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In reply to the discussion: Carville was right. Here's why it doesn't matter [View all]Beastly Boy
(9,340 posts)Last edited Fri Apr 30, 2021, 05:09 PM - Edit history (1)
While I do not expect black and brown people to carry the exclusive burden to educate white voters on issues of civil rights and social justice, and while there are plenty of white civil rights activists out there (Carville, or people like Carville not belonging to their ranks), and while I am as skeptical as you are of black and brown people having resounding success in convincing white people to pay adequate attention to civil rights and social justice, my point, which I consider to have adequately addressed your post in its entirety (and please try to remember that Carville provides significant context to this entire thread), is that people like Carville are a piss poor substitute for black and brown civil rights activists when it comes to communicate these issues from a minority perspective to the Democratic white voters. This has nothing to do with my activism (or lack thereof), or my connections (or lack thereof) to white voters, or my reading habits. And, with all due respect, you DO need to be well versed in WTF you are talking about, and being a black civil rights activist sure goes a long way in conducting effective communications on the matter, assuming the will to engage is there. You can refresh your recollection of my position by going back to my previous post, where the care to respond to what you wrote is evident.
However, if you require further elaboration, here it is:
While I fully expect white civil rights activists to talk to black civil rights activists in order to better understand the issues at hand, their understanding of the issues will by definition be less than complete, simply because they lack the daily experience of dealing with them from the perspective of black and brown people. This is self-evident. You can't expect a scholar of a phenomenon to acquire the same awareness of the phenomenon as the direct participant in the phenomenon. Frankly, while i don't doubt their sincerity, I find white people trying to share their purported expertise of black and brown people's experiences to be inevitably disingenuous, with quite a whiff of hypocrisy to them. In this instance, I see white privilege to be an impediment rather than an asset, even though you appear to not recognize it as such. (Note that, taking your preferences into account, I am putting the aside issue, as you called it, of wokeness, aside (pun intended), even though it has direct relevance when you engage in a critique of Carville and people like him.)
You may have already guessed that I am, while not an activist, a civil rights advocate. While I have read plenty of books on the subject and find your implied assumptions about my reading habits condescending, I am not naturally inclined to any sort of activism. You may be of the same frame of mind, which would explain your apparent favor for complete disengagement from the white Democrats who you classify as being hateful towards black and brown Democrats. But I am speculating here. What is clear is that my preference is to assign the responsibility of engaging with white working class voters to the people who are best equipped to handle it and are most up to the task, while your preference is to shift it to the people who are poorly equipped to handle it and may inadvertently do more harm than good.
While I feel competent enough to address civil rights, social justice, and, to some degree, institutional racism issues, as I do every chance I get, on any suitable occasion, with any receptive audience of any race and political affiliation, I am by no means adequate in intelligently articulating the issues of white privilege, institutional racism and, yes, wokeness. It takes more than mere awareness to claim even the elementary understanding, let alone ability to communicate, these concepts. And genuine understanding only comes with experiencing them. If I were to talk to the white working class people out of my above described ignorance, chances are that I would be sabotaging the efforts of more informed and more passionate people who can more effectively address the same issues to the same people.
If I am this skeptical about white activists communicating with white working class, and if I am this skeptical (see my previous post) about people like Carville to address what he is not equipped to address, imagine my lack of confidence in my own ability to do the same. If you have anything to say which will disabuse me of my insecurities, I am all ears. Otherwise, and notwithstanding any of the above, your presumptions of my competence are badly misplaced, I am afraid.