I wouldn't hold my breath about his intentions to sugarcoat this for the collective mollification of the soundly sleeping white masses..., If America's racial problems were truly the result of people being born into a world that is of necessity older than themselves and where various events have occurred over which they could have no first-hand knowledge or control then all of our black wailing over this problem would be in vain. The problem is not a matter of experience or remembering but a collective desire on the part of white Americans to forget. White Americans, for example, can cite Emancipation as a historically pivotal moment but they have no recall of the killing off of Reconstruction and the long nightmare of Jim Crow that was imposed on these newly freed men and women. White Americans can point to the Civil Rights Movement and some of them can recite lines from the "I Have A Dream" speech but relatively few of them can recall that within a decade of this speech white backlash to black advancement had set in and by 1980 Ronald Reagan felt sufficiently emboldened to give a speech in Phildelphia, Mississippi in which he strongly expressed his support for state's rights, which, as every black in America knew, save Clarence Thomas and Shelby Steele, was a coded phrase for white supremacy. For black people in this country, William Faulkner's observation about the past that he made during his acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize in Literature is quite true: "The past isn't dead. It isn't even past."
So what's your suggestion PT. Near as I can tell you reasonably describe a black vision of:
"It ain't me with any problem which needs fixed."
The two sides both seem logically consistent, but they stand there in defiance of further communication. If anyone is interested in further evidence or signs of the capacity for white Americans to deny the past give a listen to NPR's interview this evening (Sunday, October 3) with Senator Trent Lott of Mississippi. "So what's your suggestion PT. Near as I can tell you reasonably describe a black vision of:" I have no idea of what you are referring to and if I did I seriously doubt that I could respond in a meaningful way. There are other people on this list who seem to have a better understanding than I of where you are coming from and what you mean. Why don't you direct your questions to them? PT, I don't recall your having been magically forgiving of internal inconsistencies of the sort that allow a person to claim on the one hand; the majority of white people living today have little or no personal recollection of life before 1964 while nevertheless allowing that same person to profess an originalist understanding not only of logic, language, and values dating back 200+ years..., but of motives and intentions, as well. Simply phuggin amazing..., logical paradox can be a wikkid pissa Why don't you direct your questions to them? If you're asking me to lay off you PT, no problem. It would however have been appropriate for you to reply, "what's your suggestion?", and I suspect when P6 gets back to all of this that will be exactly what he asks. My suggestion is that we need to communicate with black people who see no need to be communicated with. And we need to communicate with white people who see no need to be communicated with. Of all of regular black posters, you, P6, cnulan, O, and OBM, you seem the most solidly determined to stick with the the view that you don't need any communication. The others put up mighty good barriers, and can sound ferocious, but they dart out once in a while in curiosity. So I feel that if you and I could ever share a real racial insight, that would be achieving the impossible as compared to the very difficult. Aiming for the stars, as it were. I'm limited by both imagination and deliberate intent, but I find three messages which might be communicated to black people regarding racism.
Now you might wonder why I bothered to include that third one. Mostly, it's what most white people seek to communicate to black people. If blacks would just understand that, the problem of racism would be over. And in a sense, it would. For white people. However, I have learned enough to know that this is a dead-end path. It does not yield progress. It's the white half of the deadlock. So if you were my guide PT, and feel free to decline, would you have me pursue "racism declawed and defanged", or would you have me pursue "work together to get incidences of racism down, way down". Or some other idea. "If you're asking me to lay off you PT, no problem." Let's try this again. I am not asking you to lay off me. I don't understand the question you asked me to answer. I don't have any interest in analyzing your question to determine what you may have meant. You can also direct as many similar questions toward me including queries as to whether I am annoyed by Brits like Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce, Ginger Baker and Mick Jagger singing songs written 80 years ago by Skip James, Son House, Robert Johnson and Blind Lemon Jefferson. Are you bothered by Yo-Yo Ma recording Bach's pieces for unaccompanied cello 65 years after Pablo Casals became the first musician to record these compositions? "Simply phuggin amazing..., logical paradox can be a wikkid pissa" Yes, it is an amazing viewpoint that is also shared by the new Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Senator Trent Lott and "an endless list that won't be missed when at last..." Are you bothered by Yo-Yo Ma recording Bach's pieces for unaccompanied cello 65 years after Pablo Casals became the first musician to record these compositions? Point well taken.
the principal beef with bennett should not be about the linkage between black folk and crime, to my mind, it should be about his postulation genocide in forms more expedient (for him) and direct than he was able to use as a drug czar or sec'y of miseducation. y'all are to be commended for your patience with dw and others sharing his peculiar confusion. i'll take the roberto duran zero, 'no mas.' he should take his a$$ to the library...it's cheaper. My point exactly yesterday. Cobb plays make-believe that it was a meaningless hypothetical, and won't even entertain the obvious that at best it was an ill-chosen hypothetical. "yeah hi, get in the car" Spence wants to get at it in terms of politics and economics, a tad closer to the truth of the matter. But again, long after the fact of what's real. Nobody seems willing to look at it for exactly what it is. All these post hoc narratizations of underlying behavioural urges. Self-calming just-so stories told by the eye of the crocodile and its self-talker to account for the behaviour of the crocodile at large. Meanwhile, the crocodile-at-large concerns itself with what it's always been on about, eating, procreating, enduring..., so that it can do more eating and procreating. Seems to me that when leading conservative American moralists, first Roberts, now Bennett, begin very public blurting about the core crocodilian concerns - sex, money and murder - that perhaps it's time for us to take these indications at face value. Both were/are measuring which way the wind is blowing in the American climate of consciousness. Bennett has been thinking about and acting against the generative power of black folks for a long time now. He does not assign a positive economic value to our existance. To Bennett, we're criminal competitors and he's already formulated a final solution however morally absurd striking directly at that core generative threat. Morals haven't stopped American conservatives from enacting massive gang violence in Iraq to secure that 17% of planetary proven reserves of sweet, light crude - and only a child believes that morality will stay the hand of Americans in dealing with those perceived as the enemy within |
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You angry black libs are so reactionary. If only you would knock the parochial chip off your shoulder and enlarge your vision to embrace the long-term benefit of the American Republic, why, you'd understand the perfect innocence of Bennett's remark. For example, when presented with exactly the same statement and condemnatory attitude;
Cobb was able to see through what you've so cynically misinterpreted.
Grokking Bennett's motive, his intentions, as has been carefully demonstrated to you lately, will lead your imagination to the intellectual conviction that the man was completely beyond reproach.
Free your mind P6! (^;