tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post7247656450094719733..comments2023-05-03T09:05:55.102-07:00Comments on Jacobinism: Racism; Censorship; DisunityUnrepentant Jacobinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09256579083755037018noreply@blogger.comBlogger19125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-60993136083474351582014-02-20T06:12:18.915-08:002014-02-20T06:12:18.915-08:00Hi - just to say that I always read your blog, ...Hi - just to say that I always read your blog, 'cus it's great, but this post in particular had a bit of bearing on the one I recently I wrote on the whole Julie Burchill/intersectionality business. Not quite up to your standards but I didn't know whether you might be interested all the same:<br /><br />http://www.whiskyandtea.net/2014/02/20/intellectual-masochism-intersectionality/Mark Crawfordhttp://www.whiskyandtea.netnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-76205663658912547152014-02-06T09:16:48.825-08:002014-02-06T09:16:48.825-08:00I did some further research on this - the Racism =...I did some further research on this - the Racism = Prejudice + Power slogan was coined by a woman called Pat Bidol ... and popularized by Judith H. Katz in her 1978 book White Awareness: Handbook for Anti-Racism Training. <br /><br />http://www.pearshapedcomedy.com/Philp_Corner.html<br /><br />You can sort of see how it came about. In a society like the US where there are no laws against incitement to racial hatred it made sense to some people to try and kid themselves that racial prejudice is not racism if there isn't a power dynamic to enfore it. <br /><br />However, it is unfortunately complete pastures.Anthony Millerhttp://www.pearshapedcomecy.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-52372461263908782682014-01-22T01:57:48.902-08:002014-01-22T01:57:48.902-08:00The thing is as well the whole "white guilt&q...The thing is as well the whole "white guilt" thing just doesnt wash in Europe as clearly us white people have been here for over 1000 years although we're obviously supposed to forget this when letting in immigrants but remember our cultural identity when it is time to feel guilty. "You stole your land" doesnt work here. Neithet was everyone directly or indirectly connected to the slave trade or Empire. The best these puritans can do is suggest indirect benefits. Actually I do know what my ancestors did it wasnt slave trading. And let us not dare say there wasnt universal sufferage till 1946. It's like Basil Fawlty and the Germans. Of course most of the UK's new wave of immigrants arent "coloured" either. Hence BME not POC. Of course there is still racism and institutional racism but the stereotypes dont work here. A large section of the Windrush generation and decendants have merged with the whites creating lots of mixed race people too. The days when Brixton was all black are long gone. Even Mark Duggan's family seem to be half white... at leasr his aunt is. It's conplicated ...Anthony Millerhttp://www.pearshapedcomedy.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-64465595809926599092014-01-20T06:27:16.632-08:002014-01-20T06:27:16.632-08:00Also, I have to say that the last time I looked at...Also, I have to say that the last time I looked at my girlfriend she was black <br />When did she become a "woman of colour"? Just asking<br />Only I was under the impression that the word "coloured" was racist<br />http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/6132672.stm<br />because of its association with segregation<br />"It's wrong," says Toyin Agbetu of Ligali, an African-British human rights organisation. "Because it strips me of my identity and reduces me to the most superficial physical identifier, as opposed to my African ethnicity." <br /><br />But of course if you separate out black from "people of colour" you create a smaller lobby group.<br />And that's what I see here - a lobby group excluding everybody till it gets smaller and smaller and smaller and has no power...<br />...while attempting to glue together all other non-white ethnicities in a surreal way even if they dont have a common experience?<br />Or perhaps the word black doesn't contain enough "white guilt"?<br /><br />I also love the idea of "peer reviewing" feminist (or any kind of political) thought?<br />Then again feminism used to be about ideas and political theory.<br />Today it is a label for everyone with a big gob<br />http://riseresistandrevolt.wordpress.com/2013/05/25/understanding-white-privilege-and-our-mental-colonisation-british-fascism-revived-in-woolwich/<br />"The last straw for me was a photo of 3 young Muslim men sitting around flowers holding a photo of the soldier who was killed in Woolwich."<br />How awful. Imagine Muslim men feeling empathy for the death of a young white man?<br />I mean if that woman aint a racist I dont know what is...? #whiteproverb <br />At least Germaine Greer had a functioning brain<br /><br />In the mean time could someone please supply me with the correctly respectful racial term of the week for black?<br />I do like to feel that I'm oppressing POC correctly. Otherwise I might call them BMEs or something awful.Anthony Millerhttp://www.pearshapedcomecy.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-51742323113180078712014-01-20T04:00:37.298-08:002014-01-20T04:00:37.298-08:00Okay a less glib answer to “intersectionalism”…
“T...Okay a less glib answer to “intersectionalism”…<br />“This idea holds that racism is only possible when prejudice is married with power.”<br />The thing is it’s so provably historically untrue. If there cant be minority racist how do these people explain the Nation of Islam (now so small it’s a political joke) and its schism with Malcolm X – surely that proves that minority racism does or can exist? Possibly the NofI was part of the necessary political cycle and natural polarisation that followed the end of segregation. But it is silly to pretend it’s agenda wasn’t racist. Well, “The Blackman is the original man. From him came all brown, yellow, red, and white people. By using a special method of birth control law, the Blackman was able to produce the white race. …blah blah blah” sounds racist to me but maybe I’ve just hilariously misunderstood it all.<br />“racism may only travel in one direction - from the powerful to the powerless”<br />This is dangerous indeed. If many of these people had read, for example, Burmese Days by George Orwell they would understand that the British Raj didn’t exist simply by maintaining a racist structure at the top – that kind of completely top down political control would never have worked – but by people in the middle such as the odious U Po Kyin fermenting racial prejudice at the bottom of society for their own political enhancement. Those such as the innocent Dr Veraswami who form innocent friendships with the white English are just as much a threat to his powerbase as they are to the English people’s power base. Everyone – not just those at the bottom – is trapped in a dehumanising system. <br />Enoch Powell’s famous “Rivers of Blood” speech contains this section “That tragic and intractable phenomenon which we watch with horror on the other side of the Atlantic but which there is interwoven with the history and existence of the States itself, is coming upon us here by our own volition and our own neglect.” It was useful to ferment as an argument to further oppose civil rights. <br />All forms and manifestations of racism are not the same. Mussolini, Hitler and Franco were all right wing European dictators of the 20th century so how come they didn’t behave the same way. All totalitarian regimes need scapegoats but while Hitler engaged in the systematic enslavement and murder of large subsections of his indigenous population right from the start – why didn’t this happen with Mussolini or Franco’s regimes? which were in power for a lot longer. Of course you could argue that Mussolini exported his racism by invading Abyssinia but this is a long way from a program of mass genocide. You could argue that it was because Germany couldn’t sustain and wasn’t allowed an empire that its racism turned inwards. But then you have to ask why weren’t Vallejo-Nájera’s racist ideas under Franco based purely on genetics like those of the Nazis? <br />Of course the Nazis excuse for their genocide and continual territorial demands and invasions was precisely that they were an oppressed minority who had been artificially divided. "I am asking neither that Germany be allowed to oppress three and a half million Frenchmen, nor am I asking that three and a half million Englishmen be placed at our mercy. Rather I am simply demanding that the oppression of three and a half million Germans in Czechoslovakia cease and that the inalienable right to self-determination take its place." - Adolf Hitler 1938. Some people need to watch “Genesis of the Daleks” again…? Heaven forbit we should suggest that the holocaust was all just one man’s idea.<br />“the many complexities involved in making "multidimensional conceptualizations"” waffles wikipedia. <br />Sounds a lot like the idea that there are no concrete ideas to me. Of course it’s interesting how, for example, Roy Chubby Brown used to do lots of jokes against women and has now rebranded himself doing racial jokes but … the Matrix of Domination sounds to me a lot like a load of white feminists jumping on the bandwagon of black oppression for relational aggression… to me?<br />Anthony Millerhttp://www.pearshapedcomedy.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-39095826769266371182014-01-10T13:46:07.440-08:002014-01-10T13:46:07.440-08:00You have to forgive American intersectional femini...You have to forgive American intersectional feminists. Having to sign up for the military draft by law at 18 and then sweat out the next decade hoping they won't get sent to some tropical island to get stabbed in the guts with a bayonet of male privilege makes them cranky. And all those protests for diversity at the Selective Service Administration and Vets Hospitals doesn't help. I mean, after all, 2.3% of the deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan is a pretty heavy burden of privilege. Fail Burtonhttps://www.facebook.com/max.papeschi.7noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-24087750271692121692014-01-09T11:34:02.194-08:002014-01-09T11:34:02.194-08:00http://thefeministwire.com/2014/01/moving-on/ (wit...http://thefeministwire.com/2014/01/moving-on/ (with addendum)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-48820725886764894762014-01-08T10:50:02.538-08:002014-01-08T10:50:02.538-08:00I love the idea that Hitler was only a bigot in th...I love the idea that Hitler was only a bigot in the 1920s but "became a racist" on gaining power in 1933. Truly absurd. <br /><br />On the plus side whenever people complain now that my acts are women haters or racist I sagely observe that they are in fact just bigots because they are "powerless" and it takes the edge off.Anthony Millerhttp://www.pearshapedcomedy.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-59685159951294521042014-01-07T15:53:54.146-08:002014-01-07T15:53:54.146-08:00PS: Recently I have been interrogating the idea of...PS: Recently I have been interrogating the idea of structural racism and had some heated to & fros on Twitter. Whilst I don't reject the notion outright (cases like Stephen Lawrence and studies showing people with black or Muslim sounding names not receiving replies to job applications seem to be clear examples) I reject the notion that it defines Western society and I vehemently oppose the idea that it causes the internecine violence in black communities.<br /><br />For that to be true we would have to be living in a more institutionally racist time now than even pre civil rights America as the black murder rate has skyrocketed since segregation was ended. It just doesn't square with the evidence to blame the crime, murder and incarceration rates in the black community on racism -systemic, subconscious or otherwise- and we have been doing so for decades and it is only getting worse.<br /><br />If the intersectional left truly want to see an end to cases like Trayvon Martin they would be looking to tackle the phenomenal crime rates in the black community which has led to the quite rational profiling of young black men.<br /><br />Statistically you are far more likely to be the victim interracial violence where the aggressor is black than the other way around. Not to mention the near genocidal rates of black on black murder.<br /><br />If we truly care about our black brothers and sisters we should not be making excuses for this behaviour as it is the behaviour which can be changed whereas subconscious racism -if it exists and when it exists- is almost as impossible to diagnose and tackle as nailing a fart to a plank of wood.<br /><br />If we truly want to end the fear factor surrounding young black men we should be doing everything in our power to help the black community fight the culture of violence and criminality currently thriving in black communities from London to LA. <br /><br />Currently the intersectional left are doing everything in their power to stop that. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-91937682758698110122014-01-07T14:50:58.977-08:002014-01-07T14:50:58.977-08:00Another excellent piece.
The "R" word h...Another excellent piece.<br /><br />The "R" word has increasingly lost it's meaning. The behaviors that will get one branded as a racist today have lost all relation to the dictionary definition and dare I say logic.<br /><br />Criticizing the religion of Islam, opposing unlimited mass immigration, caring about the violence afflicting the black community or oppression of gays and women in minority groups area all considered the mark of racism by these ideologues and even quite a large slice of the liberal centre.<br /><br />In fact the whole idea of intersectionality, systemic racism and privilege makes racists of us all. Even fully paid up post colonialist, cultural relativistic, third world fetishistic, anti Western far leftist radical activist is a racist because original sin is subconscious don't you see!<br /><br />The only people truly free of the taint of racism are the infallible "people of colour" but as Jacobin rightly points out their voices are only important if they confirm the pre civil rights narrative of the intersectional ideologues. People like Ayan Hirsi Ali or Thomas Sowell are Uncle Toms and self hating Neocons.<br /><br />As a society we consider racism to be one of the worst things a person can be. The rhetoric of these holier than thou identity politicians has a chilling effect. Whilst I will gladly air my opinions on crime in the black community or misogyny in Islam from the anonymity of the comment section I wouldn't dare attach an honest dialogue on these subjects to my personal Facebook account or air them in the real world.<br /><br />Anyway if we are all racists does it really matter?<br /><br />Perhaps it's time for white people across the globe to relinquish their lands and wealth and be barred from public office and institutional power because they cannot be trusted not to subconsciously commit thought crimes.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-52105519624617807132014-01-07T14:25:51.503-08:002014-01-07T14:25:51.503-08:00No need to apologise. Harry's Place comments a...No need to apologise. Harry's Place comments are deleted after a week so nice to have this thoughtful contribution archived here. Unrepentant Jacobinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09256579083755037018noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-63390492527786763432014-01-07T14:25:00.541-08:002014-01-07T14:25:00.541-08:00Thanks for all the links, Aloevera. Will take a lo...Thanks for all the links, Aloevera. Will take a look tomorrow.Unrepentant Jacobinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09256579083755037018noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-33475842229528369862014-01-07T14:21:05.882-08:002014-01-07T14:21:05.882-08:00She's terrific. I saw her speak in London a fe...She's terrific. I saw her speak in London a few months back on the same subject. She has written a book on the subject called "Your Fatwa Does Not Apply Here". <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Your-Fatwa-Does-Apply-Here/dp/0393081583/ref=sr_1_sc_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1389133127&sr=8-1-spell&keywords=your+fatwa+does+ot+apply+here" rel="nofollow">Available here</a>Unrepentant Jacobinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09256579083755037018noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-20333465542590805332014-01-07T10:57:36.140-08:002014-01-07T10:57:36.140-08:00What we are seeing here is part of a larger phenom...What we are seeing here is part of a larger phenomenon--with no name or label that I am aware of--involving the current flurry of permutations and ramifications of formerly (seemingly) discrete and neatly bounded identities, identity associations, and related sorts of political alliances. <br /><br />The whole "intersectionality" enterprise is one such attempt--it delineates fine points of identity and affiliation (and comparative victimhood)--while--the reaction against intersectionality and its contradictions "(anti-intersectionality"?) is yet another attempt to (re-claim) the associations and rights inherent in the field of "identity-reckoning". All these are "internal"--that is--they deal with how to rationalize internal differences within formerly perceived discrete groups.<br /><br />But there are permutations in the external world of identity and political associations as well--as in the alliances forged between the seemingly strange bed-fellows of Christian Zionists and Pro-Israeli Jews--or--between the (Further) Left and Islam. <br /><br />Regarding the latter, see:<br /><br />http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red-green-brown_alliance<br /><br />"Red/Green/Brown Alliance" <br /><br />_________________<br /><br />http://www.marxists.org/archive/harman/1994/xx/islam.htm<br /><br />"The Prophet and the Proletariat"<br /><br />(Essay displaying some awareness of the contradictions of this alliance)<br /><br />_________________<br /><br /><br />http://www.harrisinteractive.fr/news/2013/Results_HIFR_PAI_16042013.pdf<br /><br />« Le regard des Français sur la religion musulmane » <br /><br />A Harris Interactive investigation (in French) showing (among other factors) those in France polled with left-wing orientations, while not entirely well-disposed to Islam--nevertheless--sees Islam as the only religion viewed more postively than any other<br /><br />_________________<br /><br />Unfortunately, the issue of "legitimacy" (what is a legitimate group? -- what groups or individuals have the "right" to speak?) becomes a heavy-handed feature of these debates. Many of these doings involve accusations of illegitimacy and attempts at delegitimization against opponents. What we need now is to come to terms with all the complexities of identities and associations--and try to deal with them soberly and with respect for that complexity--and here:<br /><br />http://www.opendemocracy.net/danny-postel/who-is-responsible-interview-with-fred-halliday<br /><br />"Who is Responsible"Aloeveranoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-17626166556629497202014-01-07T08:53:05.107-08:002014-01-07T08:53:05.107-08:00Heard Karima Bennoune interviewed on CBC Radio a n...Heard Karima Bennoune interviewed on CBC Radio a number of months back, by Michael Enright on the weekly Sunday Morning public affairs programming "Untold stories of the fight against Muslim Fundamentalism". Nov. 29/13 podcast can be found here: http://www.cbc.ca/player/Radio/The+Sunday+Edition/Segments/Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-911391371472269602014-01-07T03:24:05.074-08:002014-01-07T03:24:05.074-08:00Apologies for cutting and pasting from a remark ma...Apologies for cutting and pasting from a remark made on HP, but I thought this piece worthy of extended comment.<br /><br />Yet again, this is an excellent (if depressing) post from the Unrepentant Jacobin. It cuts to the chase of what is wrong with the left on the other side of the Atlantic, but it applies to the UK as well.<br /><br />Notice how the brutal murder of Shaima Alawadi was treated by so-called 'feminists' in the USA. Her killing was the source of outrage, protest, and furious invective for as long as it appeared that a white male - motivated by racism and/or anti-Islamic bigotry - was culpable. Once it was clear that her own husband murdered her, Shaima Alawadi's death suddenly ceased to matter, and all the fine noble souls who keened over her fate suddenly went quiet.<br /><br />The murder ceased to be important. It was as if it had never happened. The act of killing did not matter to the mob who Adele Wilde-Blavatsky crossed. It was only important if a white man was to blame. Once it became clear that a Muslim male was the perpetrator, the reality of a woman being beaten to death with a tire-iron suddenly became something to forget. <br /><br />Likewise, the furore surrounding Trayvon Martin was whipped up by people who said nothing about the horrific murder rate amongst young male African-Americans - who, statistically, were 9 out 10 times more likely to be killed by a fellow African-American. The Zimmerman case is not an easy one to pass judgement on, and there were intemperate polemics on both sides, but the harsh fact is that if Trayvon Martin had been shot dead by another young black man, none of the bien pensants involved in protesting this case would have cared.<br /><br />Dealing with the loathsome Priyamvada Gopal and the mutilation of Bibi Ayisha, we can see that this is not just an American problem. At it reveals a rather sick reality at the heart of the 'post-modernist'/'post-colonialist' dogma which poisons the intellectual left. Because for all their posturing about the 'subaltern', or 'epistemic violence', or about the silenced and forgotten masses crushed by Eurocentric hegemony, it is these people who will ignore and indeed <br />facilitate and connive in the oppression and silencing of weak, the powerless, the oppressed, and the murdered, if their persecutors and killers do not happen to fit the Western imperialist paradigm. <br /><br />The Taliban's victims, or those of AQI or Boko Haram. The victims of spousal abuse or FGM. Sectarian or ethnic minorities in the Middle East or South Asia. Homosexuals in Third World countries who face lynching or the vile crime of 'corrective rape' (if they are lesbians). Unless they can convincingly demonstrate that they are the victims of US imperialism or its lieutenants, they are to be forgotten about, and indeed their existence is to be expunged from discussion (indeed, to even talk about them is to betray yourself as a closet neo-con). <br /><br />It truly is a despicable and morally corrupt mindset, and its existence in our campuses and our press should be a source of shame.<br />sackcloth and ashesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-37456932093508683962014-01-07T02:01:56.537-08:002014-01-07T02:01:56.537-08:00Another excellent and extremely valuable article, ...Another excellent and extremely valuable article, complete with invaluable research and source. material. Your point that the main victims of this kind of cultural-relativist identity politics are "those vulnerable to oppression within 'subletern' groups" is especially important, and needs to be repeated at every opportunity. Jim Denhamhttp://shirazsocialist.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-18627187364376872072014-01-06T19:44:13.330-08:002014-01-06T19:44:13.330-08:00well down article and links, thanks
maybe the whi...well down article and links, thanks<br /><br />maybe the white privileged can atone by visiting the coloured ghetto, a walk on the wild sideAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5380090049852721671.post-18029837965206805072014-01-06T15:19:06.819-08:002014-01-06T15:19:06.819-08:00When liberals and commie eat their own, I REJOICE!...When liberals and commie eat their own, I REJOICE!!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com