What a good conversation. While I think Prof. Anderson might have read a better book than Robin D'Angelo wrote, hers is one of the best defenses of the overarching concept I've heard or read. I think I still disagree with her on some specifics, but have a better understanding of what D'Angelo is trying to do than what I got from D'Angelo's book.
But when the conversation turned to populism, Anderson said something profoundly revealing. She noted research showing that social democratic parties (including the American democrats), can be described as "rainbow parties," appealing to a collection of aggrieved minorities, which tends to ignore the working class, whose own grievance then becomes the opening for another party to appeal to. This feels quite right to me.
But then she alluded to the labor movement as part of the democratic side. I can't speak to how that works in Europe or India, but in the US (and particularly in California, where I live and work, in and around government), labor has, in fact, alienated the working class. It's one of the most remarkable facts of our time that organized labor in the US attracts only about 10.5% of what we loosely refer to as the working class. While they are nominally represented in the democratic coalition, the overwhelming percentage of Americans do not think labor represents workers any more.
I think that could be a ripe topic for Persuasion at some point.
Just switched to a paid subscription in the hope of hearing more conversations as useful and fascinating as this one. Best of luck with all you're trying to achieve with this community and I look forward to being a part of it!
It looks like Prof. Anderson is defending another book that Robin D'Angelo might have written instead of the one she actually wrote! White Fragility says that when POC talk about their experiences or views on racial issues. White people should "defer" to them - accept what they say and not question their views in any way. But POC don't have identical views on racial or other issues. Why? Because people and their experiences are NOT determined solely by their race.
For example, let's take a Black American who feels that success in American society is largely determined by her ability to work hard and her talent and her race won't prevent her from doing well in life. Another Black American may feel that racism is a very serious barrier to upward mobility for Black people. If I was a White person, whose views should I accept or defer to, given that they contradict each other? Surely I must make up my own mind by evaluating their arguments and experiences and by studying the relevant literature. I think what writers like Robin D'Angelo do is to ASSUME that all Black people agree with the views of White progressives on the relevant issues, which is VERY far from being the truth. They are peddling a political ideology disguised as "anti-racism" and they are using the rhetoric of so called anti-racism to exempt this political ideology from critical scrutiny.
Second, she says white people are unable to listen respectfully or attentively to the experiences of POC and they become defensive. I am sure that is true for some White people. But it is definitely not true for many White people, including several that I know. Is it fair to make generalizations about a large group of people based on their race? I think such comments make many Independent voters feel that liberals are hostile to white people.
Third, American culture is apparently saturated with racist stereotypes and imagery. Well, speak for yourself, Prof. Anderson! Because that is not the American culture that I see. I see a country in which Asian-Americans came as immigrants and joined the elite within one generation. I see a country in which an astonishingly large number of immigrant groups do quite well, irrespective of their skin color. (and yes this also includes many Black immigrant communities). I see a country, which, in spite of its flaws, is the world's most successful multiracial, multicultural and multi-religious democracy. (apart from Canada). For White progressives, wherever they look, they see racism! It is understandable because they believe any racial disparity on any issue is automatically evidence of racism.
Finally, it is one thing to recognize that people of color (sometimes) have different experiences in society than white people. But that doesn't mean we should invest racial identity with a kind of moral meaning and allow that identity to be so central that we should structure our social interactions with other people based on that. It is best to treat race as a relatively trivial feature of our identities, unless someone else chooses to makes it central based on their discriminatory attitudes and behavior. Of course, if some people from a minority community feel that their racial identity is very important to them, I am fine with that. But that doesn't mean this race centric thinking needs to be part of any liberal or modern political ideology.
I connected with Elizabeth Anderson's takeaways from the book. I think the part about interruptions was an interesting example. I went and looked that up in the book. My takeaway wasn't that DiAngelo was proclaiming to the world that interrupting is racist. I saw it as an example from a real small group discussion where the issue of interrupting was brought up by the participants and which pointed out a few different things: (1) that some people see an action as a benign individual act; (2) some people see that action in light of a long pattern of similar actions; (3) sometimes people will disengage instead of trying to empathize with the other perspective.
I think most communicators want to communicate effectively in a way that will disarm instead of raise hackles. At the same time we don't always know what will raise someone else's hackles. I think it would be useful to pair "don't raise people's hackles" messages with another message: "we don't have to be at the mercy of our raised hackles." I think the process of becoming aware of our own emotional response and transcending it will also give us insight in how to craft our own message so that it will be better received by others. It would be a virtuous cycle if we think to both at the same time. I think a lot of the book is speaking to the possibility to overcome emotional response, or raised hackles, but doesn't give practices on how to do that.
It was informative, if not frustrating, to listen to an academic philosopher lecture us on nuance, the bread and butter of philosophy these days. Many of our problems with left-wing teaching in the university stem from postmodernist philosophers, who were ultimately rejected by the philosophy community, but inspired the more fuzzy-thinking social scientists and literature professors to adopt critical theory. [My son is a prof of social work. He‘splits hairs’ on the meaning of words and the power of microaggressions, understandable for dealing with mentally unstable clients, but overkill for most adults in society.] I thought your were a bit ‘soft’ on her first comments on how we must recognize black peoples’ experience of racism. We can all agree that you cannot erase what other people think or feel, but we can and should object to being told what we should think and feel.
Great conversation. Currently reading Martin Sandbu's book "The Economy of Belongning" I find the last part of the conversation particularly interesting. It goes beyond the "we have to live in peace despite our differences" and emphasises finding common ground. This could aid in constructing a common identity that would reduce the in-group out-group neural mechanisms that cause prejudice.
I think it's an interesting paradox emerging in this conversation: In order to be colour blind we need to identify people with race in order for us to compare white and black people to see that they are the same.
Overall great conversation. I found her view of populism to be compelling and its something I have to think about more. I do think that Prof Mounk gives in too easily when he says "..I dont want to deny that structural racism exists, it clearly does". Uh, it does? Where? So were going to call anything that gives racial desperate impact "racism"? If it's more than this, please explain. Because this premise has to first be quantified and proven before acknowledged...else it's giving away too much.
It seemed to me that Anderson wanted to avoid arguing in defense of the book, and instead she made up a different version of it that she likes better and defended that instead.
What a good conversation. While I think Prof. Anderson might have read a better book than Robin D'Angelo wrote, hers is one of the best defenses of the overarching concept I've heard or read. I think I still disagree with her on some specifics, but have a better understanding of what D'Angelo is trying to do than what I got from D'Angelo's book.
But when the conversation turned to populism, Anderson said something profoundly revealing. She noted research showing that social democratic parties (including the American democrats), can be described as "rainbow parties," appealing to a collection of aggrieved minorities, which tends to ignore the working class, whose own grievance then becomes the opening for another party to appeal to. This feels quite right to me.
But then she alluded to the labor movement as part of the democratic side. I can't speak to how that works in Europe or India, but in the US (and particularly in California, where I live and work, in and around government), labor has, in fact, alienated the working class. It's one of the most remarkable facts of our time that organized labor in the US attracts only about 10.5% of what we loosely refer to as the working class. While they are nominally represented in the democratic coalition, the overwhelming percentage of Americans do not think labor represents workers any more.
I think that could be a ripe topic for Persuasion at some point.
Just switched to a paid subscription in the hope of hearing more conversations as useful and fascinating as this one. Best of luck with all you're trying to achieve with this community and I look forward to being a part of it!
It looks like Prof. Anderson is defending another book that Robin D'Angelo might have written instead of the one she actually wrote! White Fragility says that when POC talk about their experiences or views on racial issues. White people should "defer" to them - accept what they say and not question their views in any way. But POC don't have identical views on racial or other issues. Why? Because people and their experiences are NOT determined solely by their race.
For example, let's take a Black American who feels that success in American society is largely determined by her ability to work hard and her talent and her race won't prevent her from doing well in life. Another Black American may feel that racism is a very serious barrier to upward mobility for Black people. If I was a White person, whose views should I accept or defer to, given that they contradict each other? Surely I must make up my own mind by evaluating their arguments and experiences and by studying the relevant literature. I think what writers like Robin D'Angelo do is to ASSUME that all Black people agree with the views of White progressives on the relevant issues, which is VERY far from being the truth. They are peddling a political ideology disguised as "anti-racism" and they are using the rhetoric of so called anti-racism to exempt this political ideology from critical scrutiny.
Second, she says white people are unable to listen respectfully or attentively to the experiences of POC and they become defensive. I am sure that is true for some White people. But it is definitely not true for many White people, including several that I know. Is it fair to make generalizations about a large group of people based on their race? I think such comments make many Independent voters feel that liberals are hostile to white people.
Third, American culture is apparently saturated with racist stereotypes and imagery. Well, speak for yourself, Prof. Anderson! Because that is not the American culture that I see. I see a country in which Asian-Americans came as immigrants and joined the elite within one generation. I see a country in which an astonishingly large number of immigrant groups do quite well, irrespective of their skin color. (and yes this also includes many Black immigrant communities). I see a country, which, in spite of its flaws, is the world's most successful multiracial, multicultural and multi-religious democracy. (apart from Canada). For White progressives, wherever they look, they see racism! It is understandable because they believe any racial disparity on any issue is automatically evidence of racism.
Finally, it is one thing to recognize that people of color (sometimes) have different experiences in society than white people. But that doesn't mean we should invest racial identity with a kind of moral meaning and allow that identity to be so central that we should structure our social interactions with other people based on that. It is best to treat race as a relatively trivial feature of our identities, unless someone else chooses to makes it central based on their discriminatory attitudes and behavior. Of course, if some people from a minority community feel that their racial identity is very important to them, I am fine with that. But that doesn't mean this race centric thinking needs to be part of any liberal or modern political ideology.
I connected with Elizabeth Anderson's takeaways from the book. I think the part about interruptions was an interesting example. I went and looked that up in the book. My takeaway wasn't that DiAngelo was proclaiming to the world that interrupting is racist. I saw it as an example from a real small group discussion where the issue of interrupting was brought up by the participants and which pointed out a few different things: (1) that some people see an action as a benign individual act; (2) some people see that action in light of a long pattern of similar actions; (3) sometimes people will disengage instead of trying to empathize with the other perspective.
I think most communicators want to communicate effectively in a way that will disarm instead of raise hackles. At the same time we don't always know what will raise someone else's hackles. I think it would be useful to pair "don't raise people's hackles" messages with another message: "we don't have to be at the mercy of our raised hackles." I think the process of becoming aware of our own emotional response and transcending it will also give us insight in how to craft our own message so that it will be better received by others. It would be a virtuous cycle if we think to both at the same time. I think a lot of the book is speaking to the possibility to overcome emotional response, or raised hackles, but doesn't give practices on how to do that.
It was informative, if not frustrating, to listen to an academic philosopher lecture us on nuance, the bread and butter of philosophy these days. Many of our problems with left-wing teaching in the university stem from postmodernist philosophers, who were ultimately rejected by the philosophy community, but inspired the more fuzzy-thinking social scientists and literature professors to adopt critical theory. [My son is a prof of social work. He‘splits hairs’ on the meaning of words and the power of microaggressions, understandable for dealing with mentally unstable clients, but overkill for most adults in society.] I thought your were a bit ‘soft’ on her first comments on how we must recognize black peoples’ experience of racism. We can all agree that you cannot erase what other people think or feel, but we can and should object to being told what we should think and feel.
Great conversation. Currently reading Martin Sandbu's book "The Economy of Belongning" I find the last part of the conversation particularly interesting. It goes beyond the "we have to live in peace despite our differences" and emphasises finding common ground. This could aid in constructing a common identity that would reduce the in-group out-group neural mechanisms that cause prejudice.
I think it's an interesting paradox emerging in this conversation: In order to be colour blind we need to identify people with race in order for us to compare white and black people to see that they are the same.
Overall great conversation. I found her view of populism to be compelling and its something I have to think about more. I do think that Prof Mounk gives in too easily when he says "..I dont want to deny that structural racism exists, it clearly does". Uh, it does? Where? So were going to call anything that gives racial desperate impact "racism"? If it's more than this, please explain. Because this premise has to first be quantified and proven before acknowledged...else it's giving away too much.
It seemed to me that Anderson wanted to avoid arguing in defense of the book, and instead she made up a different version of it that she likes better and defended that instead.