Trump tells minority Congresswomen to "go back where they came from"

[Straha]

Post Civil War Reconstruction I think there are a few who needs to watch this.

What argument do you think is being advanced here that is responsive to what's being said?

[Rogue 9]

Post Civil War Reconstruction I think there are a few who needs to watch this.

The failure of Reconstruction is one of the great failures of American history. That said, it was the federal government intervening to protect the liberty of the freedmen, to the point of sending the Army to root out the Klan. (The irony that it was the 7th Cavalry is not lost on me.)

Straha and Loomer, I'll get to you when I get back from my trip. I'm sorry, but I need to sleep and I leave in the morning.

[Effie]

Did you know that there are more people than white and Native people in the United States? Did you know that nothing in the linked post says anything about having pre-Columbian ancestors in order to have a right to live here? Try again, and engage your brain this time.

Did you know that listing out all the exceptions is tedious and disrupts the point? "The insistence that no one has any right to live in the Americas if their ancestors did not dwell in them prior to 1492, or their ancestors were brought there as slaves, or if their ancestors were sentenced there as punishment, or maybe if their ancestors came from Asia, etc etc etc is," serves much the same purpose, but doesn't roll off the keyboard as well and should be well understood by now. After all, we've all read the thread. Quit it with the gish gallop; you're not impressing anyone or making me forget that you aren't engaging with the substance of what I said.

See, the existence of black people isn't really a fucking exception! If you're arguing the US is not a white ethnostate, it would behoove you to not gloss over the fact of blackness in order to present decolonization as racist.

But if you used the actual distinguishing characteristic used by decolonization theorists between people who voluntarily settled in the United States and people who were incorporated into it by force, then it would be difficult to hold decolonization as racist without saying explicitly that it's racist against white people, a risible statement. And, horror of horrors, we might move on to the problematic context for decolonization of Asian and Latinx people in the US! Discussion going somewhere, how appalling!

But, to go to Nicholas's post, the basic flaw is that you're assuming "settler" is a racial or ethnic identity. As Loomer laid out in fuller detail when I was writing this, settler is a term that refers to a specific relationship a person has with the space they live in, and it's something that, for example, also applies to Han people in Xinjiang and to Yamato Japanese people in Hokkaido (though Japan, for all its many problems, is still somewhat closer to decolonization than the US is).

So if we understand that "settler" is a relationship that does not necessarily involve a particular racial or ethnic identity, it is fairly easy to understand the conceptual level of how decolonization can happen without forcing mass removals or reculturation, because all one has to do is alter this relationship with space and then the rest can (in theory) be left alone.

And indeed, a substantial amount of decolonization theory in practice, notions like rematriation, are really aimed at preserving settler inhabitance of land while stripping away the notion of settler ownership and control. Because if you accept that the discovery doctrine and terra nullius are nonsense, which is facially obvious, and also not US law, which is an increasing position, that M'Intosh was substantially obiter dictum, then upwards of 95% of all land in the United States (conservatively) is illegally occupied and legal title would revert to Native owners and the whole ensuing mess would be incredible to sort out even if everyone was ready to go along with it. That is, indeed, not a small point- "conquest" had a legal definition in standing European law, and Nahua people in Mexico were suing under Spanish law within a few years of the "Conquest" for unjust treatment during the conquest and afterwards. So in order to accomplish the kind of broad reorientation of Native societies around extraction that the Spanish needed to make conquest and colonization profitable, it became necessary to deprive Native people of full humanity somehow.

And this is also what is pragmatically meant by "the US is fundamentally racist/unjust". The basic relationships of property necessary to live here rely on accepting racist premises that exist to foster exploitation and extraction, and there is no alternative currently in existence that would not involve the total destruction of the US. Many decolonization activists are interested in creating and promulgating such an alternative, because they are not interested in grand schemes of human removal, they are interested in justice and the good.

[loomer]

But if you used the actual distinguishing characteristic used by decolonization theorists between people who voluntarily settled in the United States and people who were incorporated into it by force, then it would be difficult to hold decolonization as racist without saying explicitly that it's racist against white people, a risible statement. And, horror of horrors, we might move on to the problematic context for decolonization of Asian and Latinx people in the US! Discussion going somewhere, how appalling!

This is also where Australia is somewhat bizarre in terms of the settler-colonial states. The founding myth for White Australia is actually an event of the most horrific brutality for virtually everyone involved - people brought here in chains to labour under the whip, tortured, beaten, and viewed as essentially subhuman, most of whom were from subaltern groups within the English nation of the time. The people doing the whipping were themselves largely from the same internal subaltern groups and were themselves kept in line with the same tools of horrific violence and the threat of death, so only a very few members of the 'first fleet' were on the top of the system of oppression that founded White Australia. We supplement this with the usual 'it's a land of opportunity and wealth to be had!' nonsense and tried to spin it as some kind of Wonderful Adventure but at its core, the White Australian founding myth contains the idea that we didn't want to be here, we were forced to be and we were brutally used and abused by an elite, quasi-ethnic overclass.

It's part of why I refuse to celebrate Australia Day. Not only do I not find there much to be proud of in the genocide of the Indigenous population, but for my ancestors, it wasn't a happy day either. It's a complete recontextualization and one that I hope spreads through the whitefella consciousness, because you couldn't ask for a better tool for understanding why decolonization is for us as well as our neighbour: Settler-colonialism in Australia was always predicated on the brutal exploitation of our ancestors and the genocide of the Indigenous peoples to benefit a wealthy few and an empire a world away. We were the tools (by this I do not mean to erase our position as perpetrators, which is an important qualification - but there is a special fury that comes from being manipulated into willingly committing a horrific crime) for the latter, the victims of the former, and Australia Day should fill any true blue Australian with sadness and anger at the horror of our nation's settling.

[MarxII]

I'm gradually coming around to the idea that what you describe is not an accidental thing, in all cases. I'm beginning to think that this conflation in the minds of a prospective reader, or at least a layperson coming across arguments, phrases or slogans et cetera, might have some incentive behind it.

Sometimes it is indeed a deliberate strategy - the shock factor can break a hell of a lot of ice if you use it well.

This is more or less what I had imagined, though I'll be honest and say I had in mind somewhat more cynical motives.

But I don't think that's the case here. Let's consider the particular phrase that motivated the puerile outburst around terminology: 'White moves to innocence'. Is this a shocking or inflammatory statement? I don't think so - not unless Whiteness is now so shocking that it cannot be discussed, in which case we have some serious problems on our hands! In this regard it is different to the article Rogue 9 refers to, where the shock value was intentional and the offensiveness thus legitimate.

Shocking is probably a stretch. Inflammatory? I'm a bit more on the fence on that one. But I don't want to get bogged down in the specifics of degree regarding which terms are how inflammatory (or the descriptor of your choosing). For that matter, as you point out, a given statement or term of art can be of value even where offensive, depending on how and where it hits and to what end.

The idea I was originally trying to bring forth was that I think it's possible that these statements or terms can be deliberately crafted to that end, and that this particular angle can be used, consciously or otherwise, in frankly cynical or counterproductive ways. Straha seems to indicate that they do not, you come in somewhat short of that, and I who am altogether inexpert in this field am sounding out the better-read among us to try and form an idea as to what's what.

What we instead see sometimes is a violent reaction to ideas that threaten the existing worldviews and narratives. If the Indian grandmother complex, to borrow Vine Deloria Jr's terminology, is no longer a viable way for Settlers to avoid responsibility for ongoing involvement in forms of dispossession and oppression - which is what the 'moves to innocence' consist of, ways of avoiding personal responsibility and guilt - then the house of cards begins to wobble. Wobble it enough and people react violently, regardless of the terminology. Thus, it doesn't matter how inflammatory or not the statement is - it becomes inflammatory to those who feel threatened by it, no matter how innocuous or offensive the words themselves.

And this is an interesting point to me and I think I made mention of this tendency above. And with thanks for shedding light on 'moves to innocence,' I wonder now if you'd be good enough to do the same for 'Indian grandmother.' I think we're all familiar with the shopworn Cherokee princess meme, but I've never thought of that as central to the problems of race and our conceptions of it here in the United States, so much as an odd and embarrassing outgrowth of these.

[loomer]

What we instead see sometimes is a violent reaction to ideas that threaten the existing worldviews and narratives. If the Indian grandmother complex, to borrow Vine Deloria Jr's terminology, is no longer a viable way for Settlers to avoid responsibility for ongoing involvement in forms of dispossession and oppression - which is what the 'moves to innocence' consist of, ways of avoiding personal responsibility and guilt - then the house of cards begins to wobble. Wobble it enough and people react violently, regardless of the terminology. Thus, it doesn't matter how inflammatory or not the statement is - it becomes inflammatory to those who feel threatened by it, no matter how innocuous or offensive the words themselves.

And this is an interesting point to me and I think I made mention of this tendency above. And with thanks for shedding light on 'moves to innocence,' I wonder now if you'd be good enough to do the same for 'Indian grandmother.' I think we're all familiar with the shopworn Cherokee princess meme, but I've never thought of that as central to the problems of race and our conceptions of it here in the United States, so much as an odd and embarrassing outgrowth of these.

I mean, you could google it easily enough, and I suggest that you might want to to form your own opinion rather than relying on second and third hand impressions since Vine Deloria Jr's book is easily available. The basic idea is this: Settler people - Deloria identified them as White here because it's mostly whites who do this particular one and it was before the 'Settler turn' that shifted the focus away from just White privilege to a more comprehensive settler-centric analysis - who claim Indigenous descent usually claim it as coming from a female ancestor. It serves two purposes - one, it deflects guilt as one of the moves to innocence, because if you're an Indian then you can't be guilty of genocide and dispossession, right? Two, it does so without admitting a male link, which would have other connotations of an 'unconquered' Indigenous world and tie in with the patrilineal approach, making the tie 'too much Indian' rather than 'just enough' - in other words, Male Indian Ancestor Bad, Female Indian Ancestor Good. So it's both a gendered and racial issue with a subtext in settler-colonial states that enables it to serve as both a move to innocence and a romanticization of the past that enables the myth of the 'declining Indian' and the idea that through a great-grandmother, a legitimate claim has been established, but not an actual Indigenous state of being with all its baggage. It's this dual operation that keeps it from being just an acknowledgement of descent, and translates it into one of the moves to innocence and something that got Deloria rolling his eyes and just patting the needy white guys on the back with an 'of course you are'.

Notably, we don't really have this to the same degree in Australia. Very few whitefellas will invent ties of Indigenous blood or acknowledge those that do exist (myself included in some contexts, though usually I happily acknowledge whatever ambiguous mixed descent I have as what it is in relevant contexts) so it's more of an American, Canadian, and to a lesser extent, New Zealand thing. It's also notable in that it's kind of a given that, after a long enough timespan of the family inhabiting the nation, almost everyone in a settler-colonial state will possess some degree of Indigenous descent, whether settler or otherwise, but it's still treated within the complex as being somehow exceptional, redemptive, and special.

[Nicholas]

"Settler" is not a derogatory status. Your proposition falls apart at the first hurdle.

That depends on just how serious Loomer and Straha are when they say they want to restore sovereignty to the Native Peoples and how exactly they are defining Native Peoples. The obvious meaning of that is that they intend to strip Settlers (those descended people who immigrated (excluding slaves) since Europeans "discovered" the New World) of the right to self government and give Native Peoples (those descended from the people living in North America & and Austria when the Europeans "discovered" them) authority to govern them. If so "Settler" is intended to designate people who will be subjects of the state instead of citizens and thus is a derogatory status.

Settler is not a derogatory status but a socio-political, cultural, and economic designation. Nowhere will you see me advocate for stripping Settlers of the right to self government or giving Indigenous peoples (especially not those of Austria - sorry, couldn't resist) some kind of unfettered governing authority. What I propose is instead that the Settler ought to work towards the deconstruction and dissolution of the settler-colonial model both for the sake of their neighbour and for themselves, and that what emerges ought to be a democratic state in which the Settler - who ceases to be a Settler, but I will use the label here for convenience - has a voice and a vote. Unless you believe democracy does not convey a right to self-government, this does not advocate for stripping self government from anyone at all.

When challenged that such an action would create unjust and oppressive ethno-states governed by a tiny minority (the US population is I believe around 75% Settlers) they say that isn't what they mean and insist they favor democratic governments but then they invariably go back to calling for restoring sovereignty to the Native Peoples without defining how Settlers could become Natives or explaining what restoring sovereignty to Native Peoples means if the vast majority of voters are going to be non-native.

I have repeatedly explained this issue, so either you find those explanations unsatisfactory - in which case, please do engage with them directly - or haven't read them. The cliffnotes version is that we mean different things than you seem to be reading by restoring sovereignty. All this truly means is recognizing the sovereignty of the original nations - no different to say, Switzerland's sovereign status - and recognizing that Settlers land claims are predicated on an illegitimate theft that ought, where possible without undue human suffering, be made good on. At present the nation is mixed up with its traditional inhabitants to a high degree because it cannot be identified meaningfully with its territory, and many of its citizens live in exile in other regions and nations. Once this is resolved, a meaningful difference will naturally emerge between the Indigenous state and the Indigenous population of that state.

The second component is indigenization, which does not actually mean for the former Settlers to 'become Natives' (indeed, the idea of the Native in opposition to the Settler is part of what decolonization seeks to dismantle!) but rather for the culture to undergo a willing, voluntary shift away from identity as Settlers and into identifying on a national level with the states we actually inhabit, while retaining our own cultural and ethnic identities where they are not innately harmful. See, for instance, my proposed 'end state' for myself - a whitefella (my ethnic identity - distinct, I note, from Whiteness in this context) Bundjalung citizen, by which is meant 'a whitefella who possesses citizenship in the Bundjalung state', who speaks the local language as well as English (just as I would if I moved to Germany and became a whitefella German), who knows about and participates in elements of the local culture (both whitefella and blackfella, and increasingly as time goes on, a melding of both). This does not suppose I will become an ethnic Bundjalung man - simply that, living in a sovereign nation, I will be a citizen in that nation and participate in its culture and language.

You have repeatedly explained the issue and I have found the explanations both satisfactory and very attractive. Because of that I hope that the position you are advocating here spreads and becomes a larger part of American and Australian political discourse. In order to contribute to that project, as someone who has not read the decolonization literature, I wished to be explicit about how I understand your standard short statements of your position and the contradictions I see between those short statements and your more developed position. Based on this thread it seems most people who have not read the decolonization literature have the same interpretation.

I believe this is information you need in order to achieve your goals because you need to convince a solid majority of the population of your position to achieve what you want and the vast majority of people will not read the deconlonization literature. Therefor, advocates of decolonization need to be able to explain their position quickly to people who have not read the literature, based on this thread you do not seem to be able to do so at this time. I hope that being explicit about where the confusion comes from are will help you improve your ability to do so.

Nicholas

[loomer]

In order to contribute to that project, as someone who has not read the decolonization literature, I wished to be explicit about how I understand your standard short statements of your position and the contradictions I see between those short statements and your more developed position. Based on this thread it seems most people who have not read the decolonization literature have the same interpretation.

I appreciate your position, in that case.

I believe this is information you need in order to achieve your goals because you need to convince a solid majority of the population of your position to achieve what you want and the vast majority of people will not read the deconlonization literature. Therefor, advocates of decolonization need to be able to explain their position quickly to people who have not read the literature, based on this thread you do not seem to be able to do so at this time. I hope that being explicit about where the confusion comes from are will help you improve your ability to do so.

Unfortunately, this part is harder to appreciate and support because it is not possible to explain these positions quickly in a way that is acceptable to the audience. This is because doing so requires such a level of abstraction as to render the arguments subject to misunderstanding - consider the way we still have posters arguing that decolonization must inherently create ethnostates and displace or slaughter millions, or how TRR so fundamentally misunderstood what was meant by decolonization that he thought he was in favour of it despite opposing the return of Indigenous sovereignty. The conceptual tools that do allow for short form explanations require some degree of existing familiarity with Indigenous studies, post-colonial theory, and the emerging field of settler colonial studies, which as you say is lacking in most people. So while I understand your motive, it simply isn't feasible to explain the processes and theory involved in short form without misunderstanding and miscommunication ensuing, as attempts to use the short form explanations are met with either confusion (see TRR) or outright rage (see Broomstick).

[Ziggy Stardust]

Unfortunately, this part is harder to appreciate and support because it is not possible to explain these positions quickly in a way that is acceptable to the audience. This is because doing so requires such a level of abstraction as to render the arguments subject to misunderstanding - consider the way we still have posters arguing that decolonization must inherently create ethnostates and displace or slaughter millions, or how TRR so fundamentally misunderstood what was meant by decolonization that he thought he was in favour of it despite opposing the return of Indigenous sovereignty. The conceptual tools that do allow for short form explanations require some degree of existing familiarity with Indigenous studies, post-colonial theory, and the emerging field of settler colonial studies, which as you say is lacking in most people. So while I understand your motive, it simply isn't feasible to explain the processes and theory involved in short form without misunderstanding and miscommunication ensuing, as attempts to use the short form explanations are met with either confusion (see TRR) or outright rage (see Broomstick).

As someone who works in a highly technical academic field, and is frequently tasked with having to communicate technical concepts to a non-technical audience, this is sort of a chickenshit position for you to take. I understand that it can be frustrating when someone misunderstands your argument, but to say that it is entirely incumbent upon them to develop an entire new vocabulary to understand what you are saying, and not at all incumbent upon you to communicate clearly and effectively, betrays a worrying level of arrogance and lack of self-awareness. You aren't that far away from saying, "You are all too stupid to understand why I'm right, so you're just going to have to trust me that I'm right." Since it would be a pretty ridiculous statement on its face to say that decolonization theory is somehow inherently more conceptually complex and intractable a problem than exists in literally every other academic field (the vast majority of which are capable of communicating their basic premises quite effectively), it's hard to take your statement as anything other than a personal refusal on your part to try and reflect on how you might be able to explain these concepts in a way that might minimize or eliminate the potential for such misunderstanding.

Yes, there will always be technical nuances that are difficult or impossible for lay audiences to immediately pick up on. But being unable to communicate a broad concept without appealing to such nuances is on you, not everybody else.

[loomer]

Unfortunately, this part is harder to appreciate and support because it is not possible to explain these positions quickly in a way that is acceptable to the audience. This is because doing so requires such a level of abstraction as to render the arguments subject to misunderstanding - consider the way we still have posters arguing that decolonization must inherently create ethnostates and displace or slaughter millions, or how TRR so fundamentally misunderstood what was meant by decolonization that he thought he was in favour of it despite opposing the return of Indigenous sovereignty. The conceptual tools that do allow for short form explanations require some degree of existing familiarity with Indigenous studies, post-colonial theory, and the emerging field of settler colonial studies, which as you say is lacking in most people. So while I understand your motive, it simply isn't feasible to explain the processes and theory involved in short form without misunderstanding and miscommunication ensuing, as attempts to use the short form explanations are met with either confusion (see TRR) or outright rage (see Broomstick).

As someone who works in a highly technical academic field, and is frequently tasked with having to communicate technical concepts to a non-technical audience, this is sort of a chickenshit position for you to take. I understand that it can be frustrating when someone misunderstands your argument, but to say that it is entirely incumbent upon them to develop an entire new vocabulary to understand what you are saying, and not at all incumbent upon you to communicate clearly and effectively, betrays a worrying level of arrogance and lack of self-awareness.

This isn't what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that short explanations of this issue aren't attainable, not that people have to develop a new vocabulary - though frankly I have very little patience for people who can't be bothered to google things that are easily explained by doing so when they decide to argue about those things. Long explanations that explain what's going on are attainable - but quick explanations, which require abstraction, aren't.

You aren't that far away from saying, "You are all too stupid to understand why I'm right, so you're just going to have to trust me that I'm right." Since it would be a pretty ridiculous statement on its face to say that decolonization theory is somehow inherently more conceptually complex and intractable a problem than exists in literally every other academic field (the vast majority of which are capable of communicating their basic premises quite effectively), it's hard to take your statement as anything other than a personal refusal on your part to try and reflect on how you might be able to explain these concepts in a way that might minimize or eliminate the potential for such misunderstanding.

Yes, there will always be technical nuances that are difficult or impossible for lay audiences to immediately pick up on. But being unable to communicate a broad concept without appealing to such nuances is on you, not everybody else.

The basic premise can be communicated quickly and quite effectively, but not in a way that is easily understood. If I say 'decolonization is the process of restoring Indigenous lands to their rightful owners, recognizing Indigenous states as states, and dismantling the systems of oppression' or even 'decolonization is giving back what was wrongly taken', this is a quick and effective way of communicating it... if there is an awareness of what any of that means already on even a fairly basic level. To explain the concepts in a way that minimizes the potential for misunderstanding requires, from my perspective, the longer explanations I have been providing in response to questions. I'd love to be able to find the magic words that make the idea easily grasped, but I don't think they exist at this point. If you can think of them, perhaps we can try them out!

[Nicholas]

The basic premise can be communicated quickly and quite effectively, but not in a way that is easily understood. If I say 'decolonization is the process of restoring Indigenous lands to their rightful owners, recognizing Indigenous states as states, and dismantling the systems of oppression' or even 'decolonization is giving back what was wrongly taken', this is a quick and effective way of communicating it... if there is an awareness of what any of that means already on even a fairly basic level. To explain the concepts in a way that minimizes the potential for misunderstanding requires, from my perspective, the longer explanations I have been providing in response to questions. I'd love to be able to find the magic words that make the idea easily grasped, but I don't think they exist at this point. If you can think of them, perhaps we can try them out!

I see what you are saying about the difficulty of communicating complicated concepts.

Each short form will be prone to being misunderstood in different was. The ones you use above are fairly neutral, some of the ones you have used earlier in the thread, like "the US, Canada, Australia et al are fundamentally unjust nations that need to be dissolved as soon as safely practicable, with full restoration of Indigenous sovereignty" are clearly intended to shock. Both those you use above and the more shocking ones serve to emphasize the injustice that has been done and the radical actions need to correct it. They also tend to be misinterpreted in racially charged and violent ways.

I would like to suggest that when the misinterpretation does more harm then the phrase does good you should use other formulations. When you which to emphasize the goal of eliminating the native - settler - slave triad and building a united society I suggest a formulation like: decolonization is the process of integrating immigrants to native lands into the native cultures in which they are living or decolonization is the process of helping all residents of a the land to appreciate and participate in the local culture. I think it is obvious that these formulations have other problems, for example they understate the issues of justice involved but they might serve as a starting point when it is really important to avoid the ethnostate misunderstanding.

Nicholas

[Straha]

As someone who works in a highly technical academic field, and is frequently tasked with having to communicate technical concepts to a non-technical audience, this is sort of a chickenshit position for you to take. I understand that it can be frustrating when someone misunderstands your argument, but to say that it is entirely incumbent upon them to develop an entire new vocabulary to understand what you are saying, and not at all incumbent upon you to communicate clearly and effectively, betrays a worrying level of arrogance and lack of self-awareness.

The problem is that the stuff in this field is often internalized in what is read as deeply personal attacks. Looking at someone in the United States and saying "Hey, you're only on this land because of two inter-twined genocides and the massive, and illegal, takings of territory in a way that should never have been done." is going to rankle feathers, and toning it down misses the point of what's being discussed. This isn't new, the letter from MLK Jr. quoted above about liberal moderates and their reaction to anti-segregation protests sort of encapsulates how even things that we think of now as being self-evident will upset people if it forces negative self-reflection and/or disrupts daily life. (See also: the white fragility article).

Philosophical questions always rankle (see how almost everyone with an ounce of education usually has deep thoughts on what post-modernism is and its value but have almost never read an actual book by someone who philosophy recognizes as being 'post-modern'), and philosophical questions about personal responsibility rankle the most.

Like loomer says, the only way to effectively do this is through long explanations, and that requires buy-in from the other side and that's hard to get. Even a modicum of effort is hard to get sometimes (see most recently: TRR refusing to read the rest of the thread but still insisting that he should be taken seriously), which leaves us in a difficult situation. There's a reason why most of this discussion takes place at the University level, and part of that is that there are semi-captive audiences who are forced to listen and reflect on ideas being presented. In my opinion that just makes the right answer to try and have the long conversation where you can and hope people will buy-in to it. But I'll be the first to admit that's an absurdly optimistic approach to this question.

[Straha]

I would like to suggest that when the misinterpretation does more harm then the phrase does good you should use other formulations. When you which to emphasize the goal of eliminating the native - settler - slave triad and building a united society I suggest a formulation like: decolonization is the process of integrating immigrants to native lands into the native cultures in which they are living or decolonization is the process of helping all residents of a the land to appreciate and participate in the local culture. I think it is obvious that these formulations have other problems, for example they understate the issues of justice involved but they might serve as a starting point when it is really important to avoid the ethnostate misunderstanding.

If you're interested in actually exploring this I would love to share some books to read that could help contextualize the ideas being addressed and the potential paths forward.

[MarxII]

Alright, fair enough. It's quite possible that I'm wrong, and that the number of academics and other professional writers in fields like Critical Race Theory who choose these terms in other than good faith is utterly insignificant.

How much Critical Race Theory have you read directly? I find that most of the people who develop that opinion are usually only exposed to CRT via third-parties who are often unwilling to treat the concepts and ideas brought up fairly.

Rather little, perhaps none, depending on what counts as direct theory. Most of my exposure to Critical Race Theory has indeed been third-party, but a sizable majority of those I've spoken with advocate many of the same general sentiments and principles as you, Loomer and others have in this thread. I've also seen a fair amount of unfair or dismissive treatments as well.

I see your point here, but I'm not entirely sure I follow your conclusion all the way. While it certainly makes for a more productive exchange if all parties have at least a clear understanding of the terms being used, I hesitate to agree that one must have X degree of familiarity with the academic discourse on the topic.

I don't think you need familiarity with the entirety of the academic discourse. I do think you need to have engaged the field in something more than a cursory way. (Say, for instance, reading at least two books on the subject?) I also think you need to be willing to engage the academic terms being used in an honest and self-reflective manner, and not accuse people who use those terms of 'vomiting' them up. I think that's a really really low bar to pass.

That latter point sounds fair to me. And just to be totally clear, that's not what I was getting at before. I don't think these terms are hacked out thoughtlessly or that they don't have value in grappling with the concepts in play. What I've come to suspect, and I'm really trying to put my own fallibility front and center here, is that for a variety of reasons some writers and thinkers in the field have been incentivezed to craft their terminology and theories in a needlessly inflammatory way.

The first point you make in this paragraph, I'm honestly not certain how low a bar it is, in the context we're discussing. On the one hand, finding and reading two, three, seven books is not a hugely onerous prospect for a good many people, I think it's fair to say. But I do think it's worth pointing out that these texts are (unless I'm mistaken here?) rather technical, not especially accessible, and not in themselves of particular interest to a sizable percentage of the people that I think we can all agree need to be convinced that the system is due for some degree of change. Now this isn't a fault of the writings themselves, but I do think it supports a point that the more these ideas are able to engage a certain critical mass of people, the closer we get towards some kind of rectification of wrongs that need it.

[Zwinmar]

Here is something for you: Gasoline Baths at border in the early 1900's, Zyclon B..yes, the one the Nazi's used, started out there.

[Elfdart]

Here is something for you: Gasoline Baths at border in the early 1900's, Zyclon B..yes, the one the Nazi's used, started out there.

As I brought up a month ago, Alexander Cockburn wrote about this back in 2007:

Zyklon B on the US Border

The use of Zyklon B on the US-Mexico border was a matter of interest to the firm of Degesch. In 1938 Dr. Gerhard Peters wrote an article in a German pest science journal, Anzeiger für Schädlingskunde, which called for its use in German Desinfektionskammern and featured photos of El Paso’s delousing chambers. Peters went on to become the managing director of Degesch, which supplied Zyklon B to the Nazi death camps. He was tried and convicted at Nuremberg. (In 1955, he was retried and found not guilty.)

In the United States, the eugenicists rolled on to their great triumph, the Immigration Restriction Act of 1924, much admired by Hitler, which would doom millions in Europe to their final rendezvous with Zyklon B twenty years later. By the late 1940s, the eugenicists were mostly discredited, but the Restriction Act, that monument to racism, bad science and do-gooders, stayed on the books unchanged for forty years.

In 1918 disease did leap across the El Paso border. Romo quotes a letter from Dr. John Tappan, who had disinfected thousands of Mexicans. “10,000 cases in El Paso and the Mexicans died like sheep. Whole families were exterminated.” This was “Spanish” flu, which originated in Haskell County, Kansas.

[Straha]

How much Critical Race Theory have you read directly? I find that most of the people who develop that opinion are usually only exposed to CRT via third-parties who are often unwilling to treat the concepts and ideas brought up fairly.

Rather little, perhaps none, depending on what counts as direct theory. Most of my exposure to Critical Race Theory has indeed been third-party, but a sizable majority of those I've spoken with advocate many of the same general sentiments and principles as you, Loomer and others have in this thread. I've also seen a fair amount of unfair or dismissive treatments as well.

It's worth reading. If only to have thoughts about something that effects a signficant portion of the developed world to this day.

I don't think you need familiarity with the entirety of the academic discourse. I do think you need to have engaged the field in something more than a cursory way. (Say, for instance, reading at least two books on the subject?) I also think you need to be willing to engage the academic terms being used in an honest and self-reflective manner, and not accuse people who use those terms of 'vomiting' them up. I think that's a really really low bar to pass.

That latter point sounds fair to me. And just to be totally clear, that's not what I was getting at before. I don't think these terms are hacked out thoughtlessly or that they don't have value in grappling with the concepts in play. What I've come to suspect, and I'm really trying to put my own fallibility front and center here, is that for a variety of reasons some writers and thinkers in the field have been incentivezed to craft their terminology and theories in a needlessly inflammatory way.

I've thought about this a bit more. I speak generally, but there are broadly three etymologies of new terms in most academic fields:

First, and most common, are terms that are designed to simplify concepts in a way that's easily understandable for people. 'Settler Move to Innocence'. 'Soft Power.' Etc. Etc. These are, by and large, not particularly loaded concepts or terms and really shouldn't be understood as such except by someone reading in absolute bad faith.

Second, terms that owe their phrasing to the intellectual history they cite. Intellectual thinkers all stand on the shoulders of their predecessors, so many terms will end up referencing the works of those who came before them or including their concepts inside the new term. Sometimes this will seem incredibly off-putting to people who don't understand the context.

An example: Frank Wilderson is one of the leading intellectuals of the Afro-Pessimist movement. At various times he talks about how Black isn't an identity but a position, how Civil Society invests White folk with a libidinal desire to engage in gratuitous violence against Blackness, and discusses the dismantling of Civil Society. I know someone who, when exposed to that phrasing, replied 'I don't get off on beating black people!' which, as far as I know, is true. But Wilderson is a Lacanian who is deeply informed by cultural critics like Lyotard. All of these phrases that he uses (not all of which are his own) show that intellectual heritage and are used as a way to signal to readers that this is building off of that work. So, in one sense, yes this is potentially inflammatory. In another, very real, sense to not use these terms either be an act of intellectual dishonesty or render very very clunky writing that is better avoided.

Third, terms that are designed to provoke. I honestly tried to think of people in the world of critical race theory who use terms like this, and I came up blank. They are, generally speaking, very careful with word choice and selecting meanings to craft a finely honed message. That said, certain philosophers and writers absolutely do use terms and phrases to incite people. Jean Baudrillard famously wrote a book called 'The Gulf War Did Not Take Place' in response to Desert Storm. People who only read the title were not happy about this. (My favorite Amazon review is of this book. One Star. "Yes it did.") But the book isn't an act of conspiracy theory but rather a discussion of epistemologies in a world of media over-exposure. It provokes, but it has a point to it.

Maybe a better way to ask this question is what terms of Critical Race Theory do you think might have been thought up simply to provoke in needlessly inflammatory ways?

The first point you make in this paragraph, I'm honestly not certain how low a bar it is, in the context we're discussing. On the one hand, finding and reading two, three, seven books is not a hugely onerous prospect for a good many people, I think it's fair to say. But I do think it's worth pointing out that these texts are (unless I'm mistaken here?) rather technical, not especially accessible, and not in themselves of particular interest to a sizable percentage of the people that I think we can all agree need to be convinced that the system is due for some degree of change. Now this isn't a fault of the writings themselves, but I do think it supports a point that the more these ideas are able to engage a certain critical mass of people, the closer we get towards some kind of rectification of wrongs that need it.

Plenty of texts aren't super technical, and Critical Race Theory is often the most easily accessible of the theoretical realms these days. There are also plenty of introductory paths that are super easy to go down. But, I think that's sort of a cul-de-sac of argumentation.

A simpler question is this: If you aren't engaged enough in a field why should your views be weighed equally against those who are? Nobody would take seriously someone trying to pull this shit with regards to something like immunizations, or aerodynamics, or the law. I don't think it's an outrageous claim to make that someone who hasn't even read a John Grisham novel should not be taken seriously if they start trying to bullshit how they think the equal protection clause and the 19th amendment of the U.S. Constitution interact.

Which then gets to this thread. If someone hasn't done that basic approach with regards to the history of racial ideology in the United States, for instance, then it takes a stunning act of hubris to walk into a thread, present nothing but bare assertions, and expect to be taken seriously. Yet they do. Some people brazenly declare that they won't even bother to read posts in the thread and still expect to be taken seriously (see: The Romulan Republic).

If you don't know what you're talking about and haven't read widely that's fine, there are ways to ask questions and contribute to a thread that can handle that. But to just assert that you, a complete novice in the field, are more intelligent than experts in the field is a stunning act of hubristic arrogance that denotes a fundamental lack of respect for people in the thread and the field as a whole. In context, I also think it speaks to the lack of respect for Native and Black suffering, but that pretty much goes without saying.

And I don't think there's any value with engaging with that line of thought without calling it out for what it is. Put simply, if they won't show respect for the ideas and people they're engaging why should they be given respect in return?

[MarxII]

I mean, you could google it easily enough, and I suggest that you might want to to form your own opinion rather than relying on second and third hand impressions since Vine Deloria Jr's book is easily available. The basic idea is this: Settler people - Deloria identified them as White here because it's mostly whites who do this particular one and it was before the 'Settler turn' that shifted the focus away from just White privilege to a more comprehensive settler-centric analysis - who claim Indigenous descent usually claim it as coming from a female ancestor. It serves two purposes - one, it deflects guilt as one of the moves to innocence, because if you're an Indian then you can't be guilty of genocide and dispossession, right? Two, it does so without admitting a male link, which would have other connotations of an 'unconquered' Indigenous world and tie in with the patrilineal approach, making the tie 'too much Indian' rather than 'just enough' - in other words, Male Indian Ancestor Bad, Female Indian Ancestor Good. So it's both a gendered and racial issue with a subtext in settler-colonial states that enables it to serve as both a move to innocence and a romanticization of the past that enables the myth of the 'declining Indian' and the idea that through a great-grandmother, a legitimate claim has been established, but not an actual Indigenous state of being with all its baggage. It's this dual operation that keeps it from being just an acknowledgement of descent, and translates it into one of the moves to innocence and something that got Deloria rolling his eyes and just patting the needy white guys on the back with an 'of course you are'.

Notably, we don't really have this to the same degree in Australia. Very few whitefellas will invent ties of Indigenous blood or acknowledge those that do exist (myself included in some contexts, though usually I happily acknowledge whatever ambiguous mixed descent I have as what it is in relevant contexts) so it's more of an American, Canadian, and to a lesser extent, New Zealand thing. It's also notable in that it's kind of a given that, after a long enough timespan of the family inhabiting the nation, almost everyone in a settler-colonial state will possess some degree of Indigenous descent, whether settler or otherwise, but it's still treated within the complex as being somehow exceptional, redemptive, and special.

Interesting. I'll keep the name in mind in case I find something on one of my bookstore runs.

[MarxII]

Rather little, perhaps none, depending on what counts as direct theory. Most of my exposure to Critical Race Theory has indeed been third-party, but a sizable majority of those I've spoken with advocate many of the same general sentiments and principles as you, Loomer and others have in this thread. I've also seen a fair amount of unfair or dismissive treatments as well.

It's worth reading. If only to have thoughts about something that effects a signficant portion of the developed world to this day.

Fair enough. Any particular names or titles I should keep an eye out for?

That latter point sounds fair to me. And just to be totally clear, that's not what I was getting at before. I don't think these terms are hacked out thoughtlessly or that they don't have value in grappling with the concepts in play. What I've come to suspect, and I'm really trying to put my own fallibility front and center here, is that for a variety of reasons some writers and thinkers in the field have been incentivezed to craft their terminology and theories in a needlessly inflammatory way.

I've thought about this a bit more. I speak generally, but there are broadly three etymologies of new terms in most academic fields:

First, and most common, are terms that are designed to simplify concepts in a way that's easily understandable for people. 'Settler Move to Innocence'. 'Soft Power.' Etc. Etc. These are, by and large, not particularly loaded concepts or terms and really shouldn't be understood as such except by someone reading in absolute bad faith.

I suspect someone could make an argument about Settler Move, and I've briefly discussed Soft Power with a friend of mine who insisted it was a loaded term meant to denigrate non-military forms of international influence. I don't bring these up from a desire to argue these points as such, but it does have me wondering how certain we can be in giving these terms clear, unambiguous, innocuous meaning.

Second, terms that owe their phrasing to the intellectual history they cite. Intellectual thinkers all stand on the shoulders of their predecessors, so many terms will end up referencing the works of those who came before them or including their concepts inside the new term. Sometimes this will seem incredibly off-putting to people who don't understand the context.

An example: Frank Wilderson is one of the leading intellectuals of the Afro-Pessimist movement. At various times he talks about how Black isn't an identity but a position, how Civil Society invests White folk with a libidinal desire to engage in gratuitous violence against Blackness, and discusses the dismantling of Civil Society. I know someone who, when exposed to that phrasing, replied 'I don't get off on beating black people!' which, as far as I know, is true. But Wilderson is a Lacanian who is deeply informed by cultural critics like Lyotard. All of these phrases that he uses (not all of which are his own) show that intellectual heritage and are used as a way to signal to readers that this is building off of that work. So, in one sense, yes this is potentially inflammatory. In another, very real, sense to not use these terms either be an act of intellectual dishonesty or render very very clunky writing that is better avoided.

Is it really that important to signify the intellectual heritage of a given school of thought by porting over the specifics of language? I follow what you've said in your example, even if the names have not the greatest significance to me, but I fail to connect where failure to hand down the terminology constitutes intellectual dishonesty, given that either the original usage or the present adoption seems to be quite a bit more than potentially, inadvertently, or even secondarily inflammatory. Ditto for clunky, since the meaning appears to take a back seat to the impressionistic point on offer.

Third, terms that are designed to provoke. I honestly tried to think of people in the world of critical race theory who use terms like this, and I came up blank. They are, generally speaking, very careful with word choice and selecting meanings to craft a finely honed message. That said, certain philosophers and writers absolutely do use terms and phrases to incite people. Jean Baudrillard famously wrote a book called 'The Gulf War Did Not Take Place' in response to Desert Storm. People who only read the title were not happy about this. (My favorite Amazon review is of this book. One Star. "Yes it did.") But the book isn't an act of conspiracy theory but rather a discussion of epistemologies in a world of media over-exposure. It provokes, but it has a point to it.

That's an interesting one, and I'm somewhat ashamed to admit I'd give that book a flip just to see where the fellow is going with the idea. So having got from you that, to the best of your knowledge, terms of this type are not used in critical race theory, this does sound like a decent example of what I'm talking about. I've got no reason not to believe that the title has a worthwhile point to go along with its provocative slant, but I can't see what that title would add to a given argument on the nature of the Gulf War, media coverage of it and others, society in relation to the other two, or anything else. Beyond grabbing eyes, controversy, ad space, departmental patronage or social capital, what does the title add? And, assuming the title represents an actual argument pursued in the text, how does that one-off review not constitute at least a defensible answer?

Maybe a better way to ask this question is what terms of Critical Race Theory do you think might have been thought up simply to provoke in needlessly inflammatory ways?

That's a fair question, but one that I'd have to do a bit of digging, if only through this thread, to give an answer worth the time. Just to pick the two candidates nearest to hand, the previous one by Frank Wilderson, regarding the libidinous desire to inflict violence might qualify for at least an initial look. Your statement implies it isn't meant literally, and I'm not sure I'd take it literally if I ran across it under other circumstances, but in spite of, or even because of, that initial compensation, I can't help thinking that to some extent the idea of provoking a response has gained precedent over making a well-crafted point.

Plenty of texts aren't super technical, and Critical Race Theory is often the most easily accessible of the theoretical realms these days. There are also plenty of introductory paths that are super easy to go down. But, I think that's sort of a cul-de-sac of argumentation.

A simpler question is this: If you aren't engaged enough in a field why should your views be weighed equally against those who are? Nobody would take seriously someone trying to pull this shit with regards to something like immunizations, or aerodynamics, or the law. I don't think it's an outrageous claim to make that someone who hasn't even read a John Grisham novel should not be taken seriously if they start trying to bullshit how they think the equal protection clause and the 19th amendment of the U.S. Constitution interact.

Well, to an extent I can't argue with the idea that. Failing to familiarize oneself with a given field before making arguments on the subject of that field is pretty counter-productive on the face of it. But in this case I see that point as applying more to Critical Race Theory as a field of study, rather than the social dynamics and causes about which it theorizes. So, if someone were to add into this thread the assertion that Critical Race Theory demands that white people hate themselves for their inheritance of privilege, and follow that by admitting they'd read none of the Theory at all, I'd accept you or someone else telling them they're full of it and think no more of the tangent.

What I'm less convinced of is the idea that familiarity with Critical Race Theory is necessary in order for someone to have an opinion worth hearing on the larger issues of:
Whether the United States is a fundamentally racist institution
Whether the only solution to this is its dissolution
Whether Donald Trump represents any meaningful break with US political tradition regarding race
Whether a declared war that (I think?) we can all agree took place in fact took place(?)
What price should be paid by what proportion of the US (or other) population to redress wrongs, whether we want to call them historical or extant
And we could go on, but you get the point.

Which then gets to this thread. If someone hasn't done that basic approach with regards to the history of racial ideology in the United States, for instance, then it takes a stunning act of hubris to walk into a thread, present nothing but bare assertions, and expect to be taken seriously. Yet they do. Some people brazenly declare that they won't even bother to read posts in the thread and still expect to be taken seriously (see: The Romulan Republic).

If you don't know what you're talking about and haven't read widely that's fine, there are ways to ask questions and contribute to a thread that can handle that. But to just assert that you, a complete novice in the field, are more intelligent than experts in the field is a stunning act of hubristic arrogance that denotes a fundamental lack of respect for people in the thread and the field as a whole. In context, I also think it speaks to the lack of respect for Native and Black suffering, but that pretty much goes without saying.

And I don't think there's any value with engaging with that line of thought without calling it out for what it is. Put simply, if they won't show respect for the ideas and people they're engaging why should they be given respect in return?

I mean, to be scrupulously fair I don't remember anyone claiming primacy of intelligence over this or that Theorist. But as I outlined above, I do think there's a difference between expecting others to defer to those Theorists about the Theory they have spent considerable time on, and expecting that same deference on the topic of societal interactions overall. I certainly think that Critical Race Theory has some interesting points to make on the subject, and if I haven't made it clear by this point I'm very interested in giving those I haven't read the fairest shake I can. I consider this good form across the board. I do also consider that unlike, say, the aerodynamic performance of this or that model of aircraft, there is a deal more room for lay opinion on the subject of the morality of a given state's existence, or the responsibility of an individual to act against their personal interest to redress wrongs which were at the very least initiated long before they were born.

[Broomstick]

I mean, you could google it easily enough, and I suggest that you might want to to form your own opinion rather than relying on second and third hand impressions since Vine Deloria Jr's book is easily available. The basic idea is this: Settler people - Deloria identified them as White here because it's mostly whites who do this particular one and it was before the 'Settler turn' that shifted the focus away from just White privilege to a more comprehensive settler-centric analysis - who claim Indigenous descent usually claim it as coming from a female ancestor. It serves two purposes - one, it deflects guilt as one of the moves to innocence, because if you're an Indian then you can't be guilty of genocide and dispossession, right?

Does he also touch on the fact that claiming Native ancestry was a way to cover for being more dark-skinned than the average white person? Many folks who were told they had Native ancestry are now finding that in fact they have African ancestry. For someone of partly African ancestry trying to pass as white saying "Oh, I got the dark skin from a Cherokee princess in the family tree" was socially more acceptable than saying "my parents were slaves sired by the white owner's son, that's why I'm relatively pale for my family".

Two, it does so without admitting a male link, which would have other connotations of an 'unconquered' Indigenous world and tie in with the patrilineal approach, making the tie 'too much Indian' rather than 'just enough' - in other words, Male Indian Ancestor Bad, Female Indian Ancestor Good.

It might also tie in with many tribes determining your clan based on who your mother was, among those tribes the Cherokee and their relatives who were a major point of contact in Early America. So people with Native mothers actually did have stronger claims to membership in a Native group than those with Native fathers and foreign mothers from the viewpoint of some tribes and that might have filtered over to the invaders.

Also, it would explain why said person claiming Native ancestry had a European surname rather than something Native sounding.

In other words, there might be more than one factor at work here, some of them (like blacks passing as whites) reflecting quite unsavory social realities.

[Broomstick]

So while I understand your motive, it simply isn't feasible to explain the processes and theory involved in short form without misunderstanding and miscommunication ensuing, as attempts to use the short form explanations are met with either confusion (see TRR) or outright rage (see Broomstick).

Well, then, you're screwed unless you can come up with a way of explaining yourself in a brief manner.

You come across as wanting to dismantle a nation, render stateless hundreds of millions of people, and rely upon the goodwill of the new possessors to prevent atrocities. It sounds like a revisiting of the "noble savage" stereotype. While right now promoters of "decolonization" seem like nice folks who wish no harm upon the descendants of invaders in actual fact Natives are human beings just like everyone else with the same range of saints and sinners. The situation was certainly not bliss and paradise before the European Invasion and I don't see how reverting ownership to the Natives is going to guarantee a utopia, either.

It sounds great in theory (such theory as you have been able to explain) but knowing humanity as I do I just don't think the reality is going to pretty.

[Broomstick]

The problem is that the stuff in this field is often internalized in what is read as deeply personal attacks. Looking at someone in the United States and saying "Hey, you're only on this land because of two inter-twined genocides and the massive, and illegal, takings of territory in a way that should never have been done." is going to rankle feathers, and toning it down misses the point of what's being discussed.

It's not like the "two inter-twined genocide and the massive, and illegal, takings of territory" are a secret. That's actually taught in US schools.

The problem is that the way decolonization is presented it sounds like rendering stateless hundreds of millions of people and hoping the new owners are kind enough to grant them citizenship in the new state entities. Given how many people in the US came here as refugees fleeing oppression elsewhere that's going to cause fear, not understanding. NO protections are offered for the newly dispossessed in your discussion. If one of the new (or if you prefer) restored Native nations decides to oust the invaders/their descendants what provisions are their for the resulting refugees who no longer have citizenship in any nation?

[loomer]

Sorry Broomstick, but I'm not going to bother spending the time and energy typing up another long response to you until you go back and address the ones already posted. I don't really have the inclination to waste my time on someone who vomits invectives and then disappears for ten days without a guarantee they're actually committed to the discussion, especially when they mindlessly regurgitate talking points already repeatedly addressed. Either way you'll be waiting a few days as I have a prior engagement commencing tomorrow.

[Straha]

Broomstick, I'm going to level with you.

You've engaged in a comical (and possibly deliberate) misreading of a post by Effie, and an act that falls somewhere on the spectrum between racist micro-aggression and full on racist with loomer. Until you correct the former and own and apologize for the latter I really don't see the value of engaging with you in this thread.

[Darth Yan]

Broomstick, I'm going to level with you.

You've engaged in a comical (and possibly deliberate) misreading of a post by Effie, and an act that falls somewhere on the spectrum between racist micro-aggression and full on racist with loomer. Until you correct the former and own and apologize for the latter I really don't see the value of engaging with you in this thread.

No she didn’t. Loomer’s assuming that if the US dissolved the new native nations are going to be perfectly ok with whites blacks Mexicans etc being there or that old tribal conflicts like those between Navajo and Hopi aren’t going to flare up again. He ignored that since native Americans are a small percentage compared to other poc or white people that the only way to ensure a fully “native character” of the new nations would be to create ethnostates (just like how the Israelis had to forcibly expel most Palestinians.) It was basically “because shut up” whenever he engaged with her points.


The bundajeeling comment was weird but it seems that you’re using it as an excuse to dodge her points.

So stop being a coward