{"id":131512,"date":"2012-08-02T10:00:32","date_gmt":"2012-08-02T14:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.prosebeforehos.com\/?p=131512"},"modified":"2012-12-26T16:03:52","modified_gmt":"2012-12-26T21:03:52","slug":"race-anti-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.prosebeforehos.com\/article-of-the-day\/08\/02\/race-anti-race\/","title":{"rendered":"Wait, So Who’s Racist?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Article:<\/strong> Apparently, the ‘Real Racists’ Are\u2026 Anti-Racists?<\/a> by Jamelle Bouie in The Nation.<\/p>\n

The Text:<\/strong> In response to Jonathan Chait, National Review\u2019s Jonah Goldberg makes an argument that I\u2019ve seen more and more on the right\u2014that noticing racism, and particularly racialized political attacks, makes you a racist:<\/p>\n

What I love about this stuff is that liberals tend to insist how racism is not only repugnant to them, but alien to them. And yet, they continually demonstrate a sensitivity and acuity for spotting it that even real racists seem to lack. They\u2019re like people who claim to be nose deaf (if you prefer, anosmic) who nonetheless insist they can pick up an exotic scent from miles away (\u201cA lactose intolerant armadillo has grown flatulent over by the old Miller farm\u2026\u201d).<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a real irony in the fact that this comes from someone whose magazine employed a notorious racist, and then replaced him with another (after firing two other writers with unfortunate views).<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Regardless, I\u2019ll attempt a response. It\u2019s possible to both oppose racism and have knowledge of racist tropes and ideas. By definition, in fact, racism can\u2019t be \u201calien\u201d to an anti-racist\u2014it\u2019s impossible to counteract racism unless you can recognize racist things.<\/p>\n

For example, the character \u201cHan Lee\u201d on CBS\u2019 2 Broke Girls is\u2014to borrow from writer Andrew Ti\u2014\u201ca tiny, greedy, sexless man-child,\u201d who speaks with a broken, generically Asian accent. This is incredibly racist, but in order to come to that conclusion, you have to be familiar with stereotypes about Asian-Americans.<\/p>\n

Now, for Goldberg, this means that Ti\u2014and anyone else who noticed\u2014is a racist. This doesn\u2019t make any sense. At all.<\/p>\n

I myself have noticed attacks on President Obama that traffic in stereotypes and discredited ideas about African-Americans and black masculinity. Does this make me a racist? I hope not, since I\u2019m also, you know, black. It\u2019s not just anti-racists who notice racially charged\u2014or simply racist\u2014attacks in political life. Social scientists have been documenting the use of race in politics for decades, and have identified important and concrete effects.<\/p>\n

Hell, our political lexicon is filled with words and phrases that call back to race and racism\u2014\u201cWillie Horton,\u201d \u201cdog-whistling,\u201d \u201cthe Southern strategy.\u201d Jesse Helms\u2019 \u201cHands\u201d ad\u2014used against a black Democrat in 1990\u2014is distilled prejudice, put to devastating political effect.<\/p>\n

This is incredibly racist. But according to Goldberg, I\u2019m a racist for pointing that out.<\/p>\n

One last point. If there\u2019s anyone who wouldn\u2019t notice racism, it\u2019s actual racists. Remember, if you believe that nonwhites are inferior, you\u2019re unlikely to notice when someone says something\u2014\u201cBlacks just want handouts\u201d\u2014that confirms your biases. In fact, contra Goldberg, it would actually be very odd for a racist to call \u201cracism.\u201d After all, to them, it\u2019s just common sense.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Article: Apparently, the ‘Real Racists’ Are\u2026 Anti-Racists? by Jamelle Bouie in The Nation. The Text: In response to Jonathan Chait, National Review\u2019s Jonah Goldberg makes an argument that I\u2019ve seen more and more on the right\u2014that noticing racism, and particularly racialized political attacks, makes you a racist: What I love about this stuff is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[259],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nWait, So Who's Racist?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Are we really in a post-racial society? Methinks not.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.prosebeforehos.com\/article-of-the-day\/08\/02\/race-anti-race\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Wait, So Who's Racist?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Are we really in a post-racial society? 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