FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 2023
Home, home on the range: On Valentine's Day—this past Tuesday—one of our tribe's "most favorite" stars made an extremely dumb comment.
In fairness, her comment came in the form of a love letter to tribal belief. Speaking of the state of Florida's pushback against the College Board's original Advanced Placement course, the big star who once worked to outlaw same-sex marriage now piously told viewers this:
WALLACE (2/14/23): [DeSantis has] put out a narrative. So to counter a narrative, you have to aggressively put the facts out there.
But there's only one set of facts. There's only one history, and I wonder what you think threatens him about the one set of facts and the true history.
Presumably, Wallace is a good, decent person, but she's also perhaps been slightly "demagogue adjacent" throughout her substantial career. At present, she's loved by cable viewers of the blue kind because she's constantly sending us Valentines of that extremely dumb type.
Speaking of American history, or perhaps of African American history, Wallace said that "there's only one set of facts," and that "there's only one history!" The statement is amazingly dumb, but it helped drive the simple-minded approach to the world which tends to please cable news viewers.
Briefly, let's be fair. On the one hand, and in one sense, it could perhaps be said to be true that "there's only one set of facts."
That said, there exists an infinite number of ways you can select the set of facts you choose to report, or to include in a textbook. Similarly, there's an infinite number of ways you can shape your account of our (frequently brutal) American history.
The idea that there's "only one history" is just amazingly dumb. But so is much of the cable food product we blues get fed on our tribe's "cable news" channel—a channel whose organization recalls the old American song:
Home, home on the range
Where the deer and the antelope play
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the skies are not cloudy all day.
The lyrics track to Dr. Brewster Higley, a 19th century otolaryngologist. As a portrait of basic American culture, they remain apt today.
Sure enough! Across our blue tribe's cable prairies, discouraging words are seldom heard as our favorite (corporate) TV stars tell us the stories we like.
Carefully selected groups of "our favorite reporters and friends" rarely offer a contradictory word in the face of preferred Storyline supplied by their cable news hosts.
The skies are not cloudy all day long on our blue tribe's cable news channel! We get to hear the stories we like from our favorite multimillionaire stars.
No reporter or friend will ever suggest that the Others may possibly have some small/tiny, semi-valid point concerning some topic under review. Around the campfires of the Fox News Channel, the lunacy may during prime time be even worse.
Seldom is heard a discouraging word from our favorite reporters and friends! That said, uh-oh!
Yesterday afternoon, a storm cloud blew down from the mountains and began heading our way. Over at the New York Times, a new opinion column—by a self-described liberal, no less!—appeared beneath this puzzling headline:
DeSantis May Have Been Right
The column was written by John McWhorter, a Times "Opinion Writer."
McWhorter is an associate professor of linguistics at Columbia University. He's also the kind of professor you'll never see or hear on our blue tribe cable channel.
Professor McWhorter plainly isn't one of our favorite reporters and friends! Just for the record, he also isn't a fan of the Florida official whose name appears in that headline.
McWhorter isn't a fan of DeSantis. His thoroughly puzzling column started exactly like this:
MCWHORTER (2/16/23): In January, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida announced he would ban a draft curriculum proposed by the College Board for a new Advanced Placement course in African American studies, criticizing the educational merit of the course. This month the College Board released an official curriculum that revised the course by designating some of the writers and ideas in the draft curriculum as optional topics of study rather than core lessons.
The board claimed that the changes were responses to “the input of professors” and “longstanding A.P. principles.” I am unconvinced, to say the least, especially given the degree to which the counsel of these “professors” was mysteriously consonant with DeSantis’s.
I’d like to make clear that I disapprove of the vast majority of DeSantis’s culture warrior agenda, a ham-handed set of plans designed to stir up a G.O.P. base in thrall to unreflective figures such as Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene. If DeSantis runs for president, he will not get my vote.
However, even a stopped clock is right twice a day, and in terms of how we tell the story of Black America, the board did the right thing, whether because of DeSantis’s threat or for more high-minded reasons...
Is John McWhorter allowed to say that? On blue cable, the answer is no!
For the record, McWhorter disapproves of the vast majority of DeSantis' culture war bombast. If we can believe a word McWhorter says, Ron DeSantis reminds him of a stopped clock!
That said, we'll guess that McWhorter would have snorted at Wallace's silly claim that "there is only one history."
Like everyone else, McWhorter isn't infallible, but he's a thousand times smarter than that. That is why you'll never see him on your favorite shows.
We're going to wrap it up quickly today, looking ahead to next week. But before we do, we'll make two important points.
First, we don't mean to denigrate all of the "favorite reporters and friends" you'll see on our tribe's cable shows.
In its endless dissection of the one theme it truly adores—Trump Trump Trump Trump, Trump Trump Trump Trump, Trump Trump Trump Trump Jail! —our cable channel has introduced some very sound legal analysts into the public discourse.
That includes some people who have vast experience and yet manage to be extremely disciplined in the things they say about our tribe's simple-minded desire to see Trump frog-marched to jail.
Some of our favorite friends are in fact very sound, but quite a few others are hacks. Seldom is said a discouraging word—and the skies are not cloudy all day!
Also this:
John McWhorter isn't necessarily right in all his views and assessments. In our view, his writing isn't always perfectly clear, as we would like it to be.
That said, we think he offers some good sound advice in this latest column. His advice concerns a rather simple-minded distinction—the age-old, frequently overlooked distinction between opinion and fact.
We think McWhorter's column offers some good advice. Everywhere else we look, we see an American rampage as our antelope-denuded prairies fill with warring groups.
Those warring groups are inclined to behave as warring groups always have. In a column in Sunday's New York Times, Nicholas Kristof went anecdotal with an account of ridiculous tribal behavior from a less polarized time:
KRISTOF (2/12/23): I spent much of the 1980s and 1990s as a New York Times correspondent in East Asia, and children there (including mine) learned to read through phonics and phonetic alphabets: hiragana in Japan, bopomofo in Taiwan, pinyin in China and hangul in South Korea. Then I returned with my family to the United States in 1999, and I found that even reading was political: Republicans endorsed phonics, so I was expected as a good liberal to roll my eyes.
The early critique of phonics in part was rooted in social justice, trying to address inadequate education in inner cities by offering more engaging reading materials. The issue became more political when the 2000 Republican Party platform called for “an early start in phonics,” and when President George W. Bush embraced phonics with a major initiative called Reading First.
For liberals, Bush’s support for phonics made it suspect...
Did we liberals really behave in so foolish a way? If you think that can't be true, "Who's being naïve now, Kay?"
Next to Kristof's column that day, a second column appeared. This column was written by Jamelle Bouie, and as with Kristof, so too here:
In our view, Bouie is sharper than the average mainstream press bear. We base this assessment on TV viewing and newspaper reading, and on things that the gods have said.
Bouie is a good, decent person; he's also perfectly sharp. That said, we thought we saw a tribal Otherization forming at the start of his piece. We thought we saw an ancient impulse—the tendency to believe that only Our Tribe can ever have a valid point of view on a matter where feelings are strong.
According to this ancient impulse, almost as if by definition, the Others are plainly all wrong, and this means that they're very bad people.
In yesterday's thoroughly puzzling column, McWhorter says that a certain stopped clock may have gotten the Advanced Placement matter right. He even goes so far as to suggest that our tribe's highest ranking, official savants can sometimes be thoroughly human, just like everyone else:
MCWHORTER: Certain takes on race are thought of by an influential portion of progressive Americans—Black, white and otherwise—as incarnations of social justice. To them, our nation remains an incomplete project that will remain mired in denial until these ways of seeing race are universally accepted and determine the bulk of public policy...
I imagine that to people of this mind-set, incorporating these views into an A.P. course on African American studies is seen as a natural step, via which we help get America woken by appealing to its brightest young minds. But for all the emotional resonance, the savory intonation of key buzzwords and phrases and the impassioned support of people with advanced degrees and prize-awarded media status, views of this kind remain views.
To dismiss those in disagreement as either naïve or malevolent is unsophisticated, suggesting that racial enlightenment requires comfort with a take-no-prisoners approach and facile reasoning. Not even the tragedies of America’s record on race justify saying “I’m just right, dammit!” as if the matter were as settled as the operations of gravity.
Can it be—can it possibly be—that our tribe's most lauded professors can possibly be wrong, to some extent or in some way, in one of their Group Beliefs? Could they even be "unsophisticated" in their approach to some matter?
Dear reader! If you don't know that the professors can be wrong, we don't know where the heck you've been over the past few hundred years.
At any rate: Virginia, sadly no! There isn't "only one history," despite what Wallace said.
Everyone knows how silly that statement is, but no one said so on last Tuesday's show. It was Valentine's Day, after all! No discouraging words were allowed!
Our favorite reporters and friends seem to know the shape of the rules under which they're allowed to perform—how they're expected to show their love for the gigantic TV stars who just keep dumbing us down.
Coming next week: So much history, so little time!
ReplyDeletetl;dr
"...one of our tribe's "most favorite" stars made an extremely dumb comment."
Ha-ha: one of your cult's brain-dead stars? You've gotta be kidding, dear Bob.
"The idea that there's "only one history" is just amazingly dumb."
Not if you're a faithful follower of the liberal cult. Indeed, dear Bob, your narrative may change tomorrow, but at any given time there only one True Narrative. The one proclaimed by liberal MinTruth.
...haven't you read 1984, dear?..
Hey Mao what did you think of the recent reveal that Fox News anchors never believed in election fraud? Did you file it in your cognitive dissonance cabinet?
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete"That said, there exists an infinite number of ways you can select the set of facts you choose to report, or to include in a textbook. Similarly, there's an infinite number of ways you can shape your account of our (frequently brutal) American history."
ReplyDeleteThus Somerby reads Wallace's statement in its most literal meaning. The rest of humanity understands her to say that we need to acknowledge and teach history according to the accepted facts, not have one set of facts for Florida kids and another for those in Boston. Historians know what happened and generally agree except for narrow controversies of interest to no one except Historians and history grad students.
This is not an argument about what happened in African American history. This is an argument about whether high school students should be taught unpleasant facts about what happened. Everyone understands that except Somerby, based on his nit-pick of Wallace's assertion that there is one history.
But beyond that, there is the FACT that this is not about African American Studies or the AP course, but is about an orchestrated attack on high education that has been going on since the 1970s, and the Republicans don't give a damn about any facts -- eliminating ethnic studies and women's studies is part of their political agenda. This is why they raised no specific objections to the AP course during meetings (as described yesterday). It is why DeSantis is now talking about eliminating all AP courses in FL high schools.
Somerby ignores these political motives as he tries to make Wallace sound stupid so that he can undermine public faith in the media, and Wallace specifically.
It's too late, you're fighting a losing battle in your role as media shill (thankfully.) People eventually wake up and see things for what they are.
DeleteTrust in media is so low that half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them
https://fortune.com/2023/02/15/trust-in-media-low-misinform-mislead-biased-republicans-democrats-poll-gallup/
Here's another quote worth sharing in this context:
“Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is as follows. You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray’s case, physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward—reversing cause and effect. I call these the “wet streets cause rain” stories. Paper’s full of them.
In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story, and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about Palestine than the baloney you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know.” – Michael Crichton
https://www.epsilontheory.com/gell-mann-amnesia/
And finally I'll add this here:
Did you forget to leave something?
DeleteYou do know that Michael Crichton is not any kind of psychologist, right? Neither is Ben Hunt (Epsilon Theory). Hunt has a doctorate in political science and taught before forming his company.
DeleteLooking over the bullshit at Epsilon Theory, this does seem to be what Somerby may be infected with. It uses words like narrative and storyline and presents a conspiracy theory that Somerby seems to have soaked up and is regurgitating. Epsilon Theory looks more like a cult than the mainstream media does. But at least it explains what happened to Somerby.
Attaching the words "Gell-Mann" to something Crichton made up doesn't make it scientific. This is how pseudo-science gets passed off to the unsuspecting. There are no links to Gell-Mann in any published study, no data behind it at all. It is fiction.
Yes, the public is saying that the media is unreliable. What else would you expect after teling people that for a period of years?
Michael Crichton is a conservative, and so is Ben Hunt and @12:40.
DeleteGell-Mann was a moderate.
DeleteGell-Mann had a low brow but some postulate was a precursor to Cro-Magnon.
DeleteGell-Mann lived long after the Cro-Magnon people.
Delete"Over at the New York Times, a new opinion column—by a self-described liberal, no less!"
ReplyDeleteMcWhorter describes himself as a cranky black Democrat. He is liberal in the same sense that Somerby is liberal. Can one be a liberal and support few of the issues that other liberals support?
It is difficult for McWhorter to be Republican given the positions of the two parties on racial issues. However, McWhorter argues several conservative memes that most black Democrats do not believe in. His book "Woke Racism" undermined the liberal position on racial attitudes. He similar argues against white liberal positions on social problems, arguing against a victim stance for black people and claiming that most social problems have been solved, that racism is no longer a thing, as Somerby does:
https://observer.com/2000/10/black-scholar-turns-tables-on-liberals-smug-assumptions/
I do not believe that someone who attacks the beliefs of his political party can any longer call himself a member of that party, especially when using the definitions, memes and talking points of the opposing party, as McWhorter does routinely. This is not being a gadfly or curmudgeon, this is refusing to take responsibility for a set of beliefs that are not fundamentally Democrat or liberal but conservative.
"The early critique of phonics in part was rooted in social justice, trying to address inadequate education in inner cities by offering more engaging reading materials. "
ReplyDeleteThis isn't true. The criticisms of phonics were that once a child had sounded out a word, he still didn't know what that word meant, due to impoverished early childhood experiences. The efforts to supplement phonics-based reading approaches using pictures and stories that provided the contextual meanings of the words is an essential part of reading instruction. Characterizing these as liberal opposition to phonics, and pretending that there is an either/or dichotomy between the two ignores that modern reading programs with proven success employ a combination of methods, not a single approach, such as phonics or whole learning.
Somerby and Kristof both play into the hands of the right wing when they accept this either/or framing. At heart, this is another attack on public education by conservatives, using an old complaint that is a non-issue to educators, especially reading specialists.
Guessing about a picture isn’t READING.
DeleteTrying to figure out the likely meaning of unfamiliar words IS very much part of reading. Just as a lot of what we think we are remembering is actually plausible inference (which could also be called guessing by someone ignorant of how our minds work). A person who needs to read something by himself (with a teacher standing by to supply the right answer) may need some strategies to use when he doesn't know the meaning of a word, even after sounding it out. But this is what happens when untrained antagonistic critics try to find something wrong with instruction they have been told sucks.
DeleteIf the printed word, which the child has just sounded out, isn’t one he already knows, congratulations are in order — he has just learned a new word!
DeleteThe more ways a child has to figure out the words, the better reader. Context is important to that.
DeleteWe have to be able to read even when a word is inappropriate to the context, or when there is no context at all.
DeleteYes, but most reading takes place in the context of a sentence or a paragraph. The meanings of words support the overall meanings of sentences and paragraphs and vice versa. If you don't know a word, guessing it from the sentence or paragraph is something good readers do automatically, without even thinking about it. Teaching beginning readers to do this is part of becoming a good reader.
DeleteI do not understand why you are so resistant to this idea. People also disambiguate individual letters in the context of the larger word, automatically. It is why they can play wordle (or wheel of fortune).
Guessing doesn't have to be taught. People do it all the time, instinctively. Reading, on the other hand, isn't instinctive and must be taught. The way to teach it is phonics.
Delete"Not even the tragedies of America’s record on race justify saying “I’m just right, dammit!” as if the matter were as settled as the operations of gravity."
ReplyDeleteI strongly disagree with McWhorter's statement. The purpose of education is to teach children and adult students knowledge that is as true as we can make it. It is not to indoctrinate them, as the right insists should be done. McWhorter is a professor, so I am very surprised at his unwillingness to stick up and defend truth and students' right to be told the truth in institutions of learning.
There are many facts about African American history and other domains of knowledge that have widespread agreement on their accuracy. All knowledge is subject to revision in the face of better understanding, but we teach the facts that have consensus in a field. That is what textbooks contain, not speculation. Where there are competing theories, you teach the content of the theories and the controversies and leave the question open. You don't ignore their existence. But many things that are called theory by the right wing are settled fact among scholars. Those need to be taught as fact to students.
An example -- the flat earth society. Should a geography class have to ignore the shape of the Earth because there is a subset of nutcases who hold a different opinion and vocally object? We know for a fact that the earth is not flat. Why should students be told anything else, and why should giving in to a vocal minority of disbelievers be allowed as part of education when it is known to be untrue?
Somerby prefers to deny the existence of all knowledge. Anything is possible he says, when that is patently untrue about many things. He justifies this with philosophical sophistry but it permits him to say many stupid things that are held by conservatives and the ignorant, without correcting or even questioning them. That is a rhetorical trick, not a viable stance on education. It is not even what is meant by saying that one should keep an open mind. An open mind still requires convincing via evidence and does not uncritically accept all positions, even contradictory ones by refusing to hold a firm viewpoint, as Somerby often does.
White history is taught in a more complete way than black history. That is a racial disparity that should not be tolerated in our schools. Black kids deserve to know what happened to their ancestors. So do white kids. And neither group should be taught pleasing myths that present white people in the best possible light while minimizing the accomplishments of black people.
In 1903, W.E.B. Dubois radicalized black people by teaching a truer history of the South and the sociology of black people by writing "The Souls of Black Folks." Malcolm X describes the impact of that book on his understanding of what it meant to be black, in his "Autobiography of Malcolm X." He says it turned him from a petty criminal into a civil rights activist. His extremism may be partly due to the shock of discovering information that had been withheld from him until he found the book in a prison library. It is not only wrong to withhold history from a people, but it is self-defeating and likely to create greater racial division if white people whitewash history of their interactions with minorities. It is better to be honest about what happened, but it is also more consistent with what education is for and why knowledge is important to all of us.
It again astonishes me that Somerby would argue in favor of ignorance, after being a teacher for over a decade.
You seem perpetually amazed that in matters of history there can be any variance in the monolithic TRUTH.
DeleteI didn't call truth monolithic, you did that, but a fact is a fact. People who don't believe in reality are eventually slapped in the face by it.
DeleteIf reality dares to slap me, it had better be prepared to fight.
DeleteI understand the truth, like the COVID virus, doesn't like to be gaslit.
DeleteHome, home on the range...
ReplyDelete"The lyrics track to Dr. Brewster Higley, a 19th century otolaryngologist. As a portrait of basic American culture, they remain apt today."
Actually, not so much. What is happening on the range today? Ted Conover, in his book Cheap Land Colorado: Off-Gridders at America's Edge, describes the poverty of those who unaffordable city neighborhoods to own 5 acres (typically costing $5-10K) in rural areas in red states. There, they survive on disability or welfare, grow pot, scrounge for part-time jobs or shadow-economy work, raise dogs, goats and chickens, and barely survive in RVs, decrepit mobile homes, cobbled-together shacks, and have no plumbling and often no septic systems at all. Many adhere to sovereign nation beliefs, support Trump and extreme religions. The movie Nomads was upscale compared to this lifestyle.
https://www.amazon.com/Cheap-Land-Colorado-Off-Gridders-Americas-ebook/dp/B09QPJKSXM
It is typical that Somerby would quote an idealized vision of the American plains, simply because it contains the phrase "discouraging word" which has nothing whatsoever to do with anything.
Then he switches to talking about contradictory words, which is very different than discouraging words:
"Carefully selected groups of "our favorite reporters and friends" rarely offer a contradictory word in the face of preferred Storyline supplied by their cable news hosts."
I find a great deal that I hear on the news discouraging. Somerby's statement that everything Wallace says, or everything on cable is pleasing, is ridiculous. It is mostly upsetting and definitely discouraging. It is depressing and ugly and inspires a sense of hopelessness. It is only by reading other sources that I can maintain a sense of perspective that enables hope. Somerby certainly doesn't provide that here.
But would contradicting Wallace and the others, who are telling the truth about what the right is doing and what is happening in the world, do any good? It might avoid the discouragement but I don't believe that one should feel happier by avoiding reality. As a psychologist, that is not the best way of coping. Like the off-gridders, who avoid society by isolating themselves from the rest of the country and taking drugs (or abusing alcohol), that doesn't lead to a better reality. It makes things worse long-term.
What Somerby means by contradictory word, is that we should all go watch Fox, where we will be told that the world is even worse than reality, be fed lies about conspiracy theories that will make us more upset, and be given empty promises about what Trump will do if elected again, none of which materialized in 2017 or thereafter. We will be manipulated into enriching the grifters, including elected officials and their cronies, while fed false hope. And that is worse than what happens on mainstream and leftist cable shows, by far.
Is Wallace presenting a false picture with her reporting? I'll find that out by comparing sources, not from Fox News. If her guests all tell the same story, so what? I can find better info by reading and watching widely, not by expecting Wallace to present differing opinions on the same show, as some other shows do. There is room on cable news for different show formats. They don't all have to conform to Somerby's preferred version of news. And since when does Fox present dissenting voices either? Who is Carlson's fact-checker? Not Somerby. Not anyone on his show.
This hypocrisy on Somerby's part makes his attack on Wallace (and only Wallace) nothing more than ongoing bigotry against female journalists. Wallace is apparently Somerby's Maddow-surrogate.
correction: who leave unaffordable (omitted the word leave)
DeleteMcWhorter is a frequent guest of Glen Loury.
ReplyDeletehttps://m.youtube.com/watch?v=38_V5IzcCF4
** A special challenge to our local media shill **
ReplyDeleteYou've commented how many times on this blog? Well into the thousands, maybe tens of thousands?
Point to **one** comment you made out of that plethora of comments, just one, that was critical of a mainstream, liberal commenter. Just one.
If they are unable to do so, dear readers...! Does it not make clear that their role here is to deflect, and defend the idiotic MSM at any cost... we shall see.
The problem with your argument is that the mainstream liberal commenters here don't make errors.
DeleteI sort of like Nicole Wallace, and her coterie of MSNBC contributors who meet with her on a daily basis. So what if she is a former R star. She makes sense now (usually). But when I gained access to MSNBC a few weeks ago, after a couple of years without it, I was shocked to see Joy Reid still there. Her program is terrible, as it was, but wasn't she dropped by the network for her homophobic writings which she claimed were added by hackers, or when there wasn't proof of that, she didn't remember ever posting and besides she doesn't believe that stuff now. Do she go to reeducation camp and get sanitized? Why is she still there? (Does anyone know?)
ReplyDeleteI would guess she is here because she has fans who want to watch her show.
DeleteMcWhorter very much HAS been on MSNBC, and is recently best known for refuting the “White Fragility” book. They had him on with
ReplyDeletethe tiresome blowhard who wrote the introduction to the book. So , Bob is lazy and
had his facts wrong out of the gate today.
How’s that Dominion case working out for your both siderism Bob?
ReplyDeleteBoth sides is used as a conversation ending cliche, which is a tactic common in cults. These shows and blogs that present the world in black and white terms systematically train people that such a thing could exist. A world where one side is good, and the other side is bad. Criticism of both sides just doesn't compute in the comic book world that these poor viewers and readers have exposed themselves to over the years. There's a cultish, religious aspect to it. And both sides are guilty of producing and consuming these stories, presenting assuming them as if it represented reality. This is why the criticism from the blogger here is always so spot on and also why it draws such pushback.
DeleteNice try, but Somerby is a fake both sider himself. A story like the law suite against Fox falls absolutely under the catagory of what he claims concerns him, and he looks the other way. It’s why charges he is being paid off are all too credible.
Delete“Sidney Powell is lying,” Fox News star Tucker Carlson texted to a producer in November. “F---ing bitch.”
DeleteIn another exchange, Mr Carlson texted back-and-forth with fellow host Laura Ingraham about Ms Powell. “Sidney Powell is lying by the way. I caught her. It’s insane.”
“Sidney is a complete nut. No will work with her. Ditto with Rudy,” Ms Ingraham replied. Mr Carlson responded: “It’s unbelievably offensive to me. Our viewers are good people and they believe it.”
The compilation of text messages, emails and testimony paint a stark picture of the inner workings of Fox News, including the widespread disbelief from executives and hosts about the claims being put to air.
Fox president Jay Wallace said of the network’s Lou Dobbs, who pushed the election fraud claims: “The North Koreans do a more nuanced show.”
2:42 mm yes let’s hear the Nazi side of things, indeed let’s hear from the plantation masters, mm yes, you make such thoughtful points, mm yes, victims usually are asking for it aren’t they? Mm yes, so smart your comment, we shouldn’t just be critical of the oppressors but also critical of the oppressed. Yes yes I see!
DeleteAnother good post. Yes, these shows are just shows. They are dramas that need really good good guys and really bad bad guys and black and white, easy to understand story lines. It's based in reality. It's not like DeSantis is good. But it's massaged to only tell a black and white story. And yes, the bad guy is never allowed to be correct.
ReplyDeleteViewers of these shows need to understand they are watching a concocted drama, concocted to make them feel good and to tell them stories. It's like kindergarten. You gather around and the teacher tells you story or two. Then you go take a nap or go play.
It's the same with horrible blogs like Lawyers Guns and Money.
Nuance has its place, however, your take here is oddly unnuanced: my tribe good, critics of my tribe bad.
DeleteHaving said that, interested to hear the nuance involved in why a White person has a dollar in their pocket, while a Black person has 15 cents. No doubt it’s complicated, perhaps involving biology and other such “nuanced” subjects.
anon 7:47 - is it an established, indisputable fact that blacks on average have 15% of the wealth that whites do? I don't know, but i have some skepticism. There could be many reasons that contribute to blacks on average having less wealth. The history of slavery and racism undoubtedly has had some degree maybe an overwhelming degree) of impact on this. Part of it may be that there are a samll number of billionaires, mostly all white, who slew the statistics. Another question - some groups (Jews, Japanese e.g.) have higher average incomes than whites. There are probably a great many factors, and it would vary between individuals. There are far many more educated, middle class and wealthy blacks now than in the past. there are also a lot of poor whites. Are they poor because of "racism."
Delete1:29,
DeleteTrue, but sometimes the narratives are too silly to work. Remember when they tried to sell Republican voters as "economically anxious", who aren't just bigots?
McWorter represents a more moderate take that pushes back against some of the more extreme takes on the left on matters of race. Is his viewpoint under represented? Quite possibly.
ReplyDeleteIt may be significant that unlike showboats
like Cornel West, he doesn’t run to Fox where
he would probably be welcomed. But Bob
pretending he is not allowed on MSNBC
Is bullshit.
What is the difference between McWhorter's criticism of the left and the right-wing criticisms?
DeleteKristof and McWhorter (and Somerby and Drum) are right wingers just like Carlson. Here’s a significant difference: at least Carlson is honest, the rest of the gang hide behind their education and elitism to obfuscate their true nature.
ReplyDeleteCarlson is dishonest.
Delete