[lbo-talk] Race & Opinions

Wojtek Sokolowski sokol at jhu.edu
Thu Feb 19 08:15:02 PST 2004


Grant:
> We all signify a lot more than our DNA and we all represent things
which
> don't "go" with our ethnic background. To posit a relationship between
> anyone's physical appearance and their opinions --- unless they
themselves
> make that connection -- is always insulting.

Absolutely. But what I find even more infuriating is a certain genre of "knee-jerk-anti-racism" or for that matter "anti-sexism" "anti-imperialism" and what not as practiced in the US. It is based on the uncritical reversal of the racist/sexist/imperialist discourse. Thus, the racist/sexist/imperialist discourse claims that all non-whites/women/non-US-ers are morally inferior in one way or another or at least suspect.

The knee-jerk-antiracism/sexism/imperialism is basically a simplistic reversal of that proposition and claiming that all non-whites/women/non-US-ers are morally superior in one way or another and noble. That position is more or less explicitly expressed in innumerable posts to this list - from the unspoken assumption that each time a black guy is convicted of a crime, he must be framed, to the demand that all blacks must be compensated for slavery by all whites, to the claim that women are always victims of male dominance, to views that if a balck or a woman are elected to the position of power things would change dramatically, and to the hints that all US-sers are guilty of everything bad that is happening in the world, and if the US and Europe disappears from the face of the Earth - the world will be one very happy place, and all what all US liberals say must be driven by guilt trip.

I find it irritating because unlike racists and bigots, who are usually bonehead idiots who do not know any better, the folks who embrace the knee-jerk-anti-racism/sexism/imperialism should know better, they are the self-professed open minds, the educated class. Instead, they engage in religious zealotry of a lefitish variety instead of a critical analysis.

Wojtek



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