Sillygism/ Phony victims of criticism of racism

[Wojtek Sokolowski]

At 11:14 AM 4/28/99 -0400, Charles Brown wrote:
>This is not manufactured martyrdom. What is manufactured is the
self-declaration of victimization by such as Kelley, with her hoaky effort
to make her self out as a victim of being criticized for racist arguments.
Wojtek has it completely backward. The problem is not the targets of racism
complaining about racism, but the Reaganite line of Wojtek et al. that the
targets of racism are falsely martyring themselves. 

Charles, I do not think this whole discussion has anything to do with the
reality of "race" relations in this country.  It is about claims.

There is a clear distinction, at least in my mind, between victimization
and claims of victimization.  The former has to be proved as a matter of
fact, the latter does not (a distiction that makes all the difference in
the world, from a legal point of view).  The feelings of those who feel
victimized  may be real, but their victimization may be not.  

In fact, the US is a society that elevated claims of victimization to an
art form - regardless of factual basis of those claims.  Such claims become
standard ammunition in the morality-style politics that prevails in this
country.

It is quite pathetic to see any extraordinary event, such as the Colorado
shooting, giving birth to numerous victimization claims - liberals, gun
owners (poor things feel the heat of persecution such events may spark),
blacks, jews, gays, feminists, suburbanites, jocks, geeks, geezers - not to
mention the scores of spin doctors and media pundits - everyone tries to
appropriate that tragic event as a material for their own claim of
victimization/martyrdom.

On the top of it, every voice that calls for a reality check for that claim
manufacturing madness is automatically labeled as bigot, or at least being
in denial.  What is it, a psychotherapy session, an AA meeting, or what?
Only in Amerika....

Wojtek