How far would you dismantle 'PC (politically correct) culture'?

[Berzerker]

so we cant name stuff after racists, but not only is Lincoln okay, he's more worthy than people who weren't racists?

Lex?

we can name stuff for racists if they did something else that was good, right?

 

[aelf]

This might make sense if we assume that SJWs and the "Old Left" want the same thing, and just disagree on tactics. I don't think that's true: I think several objectives of SJWs are not at all shared by the "Old Left", which is why there are so many left-wing critics of SJWs (both in this thread and IRL).

And I have seen little to indicate that the protagonists of SJW things are "leftists". They usually are privileged members of society claiming to speak for the unprivileged but concerned with extremely narrow "causes". The whole thing puts me in mind of what Pasolini said of the italian students in 1968, that he was more sympathetic to the rather poorer policeman in their fight with the pampered daddy's sons.

If you don't hear people state something, it doesn't mean they don't believe in it.

Besides, some of the things SJWs fight for are also historically things that the left fought for. There are certainly SJW causes today that a leftist can support: Gay rights, women's rights, racial equality - to name a few examples. These are things that many right-wingers and neoliberals oppose or work against. What is socialism without equality and rights for everyone?

 

[Traitorfish]

Surely at the time that would have been a fairly reasonable thing to advocate for? If the complaint was that these people were stolen from their homelands and forced into slavery on another continent, putting them back and setting them free would seem a pretty good way of addressing that.

Yeah, I mean, this was something that African-American civil rights activists took pretty seriously into the twentieth century. Look at Garvey's Black Star Line. Look at the entire nation-state of Liberia. For moderate white abolitionists like Lincoln, back-to-Africa projects may have represented something of an easy way out, but it's uncharitable and ahistorical to read that as proof that they were secretly vehement racists.

It's a bit like Zionism: an anti-Semite may support Zionism for cynical reasons, but it doesn't follow that gentile pro-Zionists are necessarily anti-Semitic.

 

[Lexicus]

It's also worth pointing out that Lincoln's views changed with time. He was pretty orthodox on race in the 1850s but came to believe in racial equality (not quite at the level of the Radical Republicans, but still) by the time he was assassinated.

"I know that I am free, for I have seen Father Abraham and felt him."
-Unkown former slave woman upon seeing Lincoln during his tour of recently-captured Richmond, VA

 

[innonimatu]

If you don't hear people state something, it doesn't mean they don't believe in it.

Besides, some of the things SJWs fight for are also historically things that the left fought for. There are certainly SJW causes today that a leftist can support: Gay rights, women's rights, racial equality - to name a few examples. These are things that many right-wingers and neoliberals oppose or work against. What is socialism without equality and rights for everyone?

The equality and rights for everyone is not supposed to be won piecemeal according to narrow "identities"... if you do that you'll have many groups distracted with fighting each other. And some will be wanting to be "more equal" than others once they notice that they have political power as a group. There goes universalism...

 

[Lexicus]

The equality and rights for everyone is not supposed to be won piecemeal according to narrow "identities"... if you do that you'll have many groups distracted with fighting each other. And some will be wanting to be "more equal" than others once they notice that they have political power as a group. There goes universalism...

This is a total strawman though. Intersectionality means the exact opposite of this, and sectarians who emphasize a single identity over all other political questions have really always been confined to the fringe of society anyway.

 

[bhavv]

Not sure if I mentioned this yet, but what about recent outrages by Muslim communities over female genital mutilation bans being largely ignored in favour of ending such a barbaric practice, yet ignoring 100% unnecessary circumcision of male infants because both the Jewish and Muslim communities cry foul hate crime against their religious beliefs and culture?

Of course male circumcision doesn't carry all the same aspects of fgm, but there is still zero valid medical reason for it to be performed on infants, and it carries a chance of severe damage, and possibly death if done incorrectly. What on the other hand would be so wrong to leave any male free to choose whether or not they want circumcision after reaching adulthood?

Likewise why exactly to infants / babies need to be baptised? The assumption of parental / societal sin being passed onto new born infants is a very challengeable subject, and Jesus didn't undergo baptism until well into his adult life. Why again can this not simply be a personal choice after the child has grown into adulthood, as opposed to being forced onto babies that have zero clue what is going on or happening?

 

[Traitorfish]

I don't think the problem is the framing of these struggles as specific or universal, it's how specific or universal these struggles actually are, and the big sliding scale there is not identity, it's class.

Both sectarians and intersectionalists privilege "identities" and the representation of those identities over the material struggles of working class people, and inevitably this comes to mean the experience of those "identities" as experienced by affluent professionals. Even when we talk about structural inequality, it always end up meaning people being passed over for promotion in an advertising firm or some other equally narrow experience, rather than anything about employment or housing or justice or education in a broad sense. Movements like Black Lives Matter have attempted to challenge that by drawing public attention back to the working class reality of most black Americans (for example), but they've only been partially successful. Liberals would still rather hear about how the Grammies are racist because they only gave Beyoncé a seven golden scepters this year than hear about the water crisis in Flint or about violence against immigrants.

 

[bhavv]

I don't think the problem is the framing of these struggles as specific or universal, it's how specific or universal these struggles actually are, and the big sliding scale there is not identity, it's class.

Both sectarians and intersectionalists privilege "identities" and the representation of those identities over the material struggles of working class people, and inevitably this comes to mean the experience of those "identities" as experienced by affluent professionals. Even when we talk about structural inequality, it always end up meaning people being passed over for promotion in an advertising firm or some other equally narrow experience, rather than anything about employment or housing or justice or education in a broad sense. Movements like Black Lives Matter have attempted to challenge that by drawing public attention back to the working class reality of most black Americans (for example), but they've only been partially successful. Liberals would still rather hear about how the Grammies are racist because they only gave Beyoncé a seven golden scepters this year than hear about the water crisis in Flint or about violence against immigrants.

Aka the 'theres not enough Asian pop stars / female CEOs' mentality.

And then also there's this:

https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2017/07/17/pride-in-london-condemns-islamophobia-in-allah-is-gay-row/

LGBT / pride is widely accepted, but saying that God was gay is a hate crime.

Literally leftists:

 

[Yeekim]

Not sure if I mentioned this yet, but what about recent outrages by Muslim communities over female genital mutilation bans being largely ignored in favour of ending such a barbaric practice, yet ignoring 100% unnecessary circumcision of male infants because both the Jewish and Muslim communities cry foul hate crime against their religious beliefs and culture?

Of course male circumcision doesn't carry all the same aspects of fgm, but there is still zero valid medical reason for it to be performed on infants, and it carries a chance of severe damage, and possibly death if done incorrectly. What on the other hand would be so wrong to leave any male free to choose whether or not they want circumcision after reaching adulthood?

Likewise why exactly to infants / babies need to be baptised? The assumption of parental / societal sin being passed onto new born infants is a very challengeable subject, and Jesus didn't undergo baptism until well into his adult life. Why again can this not simply be a personal choice after the child has grown into adulthood, as opposed to being forced onto babies that have zero clue what is going on or happening?

Baptism isn't really comparable with circumcision though? A few drops of water on infant's head bring no risks or negative consequences with it.

 

[red_elk]

Circumcision should be conscious decision of adult person, obviously. Baptism of infants is not a big deal IMO, but Buddhism approach to that seems more progressive.

 

[bhavv]

Baptism isn't really comparable with circumcision though? A few drops of water on infant's head bring no risks or negative consequences with it.

Most cases of baptism as I am aware is not a few drops of water on the head, the babies whole heads are submerged underwater.

It's also more to do with the reason / intention behind it. How and why do Baptist's honestly believe that new born babies have any sin that needs cleansing?

It's like forcing atheist kids to pray. Praying isn't anything harmful, but why do you have to force it upon others if they don't want it, or aren't able to make a conscientious decision about it?

 

[Lexicus]

Both sectarians and intersectionalists privilege "identities" and the representation of those identities over the material struggles of working class people, and inevitably this comes to mean the experience of those "identities" as experienced by affluent professionals. Even when we talk about structural inequality, it always end up meaning people being passed over for promotion in an advertising firm or some other equally narrow experience, rather than anything about employment or housing or justice or education in a broad sense. Movements like Black Lives Matter have attempted to challenge that by drawing public attention back to the working class reality of most black Americans (for example), but they've only been partially successful. Liberals would still rather hear about how the Grammies are racist because they only gave Beyoncé a seven golden scepters this year than hear about the water crisis in Flint or about violence against immigrants.

So wait, you don't consider Black Lives Matter to be "intersectionalists"?

 

[Traitorfish]

So wait, you don't consider Black Lives Matter to be "intersectionalists"?

I think that the term, as it is commonly used, describes a certain tendency within bourgeois representational politics. I don't think it has much use in classifying grass-roots working class movements, except to recuperate them back into the logic of bourgeois representationalism.