Is "cancel culture" as bad or worse than the right-wing Christian movement?

    Modern social justice and cancel culture are secular reboots of the evangelical Christian crusading of decades past, with one big difference: Christianity is replete with forgiveness and redemption narratives, while the secular version has none. https://t.co/HU07xln9el

    — Antonio García Martínez (@antoniogm) September 25, 2019

    Comments

    Or is it more like the "100,000 Little Stalinists" as per David Mikics review of Robert Boyer's The Tyranny of Virtue: Identity, The Academy, and the Hunt for Political Heresies ?


    For all the tears shed over identity politics and political correctness, there is much more discussion of issues on the Left than there is on the Right. On the Left there is discussion of whether a particular candidate is racist or black enough. Harris has been challenged on race and her actions as states attorney. Buttigieg has been questioned on his actions on police abuse. Biden has had to defend his position on Clarence Thomas and the 1994 crime bill. These are important discussions. They are happening in the real world and they are happening on the Left. 

    College students of 2020 are pathetically tame compared to their grandparents. There is intersectionality. The Parkland students made sure that minorities got air time on the gun debate. Feminists are openly debating issues of race leading to changes at the top of the March for Women. I see a vibrant,, sometimes aggressive discussion occurring on the Left. I see "My way or the highway" coming from the Right. The high schools and colleges seem to be producing activists on the Left capable of dealing with current situations. 

    The Right does not allow debate. In the true scope of things, the Right represents the clear danger to discussion in the United States.

    I feel good about our future being in the hands of the Liberal snowflakes.

    I wonder what activities the author of the book participated in while in college.


    All I can think of saying is that the Hatfields and McCoys could never see how many similarities they had either.


    One side murdered Heather Heyer and is on FBI radar for high powered weapons used to kill innocent people. The other side is not.


    Really, one side murdered Heyer? The whole of the right not just the small number of white supremacists in Charlottesville? All republicans are white supremacists?


    All republicans are white supremacists?

    How many times have we had to ask this of him? He is just like the worst of the p.c. crowd and family values cultural warriors. He either knows not the damage that kind of  "us vs. them" partisan rhetoric and stereotyping does or he is a a poor learner and refuses to adjust his writing style to the reaction to it. (For crissakes, if it turns off nearly all of his like minded correspondents to his message, imagine the damage he could do canvassing for a candidate in real life.)

    I am convinced people like him, who practice this kind of rhetoric, very much helped Trump win. Trump has been taking advantage his whole life with how the p.c. warring affects an important group of swing type of people. There is no need to do this, lump everyone in as the same. One can attack the real bad guys without falling into the "us vs. them" divisiveness.

    And I should say at this point that there are actually smart people out there who know how to introduce politically correct memes out there with wisdom, grace, style and humor, to culture-changing effect. It's just that currently it seems the idiocracts have taken over and made it counterproductive. Again, just like the Falwell Family Values crowd.


    Hmmm. Does not compute:

    1) CRITICS: ‘RAMBO: LAST BLOOD’ IS RACIST CALL FOR TRUMP WALL

    The fifth installment of Sylvester Stallone's veteran saga gets slammed as pro-wall propaganda ... and much worse.

    @ Hollywoodintoto​.com, Sept. 19

    2) Jaylon Smith of the Dallas Cowboys:



    It seems to me the problem of men who identify as women who compete in women's sports is greatly exaggerated. There are so few of them that most women in sports will never compete against them. But it is a problem. What ever gender a person thinks they are those who have the XY chromosome are physiologically male and will dominate against most women in most sports. I don't think they should be allowed to compete in women's sports.


    While I thought of it as rare, seeing 2 dudes-turned-girls take a local track meet made it kinda obvius that someone will be gaming it out on the local level, then state, then nationals. The exception in 2019 becomes the rule.

    (kinda like the Hollywood stars paying for their kids to get into cherry schools with created fake activities - rare in this instance, but an indication of the bigger scandal that permeates the whole system, including supporting the awfully high costs of education in the US)


    The physiological differences between those with an XX and an XY chromosome is well documented. But I learned it from experience over and over again, much to  my surprise. I'm 5" 4' and when I graduated from high school I weighed 95 lbs. I've always thought of myself as small and weak. Every woman I dated or just did things with was taller and weighed more than I. The first time I realized men are stronger than women was on a canoe trip with a woman who was not just taller than me but was a huskier woman. Not over weight, just with a larger body frame and type. When you canoe you have to occasionally portage around obstacles. Carrying the canoe can be difficult but it's not overly onerous. Given our size difference I thought it would be easier for her than for me. But what was a little hard but relatively easy for me was a struggle for her. I was on the extreme fringe for size and strength for men and she was somewhat off center in the other direction for women yet what was at most a small difficulty for me was a very real struggle for her. Biology matters.


    Found @Glinner's feed interesting, prolly cuz I'm an old scuzzy cracker who ain't woke.


    I love your self-slur, it's adorable.


    "I love it when you talk self-dirty".  Self-debasement as a turn-on - class, please turn in 3-5 pages by Monday, make sure to include self-references and foot fetish notes.


    Well now, I've watched this whole thing: Black and Indigenous Millennials Are Canceling Latinidad. Here’s Why @ TheRoot.com, Sept. 26.

    And I've got to admit this particular cancellation is not at all like simple tribalism or simplistic wingers. Turns out that to achieve liberation politics and indigenating, it's real fucking complicated, it means being attuned to the ways one creates one's own hierarchies, it means unpacking them those hierarchies, and working against them as well. The end message to me, my takeaway: let's all tribalize further by skin color but first let's also get a DNA test to know who we are, check out out what our people did going back like 500 years, then you'll really know who your people are and you can hang only with them and they will make you feel welcome? Oh and homogenity is a lie, that came through loud and clear. Except: it's okay to just be "black" and reject all the other stuff.


    It seems to me that those interviewed were describing rejection by white Latinidads they experienced today. 

    Gates did a great documentary on this in "Black in Latin America".

    https://www.pbs.org/wnet/black-in-latin-america/

    Is there anything white Lainidads need to do?

     

     

     


    That video wasn't by Henry Louis Gates. I like Gates. Gates doesn't do cancel culture crap. He's interested in melting pot history. He's basically a uniter, not a divider.

    But this thread is about cancel culture getting out of hand and being tribal and/or sanctimonious and/or preachy and/or ridiculous to the point of counter productivity. Just like when right wingers do.

    So I am not going to get into Gates here.


     

    ...let's all tribalize further by skin color but first let's also get a DNA test to know who we are, check out out what our people did going back like 500 years, then you'll really know who your people are and you can hang only with them and they will make you feel welcome?

    I don’t think that would work for me, since going no further than my family of origin, there are those who are weird and unwelcoming.  Friends are those people whom you have chosen and who reciprocate.  Family members often are like friends as well.  The choice is based on shared values and circumstances; enjoying each other’s company and mutual trust.  

    Sometimes tribes are just supportive groups, and good ones are inclusive rather than exclusive, IMO.


    I'm a bit worried about that paternity test with my sister, and then there's other stuff I'm just not sayin' (without a good attorney - obviously not Rudy). In any case, do we know the gene yet for Radical Confederate? Can 23AndMe identify a Rebel Yell from birth? Is being a NASCAR fan a marker for more despicable behavior? (and can I just like Richard Petty, or does that call the whole thing off?)


    Oh crap, like clockwork, someone over on Twitter asks what happens to NASCAR with electric vehicles introduced - Apocalypse, obviously - no super loud exhausts and shifting gears,  full bore carburetors, smell of fumes... Even the pit bimbos won't even know when to bounce. It's over. Not with a bang, but with a whimper. We hardly knew thee...


    You are correct to point to the whole car fan culture as a interesting problem, much less stock car racing (famously popular in the lands of some of the most important swing voters). It is coming,  it's going to be an even bigger culture wars issue with Greta out there being turned into a potent symbol by both sides. It's also very much tied into urban vs. rural. And individualism vs. common good. And on this point, I can see suburban very much siding with rural! 


    These are easy  problems to solve. We'll still be able to see which car is faster. For those who miss the sounds loud speakers can play a sound track with roaring engines and gears grinding. That's what they do in movies. For the traditional smell of the race track burning tires can be strategically placed around the track.


    Peracles, I have it on good authority that most bimbo eruptions, or “bounces” as you so delicately put it, absolutely, definitely do end with a bang.


    Yes, but w/o the bounce per ounce, there's no bang for the bucks - literally "what/where the fuck?"
    This does not "end" well. And I'm skeptical about OceanKat's Quadrophonic surrund sound approach - all those theaters with moving seats & emitting smells & shit, including the special 3D glasses - how well did they catch on? We're simple folks - responding to simple stimuli, human sweat & sexual secretions over simulated mechanics.


    You don't have to worry about the smells & shit. The porta-pottys will be just the same


    just ran across this ad on my Twitter feed for the Polestar "performance electric car". It's definitely not the NASCAR demographic they are going after here, though, hah, with all the millennial aesthetes with Euro accents discussing design. But it's interesting because the marketing clearly expecting continuation of old fashioned love of a "sports car"


    it's a bit weird - the "Made in Chengdu" is a joy killer, it's quite a bit slower than a Tesla (4.7secs to 60 vs 3.2), less range than the Tesla extended version, and of course won't be in production until Q2 2020, almost 3 years after the Model 3 launched - which considering the amount of data & improvements Tesla gets around driver & car feedback it's a serious disadvantage. Perhaps some of the styling issues will make it compelling, and they're hoping they get some Volvo cred & European style marks, but the price doesn't seem to be any cheaper and it's hard to see what will make this succeed. [still a whole lot less than the Porsche Taycan]
    (Note: the Tesla SUVs should be going into production late Q3 2020, using much of the tech from Model 3's, so it's also hard to see why many won't wait the 2-3 months for a Tesla for those less into the sports features and more into the room)

    More on Polestar here:

    https://eu.detroitnews.com/story/business/autos/mobility/2019/09/30/pole...

    Also "made with VR":

    Automotive designers used virtual reality to create this electric performance car’s interior and the result is stunning. @PolestarCars #seeker #polestar #polestar2 #ad

    — Seeker (@Seeker) September 29, 2019

    https://twitter.com/Seeker/status/1178111579209912320


    C'Ville you are really getting up close and personal now with that meme.

    In my dotage I am really starting to regret spending so much time and loyalty and blood sweat and tears on people that I share DNA with just because I share their DNA with them. Who I don't really like. Who give me stress and anxiety when I share time  with them. And have neglected my friends who I do really like, to tend to those with my DNA. I chose my friends because we clicked. And we grew apart because I spent too much time helping family members that I actually dislike. ]

    It hit me so hard again just the other day: every minute I spend talking to my godmother/aunt on the phone is a fucking chore and distressing. I have to put on a mask, a character.  We have nothing in common and I get depressed after I get off. She doesn't even know the adult me, she knows nothing of my life and is still talking to me as if I was my 12-yr old self.

    You get so much of this, instinctively, I bet, because, as I recall you saying a couple of times, you are an adoptive mother. DNA has nothing to do with what makes for happy.


    It seems this is  a common experience. I don't tell my parents or my sisters most of the things happening in my life or most of the things I believe. I call my mother twice a month and it's excruciating to find things to talk about when most of my life is off limits. Of course it would be worse to reveal myself since that would start arguments and leave us with hurt feelings.


    Yeah, comes to mind, this Geico commercial famously exaggerated the syndrome.


    Why "exaggerated"? They nailed the mother (ok, poor choice of words), and just because *you're* not part of a Seal team stopping a thermonuclear device from going off in some major metropolitan area by hitching a ride on a helicopter doesn't mean it doesn't happen. What was your worst, in the middle of a SoHo opening? Interrupting a talk with Rudolf Stingel where he was going to turn over his entire collection to you? It happens. Don't be bitter.


    Yes, Arta, you do remember correctly.  I have three adopted children and am very close to them.  The boys will be 30 this November and my daughter will be 34, and although I would help them if they wanted to search for their birth parents it has never been an issue.  

    I agree that this may be part of the reason I feel as I do on this subject, but this feeling may also be part of the reason I went the adoption route rather than IVF, which was available at that time (though not as successful as it is now).  My mother had 8 siblings, and they all reproduced like rabbits so you can imagine how many cousins I had.  Family reunions were no different for me than going down the mid-way of the State Fair.  All kinds of kids; some too loud, some too rough, and most that I almost never even had a conversation with, made me not want to go to reunions as a kid.  I remember one of them only because I almost drowned in my Uncle Atwell’s pond.  My father saw me go under and saved me.

    But it was only when I got the best job I ever had (Student Health Center at GWU) and I realized how much more pleasant and supportive my co-workers were than many of my family members, that it started to gel.  Religion and the hypocrisy around it was the final straw in one case.  

    The other thing was that during a very stressful time in my life I made a conscious decision to avoid people who caused me stress.  It was win/win for them as well as me I’m sure.  I feel your pain about the godmother. I remember being very excited about a two-day conference I attended.  I was staying with my mother because it was in her town.  The guest speaker was Tom Robbins, and when I started to repeat an amazing vignette he shared I saw her eyes glaze over as she reached for her cigarettes.  I just stopped.  All she cared about was that I was there and she could tell her friends I was visiting.  After that I sent regular notes that she liked much more than calls anyway. I also visited, and we did have many nice visits, but almost never nice conversations.  

    Oh, well.


    Even Dem Girls Get the Blues. Just another roadside distraction.

    Yeah, I had 1 amazing breakthrough real conversation the last 5-day visit, & then it retrenched to minutia and irrelevancies. But the 1 talk was rather refreshing - vainly I hoped it might continue a bit after. We of course don't talk politics or anything even slightly controversial - my opinion isn't exactly welcome. Oddly enough, "Shark Tank" was the winning activity 3 nights in a row, which is fine - better than some of the dumber shows & allowed the kids some input. What PP does? she still has no clue.


    guy with a great head on his shoulders, not trying to shame anyone, just trying to assist everyone in communication by understanding words:


    He should be ashamed of not shaming people.


    an enemy of the woke people to be sure


    "The biggest trap of this whole identity politics lark has been getting lured into debating a proposition that’s unworthy of my address" | Lionel Shriver https://t.co/N9YeyBHDL0

    — UnHerd (@unherd) September 28, 2019

    The best weapon against people who take themselves too seriously is not to denounce but to make fun of them. ~ Shriver



    The designer quoted at the end of the article says that fashion is not diverse. If that is true, what is the proper response? If you point out a lack of diversity, those in positions of power will complain that they are being called racists. If you don't comment on a lack of diversity, you are complicit.


    On topic, Maher's opinion is no surprise, but a NYTimes "Editor's Pick" IS:

    Editors’ Picks:

    Bill Maher on the Perils of Political Correctness

    “Religions always talk about the one true religion. Now on the left we have the one true opinion.”

    Magazine 17m ago



    The K-12 Math Ethnic Studies Framework in Seattle Public schools: https://t.co/c3YdwqRfWX

    This is apparently not satire. pic.twitter.com/FDBLKrqiQC

    — Amir Sariaslan (@AmirSariaslan) September 30, 2019

    How is this so very far from how some right-wing-Christian curricula approach science and twist it to fit what is in the Bible?


    Actually it's quite different. Think of it say as media studies by Latin American students who look at US/Hollywood-originating programs and analyze the often subconscious assumptions & negative cultural messages that permeate themes & imagery. One class I had discussed the frequent Tom & Jerry scenario, where Tom is patient while Jerry runs around annoying him until Tom is finally "forced to" act. In Latin America, this parallels the patient paternalistic US calmly standing by as Latin America makes a mess, until finally "but reluctantly" the US has to send in troops or restructure the economy or some other drastic measure. Of course those on the receiving end of this "patient largesse" have a different view to American "patience" and how much the US restrained itself vs. stoking the flames in the background. A different lens was how US values in Sesame Street or other programs differ from cultural norms in say Colombia or Chile - small details, but it's a steady pressure to change to the "right way" from the US, vs. homegrown programs that might reflect better that culture's values.

    Garcia-Marques' "Erendira & her heartless Grandmother" looks like a shocking book about a young girl who's raised as a 24x7 maid for her grandmother, doing all the chores, cooking, whatever, til exhausted, and then by mistake she falls asleep with candles burning & burns the mansion down, so her grandmother takes her on the road to whore her out to pay back her "debt". For us a rather bizarre inexplicable behavior. But for Latinos, it's an allegory of how the US entraps Latin America & then controls its whole economy & freedoms of action to pay back its unrepayable debt - essentially an eternity of prostitution & servitude.

    So while at some point I think these students will have to learn the various standard mathematics forms, I find it fascinating addressing what are the assumptions behind the development of mathematics, how it addresses problems of the European world where it found greater development, how it might be looked at from another angle...

    There was a mathematician G. Spencer Brown who developed a pre-algebraic/pre-logic framework based simply on 1 allowed operation: to cross. So you have boundaries, and the only thing you can do is cross. To cross back is equivalent to not crossing at all. Using this form, he was able to derive a proof of basic AND/OR logic & other seeming primitives. Another mathematician decided to fuck with Euclid's postulate that parallel lines never intersect, and from that came up with a model & proof system for spherical geometry, where parallel lines intersect at poles,but not as latitudes. This is great for plane & boat navigation. But what are the insights into daily conditions in Uganda or Tajikistan or Borneo? while the world is developing new AI algorithms for self-driving cars, what are the math theorems & paradigms to assist with a well gone dry or poorer less-educated people trying to compete with globally encroaching Silicon Valley software firms? Knowledge is Power, which means it greatly has the potential for abuse. With offshore economies, an Indian mathematician is more likely to be training his insight onto problems of the Western world than the ills that plague his own backyard. Think of "Psychology" - it's of course much more developed in areas that reflect Western thinking, with some hat tip to these mystical Asian values, but those are "exotic" rather than default or a standard version of reality. Math & Engineering appear to be more pure, but still they're part of grasping the levers of production, the Marxist ideal - yet invariably managed by Capitalists for Capitalists, with occasionally a charity project by some foundation.

    So yeah, I actually think the course curriculum *might not* be such a bad idea, if it leads to both a better understanding of how math can be more relevant to these other traditionally left-behind cultures, and leads to developing both standard & new alternative math approaches that fit & assist these different environments.

    And note that nowhere in the curriculum do I see promoting of ahistorical junk, such as "God flooded the world & Noah put 2 (or 7?) of every creature on a boat (and they didn't eat each other but instead survived a year or so of just floating around, no diseases, no probs...)". Presumably they have *some* justifications where math hurt people of color in some scenario(s) [life surely isn't always level & fair]. So it's *some* kind of indoctrination, but then again so is much of our "do your math tables like this, these are the X most important topics for an 8-year-old to know" and so on - by the time a kid finds some breathing space to think she's been indoctrinated with years of specific techniques, vs. how to think about math in new more generalized ways before La Place & Euler & so many others nailed down the basic landscapes. [the teachers see the destination points they want to hit on this tour, but maybe a few students could skip the tourguide part & approch it as non-guided tourists]


    Ah but why do I not mind reading what you have written here, but looking at the link still makes me want to roll my eyes?

    If I were a parent, I really would be quite upset about the level of victimization language the kids are being pushed. Heck, I couldn't even stand this stuff back when I was a radical wannabe undergrad. A lot of the rhetoric there sounds to me like Pol Pot re-education camp speak. And sounds like pushing an ideology just like a religion. Some of those questions sound just like ones in Sunday school.


    Because a narrative's more persuasive & powerful than a litany of grievances?


    If the question is whether "cancel culture" is as bad as the Christian Right, the answer is that the Christian Right is worse.An Evangelical pastor warned of a civil war if Trump was removed by impeachment for abuse of Presidential power. Trump retweeted the threat.

    From the NYT

    As outlandish and extreme as it is, warning of a looming civil war is a familiar talking point across the pro-Trump media. It’s part of a growing tradition of right-wing fearmongering — what Vox’s Dylan Matthews referred to last year as “apocalypse punditry” — that moves easily from the online fever swamps to the Oval Office and back again. 

    So it wasn’t surprising — though it was deeply troubling — to see President Trump tweet a warning from a pastor on Sunday night of “a Civil War like fracture in this Nation” should he be removed from office. 

    Invoking civil war — even indirectly — was once a third rail of modern American presidential rhetoric. Though Mr. Trump in the past has openly toyed with illiberal notions (ignoring term limits, not accepting election results should he lose), his casual suggestion that his ouster might lead to bloodshed felt like uncharted territory.

    It doesn’t matter that we’re not on the brink of a civil war; the threat as outlined by right-wing media is intended to inspire fear in liberals and conservatives alike. For conservatives, it’s the notion that Democrats will stop at nothing to get rid of Mr. Trump and will marshal the forces of the “deep state” to right the wrongs of the 2016 election. For liberals, it is a warning: Don’t push churchgoing, gun-loving conservatives too far, or there’ll be dangerous consequences.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/30/opinion/trump-civil-war.html

     

    This is not a both sides do it argument. The Right is openly threatening violence. The Evangelicals are leading the charge.


    You introduce the op-ed you link to with this An Evangelical pastor warned of a civil war if Trump was removed by impeachment for abuse of Presidential power. Trump retweeted the threat.as if I don't know what he is talking about, that I don't know that happened, as if I am clueless about recent news. When actuality I am the one who first posted about that on this site and while you may not have noticed that, I am sure you saw me post on TMac's thread joking about a supposed civil war.

    Do you realize how insulting that is?

    This is what makes it sound as if you are preaching to someone you think is dumb and needs to be enlightened. If you left that sentence out, and put this If the question is whether "cancel culture" is as bad as the Christian Right, the answer is that the Christian Right is worse, it would be your opinion and that would be fine. I would disagree, but we might talk.

    If you were a newbie to the site and just plopped that here I might just ignore it as someone who doesn't participate here regularly and doesn't know member's knowledge levels.

    But that's not the case. So it's insulting.

    It's one thing if you did it on your own blog. But in reponse to me, it's a different thing. 

    But I want to carry what you do further and make it an example pertinent to the topic of the thread.

    This is actually what a lot of p.c. people do that ramp up culture wars rather than de-escalate them.And that it is exactly like an evangelical preacher. A lot of your own rhetoric style actually sounds just like evangelical preachers do.

    When people are angry to the point of threatening violence (which is not the case here) there's a traditional thing called the art of diplomacy that de-escalates the situation . War of words vs. communication and treating the other with respect, you should try practicing it here sometime and your p.c. friends should try it in meatspace. Otherwise, you are being just like them, following Trump troll style. And in the end, this is exactly what Warzel is saying in his op-ed, that people have to stop buying into that. He says Fear wins. We all lose. And all you ever seem to want to do is promote fear of "them".  You sound very afraid, often. There's fear in your words, you preach fear. They're just trolls. They are not going to be able to start a civil war, not if you quit buying in and sharing the battle rhetoric.


    My post was specifically about the question of whether cancel culture was as bad as the Right. I addressed that question. An Evangelical suggests violence. We have seen wingnuts use Trump's own words to justify violence.

    From ABC News

    "I think my rhetoric brings people together," he said last week, four days after a 21-year-old allegedly posted an anti-immigrant screedonline and then allegedly opened fire at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, killing 22 and injuring dozens of others.

    But a nationwide review conducted by ABC News has identified at least 36 criminal cases where Trump was invoked in direct connection with violent acts, threats of violence or allegations of assault.

    https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/blame-abc-news-finds-17-cases-invoking-t...

    I bet you think this song is about you, don't you?

     

     


    Also of note from the NYT 

    In a little-noticed strategy document published last month to guide law enforcement on emerging threats and in recent public appearances by Kevin K. McAleenan, the acting secretary of homeland security, the department is trying to project a new vigilance about violent white nationalism, beating back criticism that the agency has spent a decade playing down the issue.

    “I would like to take this opportunity to be direct and unambiguous in addressing a major issue of our time. In our modern age, the continuation of racially based violent extremism, particularly violent white supremacy, is an abhorrent affront to the nation,” Mr. McAleenan said during an address last month, describing white nationalism as one of the most dangerous threats to the United States.

    The department’s new stance contrasts that of President Trump, who has repeatedly dismissed white supremacy as an insignificant fringe movement. But beyond words and documents, many officials trying to combat the threat throughout the country remain skeptical that the full weight of federal law enforcement is finally being used to give bigoted domestic terrorism the attention it deserves.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/us/politics/white-supremacy-homeland-...


     

     

     


    The above are all Facebook ads placed by Russian trolls before the 2016 election to provoke tribal divisiveness. Facebook Russian Ads: 50 Fake Posts From the News Feed PERMANENT SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE  @ Newsweek.com, May 11, 2018. The irony: they are milder than a lot of the real thing lately!


    Both cancel culture and right wing evangelicals do this:


    So these posts (fake and real) are the same as the terrorist acts committed by the Right?


    Wow you're so insightful. That's exactly what Arta is saying. Posting on facebook is the same as mowing down Heather Heyer with a car and killing her. God how did you get so smart to see that? Most of us missed it completely. It's totally on topic and it's not a strawman at all.


    Trump is a racist. Trump tweets violence.


    I'm on point because the violence comes from the Right. That is the important message. 
    You confirm that with the Facebook posts versus the murder of Heather Heyer.
    Both sides eat food.


    You absolutely are on point to point out that Arta thinks the facebook posts she posted  (fake and real) are the same as the terrorist acts. You're the only one here who noticed that. It must be because you're so brilliant! It's such a perfect reply to Arta in that is exactly how she thinks. It's so clear from her posts. Finally you're addressing what people post because that's surely not a straw man. 


    The first post was about cancel culture being the same as Evangelical Christianity. An Evangelical leader just talked about civil war if Trump was impeached. The two sides are not the same.


    A white comedian has video showing him telling racist jokes about Asians.He loses a spot on SNL. Was that cancel culture?
    Teachers are being questioned about the use of the word nigger.

    Comedians' skits are challenged. We are doomed.

    How can you say that you are tolerant if you don't tolerate my intolerance?

    All I see is challenging the status quo.

    I don't see society collapsing from discussion.

    I do see violence from the Right.

     

     


    First example, no.

    Second example - can be, depending.

    Still, these are pretty dumb examples.

    Try "Elon Musk gave $40k to group that's against X", or "Female athlete disses trans women", or "2 professors resign over comments about Halloween costumes".

    You could try harder. But will you? This thread has been up for days - yet all you can offer is some lame examples that fit closest to your usual racial topics without having much to do with the new social media rapid-disapproval/shunning mechanism.


    You talk as if all republicans are complicit in the killing of Heyer. They're not. Most were horrified when Fields drove the car into the crowd and killed her. That's like blaming all democrats when James Hodgkinson deliberately targeted and shot republicans at a baseball park in 2017.


    Mahrer laments the fact that he can't perform at colleges, then at the end of his television show, he tells about all the comedy clubs where he appears. Comedians hone their acts in clubs, where they can tell their edgy jokes. Profanity is allowed. The only thing that has happened is that the market has shifted for comedians.

    The question was if cancel culture is the same as the Evangelical Right. I pointed out that an Evangelical pastor threatened a civil war if his people don't get their way. I think that equating cancel culture and the Evangelical Right is false equivalence.

    I gave examples of targets of cancel culture who remain intact. On the Right, if you disagree, you are kicked out. The true cancel culture is a feature of the Right. 

    The teacher who question why the documentary wasn't called "I am Not Your Nigger" was cleared and still has her job.


    1 crazed evangelist doesn't make the whole field, and i'm sure comedians have said crazier shit than "civil war". The 2 professors lost their jobs over Halloween. Cancel Culture is a technique, preachers are a group as are comedians - does the evangelical community use cancel culture? Sure. Same as liberals? Nope. Does Maher like being smug and pissing people off? Affirmative.


    Have you seen the forgiving Christianity mentioned in the first post coming from Evangelicals.

    Were the 2 professors fired because of blackface?

     


    I said that Christianity/Evangelicals are being affected by Cancel Culture, did I not?
    nonetheless, I'm not around, so aside from nonsense out of Jerry Falwell Jr & other prominent nuts,
    I don't know what the average evangelist is doing these days.

    The 2 professors were forced to resign roughly for thinking students could wear what they want for Halloween,
    without all the self-policing.


    Fire and brimstone has been around for ages. It was the inspiration for Southern Baptists supporting Jim Crow. The reason there are Southern Baptists is that Baptists split over slavery during the Civil War. Cancel Culture must be ancient.

    If you are talking about the Yale controversy, the male professor kept his tenured professorship and won Yale's highest faculty honor.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/14/nyregion/yale-professor-protests-christakis-honored-sterling.html

    Are you talking about another incident?

     


     

    “Cancel culture” is a phrase that’s been lobbed often this past year, as an impulse toward outrage is ever-amplified by the megaphone of social media. But what the hell does it even mean?

    At face value, the term refers to what is perceived as a reflexive, unfair ruthlessness. In a society that is increasingly concerned with being politically correct and “woke,” there is no tolerance of anyone whose words, attitudes, or behavior do not adhere to those mores. And as those ideas are most often ascribed to people who hold liberal values, it is often alleged that this applies to anyone who speaks or does anything that works against a utopian lefitst ideal. In other words, say something that upsets a “snowflake” and you’re fired. 

    In that version of “cancel culture,” we’re a lynch mob of Red Queens, hysterically policing social media for problematic people, screaming “off with their heads!” anytime we encounter an idea we don’t like. 

    But like many phrases and ideas in 2019, this one has been appropriated, bastardized, and misused to the point of not only betraying its original definition and its usefulness in checking the actual repercussions of reactionary censorship, but in fact has become almost meaningless. 

    Now, “cancel culture” isn’t a diagnosis of a concerning trend that has become prevalent in recent years: Celebrity says something eyebrow-raising, ensure that the celebrity never works again!  No, it’s morphed into an excuse used by those who wish to justify or endorse the very words and behaviors that are being flagged as offensive in the first place. 

    You see, consequences are not “cancel culture.” Just as entitlement is not a rationalization for offensive behavior. 

    It would take too long to list all the recent controversies involving celebrities who said something alarming enough to detonate social media outrage: Scarlett Johansson defends Woody Allen, Dave Chappelle mocks Michael Jackson’s accusers, Lara Spencer shames male dancers, a Queer Eye host rails against his critics, some Real Housewives are caught being casually transphobic. 

    Some of these celebrities apologized. Some didn’t. All were likely forced to consider the impact and the responsibility of their words, amid outcry and, in many cases, calls for them to lose their jobs. But none of them were fired. Shane Gillis, however, was. Is that a symptom of cancel culture? 

    https://www.thedailybeast.com/shane-gilliss-racist-jokes-and-snl-what-th...

    A different view of. cancel culture 


    No, Shane Gillis is not an example - he was a bad choice for a position who wasn't properly vetted. He didn't just step into a controversial area - he had age-old comedy acts based on surprisingly backwards cringeworthy nastiness. If they gave a comedy slot to someone who'd been doing jokes about lazy blacks liking watermelon, it would seriously be about equivalent. Yeah, maybe he can survive a small comedy club, but promioton to Saturday Night? Nope, wrong league.

    You trivialize the issue by going for Hollywood examples, as if Taylor's spat with Kylie is the same as somebody gives an un-PC opinion on immigration, healthcare, voter ID, free education, a particular protest, free trade, etc. and is then shamed into silence and takes a big hit in popularity. It's hyperretribution Mean Girls, and greatly discourages open thoughtful opinion.

    I was insulted and quickly blocked because I suggested mental state *might* have an effect on susceptibility for *some* kinds of diseases, giving links to a couple - I thought -relevant scientific literature surveys that were then derided as being useless and if I didn't know what I was talking about (I.e. a PhD or MD in immunology and cancer treatment?) I should just shut up. One of the ones who blocked me was someone I'd had a lengthy funny friendly round if jokes with the night before on a different more standard political area or just gonzo dada humor, so it surprised me that this area would be a tripwire for him, but it was. Multiply this by a swarm of dozens that can quickly take down a known figure, and people learn to shut up and do virtual air kisses.

    ETA - ugh, NYC just passed a sweeping law that includes huge fines for using the common term "illegal alien" with the annoying pithy "no human is illegal" from some campus somewhere. Should be unconstitutional (a judge struck down the understandable but flawed CA attempt to add taxes as requirement to run for Prez). https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_5d93d9a0e4b0e9e7605498ee


    We began with:

    Modern social justice and cancel culture are secular reboots of the evangelical Christian crusading of decades past, with one big difference: Christianity is replete with forgiveness and redemption narratives, while the secular version has none.

    This is bullshit. Evangelical Christianity is not about forgiveness. They openly speak of violence if others do not fall in line. 


    Wrong decade. Yes, Christianity has had a path to redemption, but is now afflicted with same cancel culture, which is the topic of this diary. But a judge who was recalled for a horrid sentence on a rape trial needs to resign from coaching volleyball? A comic who masturbated in front of women or maybe something less is not ready to work a comedy club 2-3 years later? In the old days you went into Betty Ford clinic, did your purge and came back out chastened a few months later. Now it's a totally undefined lengthy period of shame and exile. 5 years? 10?


    Sarah Silverman who appeared in blackface and was caught up in cancel culture

    During an episode of “The Bill Simmons Podcast” last week Silverman criticized the movement to essentially erase people for their past mistakes, even if the mistaken have since recognized their errors. The comedian also discussed some of her own regrettable moments — like performing in blackface in an episode of her show that was about race — for which she hopes the public can forgive her.

    “It’s really scary,” Silverman said of the cancel trend. “I call it ‘righteousness porn,’ where it’s like, if you’re not on board, if you say the wrong thing, if you had a tweet once. … Everyone is throwing the first stone. It’s so odd, and it’s a perversion.”

    But not everyone deserves a second chance, in Silverman’s opinion. After all, she’s had no problem jumping on the cancel train for controversial public figures like President Trump and Supreme Court Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh. For the comic, cancel culture operates on a “case-by-case” basis.

    https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/story/2019-08-12/sarah-silver...

    Dave Chappelle is surviving. The Governors of Virginia and Alabama are surviving. Trudeau May still win.

    If someone is dumb enough to appear in blackface this Halloween, well that is just thinning the herd.


    FFS, it wasn't just "blackface" for Halloween - it's worry about every goddamned type of "cultural appropriation" or "harmful portrayals". You can't even go as a guppy w/o offending some fish somewhere.

    "I was raped by a doctor, which for a Jewish girl is bittersweet" - Sarah Silverman
    (she also kinda defended CK for masturbating in front of women, just an ez going live-and-let-live kinda chick...)

     


    As noted above, the Yale professor just won the highest faculty honor.


    So *she* lost her teaching position, *he* lost his place as head of residence plus the school's so worried they gave him his award/"highest honor" in summer so no one would notice. Thanks for picking out the critical distinctions, rmrd.

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erika_Christakis


    If Liberal cancel culture was all powerful, why give the award? Wouldn't they both be fired?

    I don't see comedy not addressing issues. On television, Black-ish begat Grown-ish and Mixed-ish. They have addressed things like the use of the word nigger. There is also Fresh Off the Boat. Women have Daily Show style programs. I think these shows reach many more people and have more impact than the college gigs.

     


    They were both "fired" or forced to resign, just from different positions - though she made the comment, he just backed her, so she just lost her full tenured professor gig - no big deal, I s'pose...

    (we haven't gotten to the point where it's cool to turn in your parents or spouse for thought crime, but it's coming).


    How are the supposed snowflakes of today different from student protests of the 60s and 70s? The NAACP objected to shows like Amos N Andy. Even earlier than that there were protests of minstrel shows and acts like Al Jolson. Society isn't collapsing. 


    Wow, that's so coherent & consolidated.

    Did the NAACP protest or dictate how people dressed up on Halloween?
    Did they want to get people who enjoyed Amos 'n Andy or Al Jolson, or thought it was ok they existed, fired?


    Did they want to get people who enjoyed Amos 'n Andy or Al Jolson, or thought it was ok they existed, fired?

    Students wanted William Shockley gone

    https://www.nytimes.com/1974/04/16/archives/yale-protesters-silence-shockley-disrupt-physicists-debate-on-his.html

    The NAACP worked to get Amos N Andy off the air

    One of the landmark radio shows in American history was “Amos ’n’ Andy,” which began in 1928 and featured white actors portraying black characters. It was rife with black caricature. Black audiences, starved for entertainment, listened as well as whites. In June 1951, the show landed on television. The actors were now black, but the stereotypes were intact. The protests were swift, and the show lasted less than two years.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/07/arts/blackface-american-pop-culture.html

    There were protests against even showing a film featuring Al Jolson

    For Stan Maclin, the President of the Harriet Tubman Cultural Center in Harrisonburg, the photo of two people — one in black face and the other in Ku Klux Klan attire — was not surprising.

    "It's nothing new to me," he said on Wednesday. "This is something that goes on. It doesn't make it right."

    Maclin feels while the country has integrated 'professionally,' it remains segregated socially. In the 1980s, he led a protest in his Illinois hometown against the viewing of a film by Al Jolson — an actor known for wearing blackface.

    "It is a taboo, it is not acceptable and it is stereotyping," said Maclin

    https://www.whsv.com/content/news/Blackface-controversy-not-surprising-to-some-505471201.html

    I doubt that blacks had the power to truly punish people who wanted to see the performances, given the times.

     

     

     

     

     


    I didn't ask about getting Amos n Andy off the air - I asked about getting the people who liked them fired. You ain't too good with this reading bit, or else you have ADHD. Here's how it goes in real life -someone asks a question and you answer the question, not something tangentially related but largely irrelevant or obvious.


    I said that at the time, it was doubtful that blacks had the power to get people fired.


    Not whether they had the power - they would *want* to do that? Get someone fired for having a bit redneck or objectionable taste?

    I mean, here we have black guys giving hugs to people who slugged them or killed family members, but minstrels and statues bring out unforgiving anger? Something strikes me as weird.


    The hugs are not about the murderers, but about personal peace for the family members. That was the message from the mother of Botham Jean.

    Whites love the idea of docile blacks. A single statute by a black artist is viewed as the proper response to over 1700 Confederate statues. Roxane Gay expressed why she is all out of hugs. Sophia Nelson wrote about the one-side nature of black forgiveness.

    https://www.thedailybeast.com/amber-guyger-brandt-jean-and-the-one-sided-nature-of-black-forgiveness?ref=home

    The narrative of the Mother Emanuel massacre was forgiveness but that was not the full story. 

    From "Grace Will Lead Us Home".

    I mean, look at the forgiveness narrative, that's a key one. Everyone points to the notion that all of the families of the survivors forgave Dylann Roof two days after the shooting, at his bond hearing, and that is just not true. There were five family members who spoke at his bond hearing; three of them referenced forgiveness. They all spoke in Christian themes of love and mercy and forgiveness and grace, but they were [just] one group.

    If you talk to all of the survivors and a whole variety of family members, you'll see some family members didn't forgive him. And the people who died are all human beings who are different. They may share one thing in common, they may all be Christians, or in this case, they may all be black, but they are not all the same person. As journalists, we do them a disservice by painting them that way when in fact the story's a whole lot more interesting.

    https://psmag.com/ideas/jennifer-berry-hawes-remarkable-new-book-about-the-charleston-shooting

     

    Whites love the stories about the docile blacks.


    Regarding getting people fired. Don Imus got his sorry behind fired when he made an offensive joke about the Rutgers women's basketball team. Al Roker led the movement to can Imus. Blacks who worked around Imus could not stand Imus.

    https://people.com/celebrity/al-roker-says-imus-should-resign/

     

     


    Yeah, us honkies be funny & sentimental that way.

    It's pretty grand how you attribute characteristics to all whites, thinking probably that that's not a racist and stupid and reality-defying thing to do. But that's you being you.

    "The hugs are not about the murderers, but about personal peace for the family members." - interesting - like you can really separate the two? I understand the mother's feelings, but I also thought her son was pretty strong for taking that act, trying to reach across an incomprehensible divide & try to *create* that peace. I wouldn't dismiss it as just a selfish act to help him settle scores - I don't see how it actually works *unless* he also brings some understanding, some type of forgiveness to the killer as well. But I'm not in his head, so I'm just guessing.

    A bit of whities doin their mawkish Home on the Range schtick fer ya...

     


    I note some white male comics been using an dead white Jewish lady given to self-deprecatory shtick and equal opportunity ridicule (note 553 likes and 118 retweets)

    but then they've also been retweeting this ol' black lady:

    mad as hell not going to take it anymore


    They can say if you don't get it don't watch us, but they don't really mean it. If enough people stop watching they'd change their routine fast. If they're capable of doing that. The whole reason Gillis was fired was SNL was worried that enough people would stop watching and they'd lose money. If they thought the controversy would increase ratings they wouldn't fire him, they'd be hoping he'd call the new comic a slant eyed chink live on the air. 


    If you could justify Gillis as funny, he would have made it.

    But his Asian stuff just wasn't very funny, more just standard crap discrimination fare. Sure, Beavis & Butthead might laugh. Anyway, if he's so awesome, he'll bounce back.

    As for "Don't Watch Us", no, it's true - if they don't make you laugh or somehow enjoy yourself, walk away. If few enough people find the comedy cathartic or enjoyable, then the comedian(-ienne) will adapt or change careers. That process happens every time they walk up to the mic. Bomb once? It happens. Bomb 3-5x? Reconsider your line of work or go spend some time on your act/delivery/material.

     


    Hah, I think I saw them doing the blueface in 1988, like everyone says "it was the 80's"


    Still wondering what to do with my Mudman outfits. Oh wait, that was just smearing myself with mud & going around naked. Appropriation? The Earth screams. As does Papua New Guinea and Uluru.


    Food for deep thought on topic:


    I'm waiting for someone to figure out that new statues going up will undoubtedly honor some people about as flawed as those coming down. When that time comes, of course we'll discover tolerance for flawed human beings.


    Martin Luther King Jr has a statue.


    It was one of many ways in which Trump’s less-than-Christian behavior seemed, paradoxically, to make him a more appealing candidate to beleaguered, aggravated Christians. “I think conservatives for decades have felt bullied by the left, and the default response was to roll over and take it,” Jeffress said. But Trump enacted a practice of hitting back twice as hard whenever a critic takes him on — not exactly turning the other cheek, I pointed out. Jeffress chuckled. Trump’s “favorite verse in the Bible he says is ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for tooth,’ ” the very maxim Christ was rebutting when he taught believers to return offense with peace.

    from


    found retweeted by Australian costume historian Hillary Davidson wink:

    BROWN PEOPLE IN PERIOD COSTUMES WE BE COMING FOR ALL YOUR JOBS https://t.co/pWOYmIX9qc

    — big müde (@snaxolotl) October 3, 2019

    I am unashamed to admit that I find Discover trying to brand itself as the genderless loving credit card hilarious:

    I am amazed that comics can even think of material anymore when reality is the same as The Onion


    Note to fellow honky PP,

    Though you introducing the word pedantic in discussions recently was an aha moment, I still felt a need, it wasn't quite right.

    Yesterday I just thought of the word I've been searching for these last couple years. It's the secondary definition here:

    pa·ro·chi·al

    /pəˈrōkēəl/

    adjective

    adjective: parochial

    1. relating to a church parish.

      "the parochial church council"

      • having a limited or narrow outlook or scope.

        "this worldview seems incredibly naive and parochial"

        Similar:

        narrow-minded

        small-minded

        provincial

        insular

        narrow

        small-town

        inward-looking

        limited

        restricted

        localist

        conservative

        conventional

        short-sighted

        petty

        close-minded

        blinkered

        myopic

        introverted

        illiberal

        hidebound

        intolerant

        parish-pump

        jerkwater

        hick

        Opposite:

        cosmopolitan

        broad-minded

        liberal

    Origin

    Back to the topic of the thread and somewhat related. Struck me after seeing this comment by Abramson, one of the major problems we have is HYPERBOLE of the worst thing that has happened in human history. It's a competition and Drumpf is just one who plays it to the max

     

    Just a quick note to remind people that Trump has twice in the last 72 hours implied that what is happening to him now (facing even the *prospect* of responsibility, for the first time in 70+ years, for a *lifetime* of crimes) is the worst thing that has happened in human history

    — Seth Abramson (@SethAbramson) October 4, 2019

     


    Since it's PP, parochial *and* pedantic seems fitting.

    Good that Danny's been documenting that the plague doesn't look too bad in the hinterlands. Perhaps Hunger Games haven't hit his sector as hard as others.

    PS -it's a bit pedantic to give me the entire goddamn list of 27 or so synonyms, but I guess you wanted to make sure *got* it, and indeed I *got* it, will not confuse it with patriarchal nor Petrarchal, will indeed pay it forward...


    More pile on but not so pedantic


    Yes, I'm able to think in grits and corn pone, a skill I've been unable to pass onto my kids, sadly.

    Wanna hear me cracker? I duz it reel good. I can even cracker in multiple languages, jes so they knows what theys dealing with. And have put together a pedantic list of "You ain't from around here, is ya boy?" in those same languages.


    PC CULTURE: The Mob vs. Joker’s Director

    His unguarded remarks about the state of comedy inspired a huge wokelash.

    By Kyle Smith @ NationalReview.com,  October 4, 2019 2:21 PM​


    The Problem with Sensitivity Readers

    By Ryan Holiday @ Quillette.com, Oct. 1

    The idea of a sensitivity reader, the newest profession birthed in our politically correct times, instinctively does not sit well with writers. Because writing is not about protecting people’s feelings—it’s about provoking them. And nobody pursues a career in the arts because they like being told what they can and can’t say with their work.

    So I, like many writers, watched the influence of these “editors” grow with significant consternation. In theory, sensitivity readers simply review looking for anything that might offend the arbitrary sensitivities or transgress the invisible fault lines of the moment. In practice, I saw what looked like hordes of censors with the power to block the publication of Young Adult novels. I even watched as one professional sensitivity reader—a black, gay man—had his own novel sunk for not being sufficiently sensitive to diversity concerns.

    I shook my head and then, for some reason, I thought, “Well, I’d like to try that.”

    Earlier this year, between the final passes on my book Stillness is the Key, I told my publisher that I wanted to hire a sensitivity reader to review my writing [....]


    Be careful who you praise, because they might have flaws - and then you're tainted too.

    You've been warned.

    Oops...

    One sided mentions of historical situations, such as slavery, that do not tell the whole story (ie, I’ve read a lot of books that say the civil war was only about slaves, which isn’t fully true, things like that).

    So much for *that* sensitivity reader.

    Some time ago I read that Dostoevsky & Faulkner's worlds are universally accessible because they're so specific, Yoknawpatawpha(sp?) County & the Russian capital. Yet the "sensitivity" is saying to expand it all so all frames are represented - an impossibility, of course. Where you can narrow things down to a few variables, you can't take on near-infinite. Good luck with all that. Is this why people don't read so much anymore? Prolly not, but...


    Ellen pushes back - "Be kind... to everyone" (even George W Bush)

    https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ellen-degeneres-george-bush-sitting-dalla...


    thanks, I did see it on Twitter and watched her whole monologue on it. The problem, though, is her shtick works on already halfways decent people who are capable of learning one-on-one tolerance if they aren't practicing it already. But I'd seen more than one tweet previously screeching along the lines of "how can she sit next to a war criminal?!! She's a traitor now!" What do you do with people like that? The kind where Ellen's of the world can not only not have an affect but are treated as if they are totally complicit and have gone over to the dark side. Those that are worse than purity police, they are basically the same as Jacobins, they want blood, they want revenge, they want perpetual war.


    Well, I'm halfway. I mean, we can shame a guy more for patting a woman's ass or not using a new gender pronoun than we would for someone who lied us into a massively destructive war (including destructive of a sane foreign policy trajectory these last 16 years & the expansion of neocon eternal war doctrine) or introduced a whole new type of surveillance state (see 15 years of Emptywheel's work on FISA & related).

    But that's still on all of us - we elect the leaders we deserve to a large extent, and we in general don't hold them responsible for much of anything aside from speech mishaps.


    too many utilizing the simple-minded superhero comic book narrative:

    ....It’s an anxiety that has led reviewers to condemn the kind of moral ambiguity that was supposed to distinguish art from crass commerce in the first place. Legitimate movies are about complicated protagonists who combine good and bad qualities; superhero movies are about two guys, one good and one evil. By combining them into a single guy, won’t this movie cause dummies to think the Joker is good? To ask the question is to argue that nuance is dangerous. By fretting over Arthur Fleck’s sympathetic qualities, progressive-minded critics are demanding the same sort of bright line between good and evil that makes comic-book movies so boring....

    from 

    What’s the Panic Over ‘Joker’ Really About? by Dan Brooks @ NYTimes.com, Oct. 3 


     the preview provided social media with the one thing it will not tolerate: moral ambiguity.

    I haven't seem the movie so I can't comment on it. But this analysis has to be wrong. By far the most popular show for the last 7 years has been The Game of Thrones. Every one on it was a morally ambiguous character. People didn't just love the show they obsessed over every detail. Another very popular show was The Walking Dead, another extremely morally ambiguous show. What ever the issues are about this movie it doesn't seem likely that it's because people, or progressives, can't tolerate moral ambiguity.


    The current Nobel Prize in Literature "cancel culture" type disagreement is on a much higher level and more complex than the usual shit that is represented by most of the comments on this blog entry. Really gets at the disagreements in among "high art" intellectuals, as there is a push for new paradigms. It's where the libertarians about art become the free speech radicals and those formerly known as "liberals" and free speechers have become illiberal, they are now into judging a whole oeuvre and life as an artist rather than an individual work. I.E. should there be a breathtaking work of genius by a Nazi, it is still a Nazi work and must be cancelled.

    Olga Tokarczuk and Peter Handke Awarded Nobel Prizes in Literature

    The 2018 and 2019 laureates were named at the same time because last year’s prize was postponed over a scandal involving a husband of an academy member.

    By Alex Marshall and Alexandra Alter @ NYTimes.com, Oct. 10

    For more than a century, the Nobel Prize in Literature has often been a polarizing spectacle, with critics denouncing the winners as too obscure, too Eurocentric, too male, too experimental, or simply unworthy of literature’s highest honor.

    On Thursday, it waded into fresh controversy, awarding the prize to a right-leaning writer, Peter Handke, who delivered a eulogy at the funeral of Slobodan Milosevic, the former leader of Yugoslavia who was tried for war crimes.

    This year was supposed to be a reset for the Nobel Committee [....]

    [...] it was Mr. Handke’s prize that sparked a backlash, including a rare rebuke from another literary organization, PEN America.

    “We are dumbfounded by the selection of a writer who has used his public voice to undercut historical truth and offer public succor to perpetrators of genocide, like former Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic and Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic,” the novelist Jennifer Egan, PEN America’s president, said in a statement on behalf of the organization. “At a moment of rising nationalism, autocratic leadership, and widespread disinformation around the world, the literary community deserves better than this. We deeply regret the Nobel Committee on Literature’s choice.”

    When asked about the academy’s selection of Mr. Handke, Mats Malm, an academy member and its permanent secretary, said it was based on literary and aesthetic grounds, adding: “It is not in the Academy’s mandate to balance literary quality against political considerations.” [.....]

    edit to fix paste duplication in quote 


    Oh come on, part of the Nobel in Literature is its inspiration of words on mankind. Yeah, ok, Idi Amin's secretary wrote some fine verse, but uh, the negatives rather outweigh the positives. Shockley? a great scientist - we usually don't parse the mutterings or political affiliations of scientists - Liz Meitner sadly didn't get hers, but her German Nazi-funded co-workers did. Still, Literature & Peace Prizes have higher social expectations. Take Toni Morrison's. Or William Faulkner's acceptance speech, "not only will man endure, he will prevail". Undoubtedly part of Camus' consideration was his role in the French Resistance, not just his contributions to Existentialism. Orwell had he lived longer would have won not just because he told some nice tales, but because he exquisitely expressed the debilitating corrosion of totalitarianism & seductive group-think.

    That said, there's always been some contradictions in writers who fell in with fascism, vs writers who fell in with socialism & communism, even if the latter wiped out a lot more people than the former, but neither having stellar humanitarian credentials. Borges was denied a Nobel because of his support for dictators, and Tolstoy was denied for his social & political theories. Someone else was denied because he was too plain, not idealistic enough.

    https://eyeoflynx.wordpress.com/2014/03/05/great-authors-who-didnt-win-a...

    Should we reconsider Leni Riefenstahl's reputation? generally acknowledge as a great film maker, but also as a Nazi apologist, enabler, and ultimately huge liar, denying against facts her collaboration. Had she been a writer, I'd count her out of the running for a Nobel as well. Not ban her works, but not reward her fucked-up ideals & behavior.

     


    I learned that Rosalia is a nasty appropriator and instead of singing stealing various Latin American genres, she should be suffering for the sins of her Catalan ancestors, and repent by being ashamed and sticking to Flamenco. How dare she, really:

    Rosalía and the Blurry Borders of What it Means to Be a Latin Artist

    As the pop sensation pivots to reggaeton, not all fans are applauding.

    By Justin Areglo @ MotherJones.com, Oct. 11

    [....] Just a month earlier, Rosalía became the first Catalan artist in MTV’s Video Music Award history to win multiple awards, snatching trophies for Best Choreography and Best Latin video for her hit “Con Altura.” “I come from Barcelona,” Rosalía said while accepting the VMA for Best Latin video. “I’m so happy to be here…representing my culture.” 

    That acceptance speech earned Rosalía a strong side-eye from some viewers. As Afro-Dominican journalist Jennifer Mota put it: “What part of ‘Con Altura’ was Rosalía’s culture, exactly?”

    “Con Altura” is a reggaeton banger featuring Colombian superstar J Balvin and Spanish producer Pablo “El Guincho” Díaz-Reixa. The song showcases Rosalía’s beautiful, airy voice and distinct Spanish pronunciations over a classic Dembow beat—a rhythm that originated in Jamaica and then made its way throughout the African diaspora to places like Panama, New York City, Puerto Rico, and the Dominican Republic. Dembow is the foundation of reggaeton, a genre of music created in large part by Afro-Latinx people. 

    While Rosalía’s wildly popular song draws heavily from Afro-Caribbean music traditions, the artist herself has no Latin American heritage—a fact that has sparked cries of cultural appropriation from many Latinx fans. Since the artist’s catapult into the upper-crust of Latin music over the past year, a debate about race, class, privilege, and who gets to be considered Latinx has followed close behind [.....]

    Likewise, all those rockers of various non-Afro-American nationalities deserved to die at early ages having appropriated and transformed the blues?

    More and more this shit is so similar to religious zealotry, it's beyond ironic. Some of these people could just as well trade places with 16th-century missionaries. Over music, yet. It's supposed to be a joy that unites people and crosses tribes, soothes the savage breast. Even The Taliban know that, that's why they try to ban it.


    All I see going on is discussion 

    Here is true cancel culture

    A Latinx author’s college talk about the ills of white privilege got the predominantly white crowd so riled up, a group of them decided to use her book as kindling.

    Jennine Capó Crucet was invited to the campus of Georgia Southern University to discuss themes from her novel, Make Your Home Among Strangers, about the travails and experiences of a Cuban-American student during her first year at a predominantly white college

    https://www.theroot.com/white-college-kids-get-so-burned-up-by-a-latinx-author-1838987906

    Link to the original article

    http://www.thegeorgeanne.com/news/article_27bf3288-eb78-11e9-b386-47de5677b8c7.html

     


    That's tribalism based on skin color or ethnicity and cancel culture, all outrage all the time, zero sum game. Everybody canceling everyone else out. People of color don't like being judged for the color of their skin, why do you think white people would? Unless they're masochists who wallow in victimhood.


    I read today that Pompeo's actions were an example of white pipple - men of course - screwing everything up. Of course tgings would be better if run like China or Venezuela or Haiti or Saudi Arabia or Congo or Papua New Guinea - I'm afraid my privilege has created a mess.


    The problem really is that white pipple all look the same, you can't tell them apart.


    That's a feature, not a bug, right? I mean, melting pot is more than smoking ganja wanning to be Bob Marley, yo.


    Um, yeah turns out you're really fucked if it's hard to tell what skin color you are?

    https://www.quora.com/Are-Kurds-considered-white


    Oh and I see over there on Quora that in Turkey, they got a sort of Hispaniola thing going on, lovely:

    [....] Kurds are indeed darker than Turks.

    And it's not a matter of Who Gets The Most Tanned In The Summer! Light hair and eye color just happens to be higher in ethnic Turks.

    First off, "Turkish" IS an ethnicity.

    Ethnicity ≠ Race.

    An ethnic group is a bunch of people who identify with each other based on similarities such as shared ancestry, language, history, culture, religion, homeland and Turkish people fit this description perfectly. The diverse background of many Turks is not an obstacle to their unity.

    That being said, there are categories in Turkish:

    Esmer : black/dark brown hair and/or deeply olive skin

    Kumral : lighter brown hair

    Sarışın : blonde hair

    Kızıl : Redhead

    [....]

     This really begs the question: which hair color gets the best schools and which gets the highest food subsidies?


    They left out Hamburg, which tends to be a bit darker.


    And in the geographical area of uber identity politics bar none, it gets real complicated with the skin color thing

    https://www.quora.com/Are-Bosnians-considered-white

    "White" is whatever you want it to mean, I guess. Right now, it means "Trump & Pompeo"?

    Before it used to mean: Dick Cheney and George Bush?

    And: hello people who can't see and call him the first black president:  Bill Clinton was born with blue eyes and blond hair. Since white privilege obviously helped such a cracker get into Oxford and Yale law, begs the question: was it the white half or black half privilege that helped Barack Obama get into Harvard Law? And did Hillary really lose because she was a blue-eyed devil without the benefit of being a cracker?

    Hey that reminds me, I never figured out which color skin is the best to have in Hawaii!

    What about prejudice towards white-haired people running for president?

    And is Corey Booker an oreo or not?


    Furthermore: Aha! 'Splain yourself, Kamala

    Harris was born into the top Indian caste. Her mother was an upper class Brahmin from the Besant Nagar neighborhood of Chennai, Tamil Nadu, whose "Gopalan" bloodline can be traced over 1,000 years.

    Kamala Harris - Wikipedia

    Real "privilege" for 1,000 years. Imagine that. But Kamala was born in the U.S.A.


    Along those lines, comes to mind Cardi B's got some splainin' to do, she's been down in the D.R. rubbing her Dominican privilege into the faces of the Haitians currently suffering next door on Hispaniola.


    So you accept pity olympics when it's done by white people? Whites who don't complain are victims?


    I think the audience just told her to fuck off - didn't seem to be looking for any pity.


    How can I make it clear to those who wish to twist comments into strawmen? I think identity politics is counter-productive to whoever practices it. Especially when it's done by skin color only, that's when it makes the least sense and is bound to get major kick-back. Because frankly, that's "racist".


    If people see white privilege in operation, what are they supposed to do?


    This one definitely is very much like right-wing Christian jihad against "Hollywood".


    Not to mention the role of the bikini in objectifying women.
    And just like a man to sponge off the hard work of women as well.


    Just like how mom solves the problem: NOBODY gets to say the word now! NOBODY!:

     


    You'd make a good parent - or block warden.
    Meanwhile...

    every time we talk about how absurd tech-company gut-check "culture fit" hiring is, I trot out this talk a PayPal guy gave during Peter Thiel's computer class

    so many different threads of bullshit woven together pic.twitter.com/w6Q7VXlBXA

    — Alex P (@SaddestRobots) October 17, 2019

     


    Makes me wonder if they understood the meaning of the word "ghetto". Diversity/globalism, it's not rocket science, not even as hard as coding.


    He has his job back 

    Anderson's reinstatement came after Madison School Board President Gloria Reyes asked district officials to give the 11-year district veteran his job back.

    The school board had until then largely stayed quiet on the details of the incident, but board member Savion Castro on Saturday called the situation "incredibly frustrating."

    "While I can't comment on the specifics of Marlon Anderson's case because I would limit potential options to remedy in the future, I can say the situation is incredibly frustrating because a black man and black child were sharing an incredibly vulnerable moment together in one of our schools," said Castro, who is one of two board members who are black. "Historically, educational spaces have disciplined black and brown bodies out of those spaces for simply being who we are, including language."

    While Anderson has been away from his job, a colleague started a fundraiser to help Anderson and his family. As of Monday, the effort had raised more than $12,000 for the Anderson family. 
     

    https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2019/10/22/wisconsin-security-guard-fired-telling-student-not-use-slur-rehired/4061355002/


    I saw that, it's good and wise 

    I also saw that Cher tried to put her two cents in, I didn't think that wise.


    The Harvard student newspaper covered an anti-ICE rally & afterward contacted ICE for comment. Because of this normal act of journalism, the rally organizers have tallied 670 petitioners demanding an apology & change in editorial policy. Good grief. https://t.co/XnTbPPM1AD

    — Dan Zak (@MrDanZak) October 23, 2019

    Pumpkins pulled from stores for looking like blackface, but politicians who wear it some how not only survive but get reelected https://t.co/ihe7pnIg2h

    — Mike (@34_91_16) October 23, 2019

    Bed Bath & Beyond pulls black pumpkins from online shelves over blackface concerns

    By Mike Snider @ USA TODAY,  Updated 3:59 p.m. ET Oct. 23, 2019

    Retailer Bed Bath & Beyond has responded to concerns about blackface pumpkins Halloween decorations by pulling the product.

    Objections to the black artificial pumpkins, which could be personalized with names and faces, first arose in Nyack, New York, where a law firm had decorated its front steps with them.

    After some reaction from the neighboring community, the Feerick, Nugent, MacCartney law firm removed the pumpkins, which were painted black with white eyes and mouth, from the porch outside its office in South Nyack, according to News 12 Westchester

    “We understand that someone complained about them, and so once we got word of that we immediately took them down," one of the firm's partners, Mary Marzolla, told the 24-hour news station. She said the pumpkins had been personalized with the names of each of the firm's partners and weren't meant to be offensive.

    “We represent people of all colors and faiths, and we would never do anything to exclude anyone from any community,” she said.

    Bed Bath & Beyond told USA TODAY that the item, only available online, had been removed from the retailer's website. "This is a sensitive area and, though unintentional, we apologize for any offense caused. We immediately removed the item from sale," the company said a statement.

    That was an appropriate move, says Wilbur Aldridge, the Westchester (N.Y.) region director for the NAACP, who was contacted by the news station about the situation.

    "It wasn’t about the pumpkin itself, but what was done to the pumpkin. When you proceed to put the white eyes and the white mouth, now you have crossed the line because it then goes into having blackface."

    The law firm should also be commended for quickly removing the display when told it offended some, Aldridge says.

    "This is not a huge incident, however if you don’t respond small things have a way of becoming large things," he said. "So you need to respond and make it where people are aware of what they are doing." [....]

     


    I ordered a doll online the other day and didn't realize I'd clicked a brown one - "cancelled" before shipping, but if not, would that me woke, racist, or just a bit perv for riffing on my make believe Rosie Perez lovechild?
    Or maybe it was all just mistaken cultural misappropriation -
    #WhiteDudesJustWannaHaveFun (NY Dolls Version)

     


    A bit confused... woke? broke? a joke? or blowing smoke?


    The discussion today s about Trump appearing at a black college and resisting black students from attending the event

    https://www.thestate.com/news/politics-government/politics-columns-blogs/the-buzz/article236652858.html

    Kamala Harris was supposed to appear at the event, but withdrew after finding out Trump was a participant 

    https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/467550-kamala-harris-skipping-forum-to-protest-award-given-to-trump

    Nyack's blackface pumpkins are removed. Trump attempts to use a black college as a prop and Trump gets pushback. The republic survives. 

     

     


    Has nothing to do with the topic of the thread which is political correctness policing culture similar to how right-wing Christians try to police culture.


    p.s. I really do wonder what you are going to do when you don't have Trump to kick around anymore as your symbolic bogeyman.


    Token Trumpkin?


    There'll always be pumpkins.


    Trump is a mere symptom. His supporters are the problem and they will still be around. How can you not realize this fact?

    Edit to add:

    Here is a recent summary to remind you that being concerned about Trump is more rational than ignoring him

    https://progresspond.com/2019/10/25/were-making-progress/


    The comment is on point. The point is that so-called political correctness is not impeding addressing other issues. A local situation has been resolved. I haven't seen calls to form a national group to combat blackface pumpkins. The wingnuts made national issues out of the dangers of transgender bathrooms and the war on Christmas. This is not both sides do it.

    The student lockout at Benedict college just days after Trump's lynching comment is what is trending now. Artists are still free to decorate pumpkins.


    Everyone knows kids have a habit of spreading mud all over themselves, so that one shouldn't get too much guff. But those spiders with googly eyes, oh boy, if they don't look like minstrel show performers. And even if you don't see that in them, there's the ridicule and anthropomorphizing of species that needs to be treated with dignity and the arachnida themselves should have a say in this.


    P.S. I really like the guy in the first photo farthest right. He is a Boris Johnson Jack O' Lantern.


     


    yes I know that's the actual photo, it's in the first tweet I posted,comes from the News 12 story that started the coverage

    http://westchester.news12.com/story/41211141/be

    This is 20 miles north of where I live in the Bronx, everyone here thinks it silly. Allow me to 'splain the silly part since you might not get it.

    The point is: I see pictures in cloud formations that others might not see. The ancients saw pictures in star constellations and named them for characters.Another person might see something totally different.  As far as actual offense, though: the intent of the image is what matters. These are not KKK people putting burning crosses in their yard. They did not intend them to be black face, they did not even intend them to be offensive, they intended them to be Jack O Lanterns. The only offense should be to those who think of celebrating Halloween as the work of the devil.  Just because you see "black face" doesn't mean that's what they are.

    Okay, on to the "I find it offensive" thing. So something your neighbor put on his house is offensive to you because you see things in it that weren't intended. It would be pretty damn classy of the neighbor to take it down even though they didn't intend it to be what you see it as. One cannot expect everyone to be that classy, they might not take it kindly if they like the way it looks and you don't. I loathed nearly every single Christmas decoration I grew up seeing in the ethnic working class Milwaukee neighborhood that I grew up in, they all made me nearly want to vomit. But I wouldn't dream of telling them they need to class it up. You can't expect people to be that sensitive to other cultures in a democracy, you just can't, or it won't work. The intent of the user of imagery matters, not what the viewer sees. If you're seeing bogeymen everywhere, as if everyone is trying to hurt or harm you, when others don't and it's not intended that usually means you need psychological help.

    This is far from Jim Crow putting up statues of confederate leaders. There is no intent like that here. That's why reasonable people find it silly. And that it was awful nice of the law firm to take them down just because some saw things that weren't there. But that level of niceness shouldn't be expected or demanded because: we can't all walk on tippytoes about other people's cultural demons.


    One of the best parts of a democracy is being able to openly state that you find something offensive.

    Not only did the decorations come down from the law office, but the company that created the objects took them off their website, The law firm and the company thought that the decorations could damage their image. They tippy toed.

    You don't find Confederate statues offensive, others are free to express their objection to the statues, Those who find the statues intolerable can work to bring them down. They do not have to stay silent.

    Welcome to free speech. The republic survives.


    The Gucci balaclava jumper, which has been withdrawn from sale.
    Gucci stop selling this jumper

    https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2019/feb/07/gucci-withdraws-jumper-blackface-balaclava

     

     

    Katy Perry pulled blackface shoes

    https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/feb/12/katy-perry-shoes-removed-from-stores-over-blackface-design

    Bomani Jones was criticized when he wore a Caucasians T-shirt. His point was that people tolerated the Cleveland Indians Chief Wahoo logo, but did not like the parody T-shirt. 
     

    The company that provided the server for the manufacturer of the T-shirt, stopped allowing access to the servers. 

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexreimer/2016/04/09/the-story-behind-bomani-jones-caucasian-shirt/#7466677c4e26
     

    Bed Bath and Beyond and Katy Perry still selling stuff. There was an attempt to kill the enterprise of the guy who made the T-shirt. 

     

     

     


    If your experience with art has been seeing dark skinned caricatures mocking you, you might not see a black pumpkin with big white teeth and big white eyes as something benign. You might complain, Others might call your complaints silly and dismiss them. These same people may tell you that your complaints about Confederate status are silly. Best option? Complain about the pumpkins. The pumpkins may come down. 


    Seriously, "Best option"?
    So non-blacks are hesitant to put out anything visually related to blacks, anything that might be remotely controversial? I just had a friend post "Today is Super N**** Day". While I'm careful how I follow up, I'm sure he didn't post it just waiting for people to make un-PC comments so he could shame them - he knows he's being un-PC himself, but reveling in his blackness. It all feels nice, warm, welcoming, invigorating. Not this cramped style we have on Dagblog over and over.
    How about a "Better option" of just make fun of the pumpkins, express *cleverly* why they feel old school or stereotyped (in the pumpkin world), or ...? Somehow I think Chris Rock & Eddie Murphy & Richard Pryor & Red Foxx & Dick Gregory did a whole lot more for getting black acceptance across than screaming and shaming people all the time. All the "white men can't jump" and "white men can't dance/move" is racist at heart, but most of the time it's a) partially true (as most stereotypes), and b) usually a bit funny (even though 50-60 years on it's a bit worn out). White folks like many others learn through humor. Heinlein commented "we laugh because it hurts", which is partially saying we use laughter to more deeply examine harsh truths. If I'm acting like a cracker, I'm more likely to take the lesson through some well-crafted put down - funny or simply clever - than some tightass homily & prescription.


    Why just make fun of something that is offensive? In a democracy, you can voice your opinion. Both the law office and Bed Bath and Beyond received complaints. The pumpkins were removed. I don't live in the area. I didn't make complaint about the pumpkins. You should address the black and white people who complained. Apparently, they weren't laughing. I'm sure non-black artists can find something other than blackface to use in their art.

    Edit to add:

    I wasn't involved with the Gucci mask or the Katy Perry shoes, so outside of dagblog people have a different opinion than PP.


    In a democracy you can do all the stupid counterproductive things you want. I'm not arguing against your right to screw up and do counterproductive things. Have at it - you obviously don't give a shit about my advice or viewpoint.


    It should be obvious that I don't give a shit about your opinion. Plenty of other people don't give a shit about your opinion either.

    People are working to remove Confederate statues.

    There are moves to get people to stop calling police for blacks simply existing in their space

    Michigan 

    https://newsone.com/3825240/calling-police-black-people-bill/

    Oregon

    https://www.vox.com/identities/2019/6/5/18654140/oregon-911-call-legislation-racism-living-while-black

    Bills are being crafted to end policing black hair

    California

    https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-pol-ca-natural-hair-discrimination-bill-20190703-story.html

    New York

    https://www.allure.com/story/new-york-natural-hair-discrimination-law

    Your advice is being ignored all over the place.

    Steppin Fetchit, Redd Foxx, Richard Pryor, etc. didn't solve the problem.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     


    Well, in case you didn't notice, they're still beating blacks in the street and keeping them from voting (and even writing apps to treat whites first, it seems) but if taking down a statue and keeping a fancy doo is consolation enough for you, rock on.


    Sigh

    There are ongoing fights against police abuse and bias in the judicial system. Organizations like Color of Change and BlackLivesMatter have worked to elect Progressive district attorneys.

    Your personal attacks seem desperate.


    I don't see any personal attacks. I see someone frustrated with illogic and inability to separate real reason for grievance from imagined nonsense.


    Just saw a waiter on the street with face chalked half black - don't know how to tell him American culture is coming for him.


    yup, soon coming for Sock and Buskin, these 2,000-yr. old memes gotta go:

     

     

     


    Saw a guy on the street doing all sorts of weird stuff in white face. They call themselves "mimes" but clearly they're white supremacists.


    The complaints came from Nyack, you should talk to them.


    Burnt orange black - damn pumpkins.

    https://youtu.be/5DIOhEi2xnc


    Again opinions differ


    It's a band - of course opinions differ. Even the bass player quit.

    I hear the Kurds "changed their opinion"


    Best option is learning to see in different ways and not presuming everything is always about you.

    Native Americans have never seen pernicious parody in orange Jack O'Lanterns.


    Native Americans have taken offense to the Redskins and Indians sports teams.

    Chief Wahoo?


    but not Jack O' Lanterns. I refuse your attempt to straw man this pumpkin thing. Going back to the title of this thread, It is the same thing as when evangelicals push their agendas too far to the point of ridiculous. You can't see that when there is overkill, that is counter-productive, and normal people begin to ridicule, and it is material for SNL skits, I can't help you. Overkill past the point of common sense is the problem. You don't win over a majority with overkill, you marginalize yourself.


    Normal people took down the pumpkins and normal people stopped selling them. You can take it up with the Nyack law firm and Bed Bath and Beyond. I haven't seen stories about a big pushback.

    The trigger was blackface. You don't have a problem with blackface, so you don't have a problem with the pumpkins. I'm waiting for Thursday when the next nitwit does blackface.

     


    Sure but that doesn't mean that in the privacy of their own mind they weren't saying, "This stupid shit is too petty to  fight over. I'll just take the pumpkins down." No matter what they might say in public. And what happens next time when there's a complaint that's real? It's the boy who cried wolf.

     

    eta: Oh no, I was talking about black people and their complaints. And then I used the word "boy." I'm sincerely sorry if I've offended anyone.

    Now what do you think I was thinking in the privacy of my own mind when I typed that?


    The pumpkins came down

    l don't give a damn what you were thinking.

    Talk to Nyack.


    Another case of mass whiteface - how much more of this can we take?

    https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2019/oct/27/beauty-and-the-beam-the-...


    The Neutrogena mask in the photo was recalled by the manufacturer.

    The recall was due to concerns of eye damage.

    There were no race-based protests.

    •  
    •  
    •  
    • Neutrogena recalls acne mask over concerns about blue light

    Liast month, Neutrogena voluntarily recalled its popular Light Therapy Acne Mask, citing customer complaints of eye problems and “an abundance of caution,” according to the company. The mask targets acne-causing bacteria by irradiating skin with blue light, which sits on the more energetic end of the visible spectrum. Blue light can increasingly be found lighting up organic chemistry labsas a way to drive radical reactions. The ocular safety concerns that led to the Neutrogena recall are also inspiring chemists to find ways to protect themselves when using this popular color of light.

    According to Neutrogena, adverse reactions reported by mask users included “transient eye pain or irritation, tearing, blurry vision, seeing spots, or changes in color vision” that resolved once people stopped using the mask. These reports were rare, with the company receiving complaints on about 0.02% of masks sold at the time of the recall. In a statement to C&EN, Neutrogena added that mask users with underlying eye conditions or people who are taking medications that make skin more sensitive to light, such as antibiotics like doxycycline, could theoretically be at risk for eye injuries 

    https://cen.acs.org/safety/lab-safety/Neutrogena-recalls-acne-mask-over-concerns-about-blue-light/97/web/2019/08

     

     


    Clever of us, eh? Cuz if we'd protested, it's be "white supremacist this" or "white privilege that". Instead we chose a colour no one'd stuck up for  - blue - to demand a recall (just 3 percussionists in Vegas and some Smurfs and some made up Avatar tribe).


    No one protested the masks, that was an image you created.

    White supremacy and white privilege are realities.


    Yawn.


    No one protested. Strawman argument. 


    I didn't take it as an argument, I took it as humor along the lines of parody.


    Really? I've been exposed. And there I thought I covered my tracks so well...


    If you have to explain the joke it wasn't funny.


    Or the audience has no humor.  And then with kids and seniors you may have to dumb it down or draw a picture. Certainly more than 1 way to skin a cat.


    People have become too sensitive about comedy, but when I say "people," I don't mean the audiences, I mean the comedians.

    https://www.elle.com/culture/movies-tv/news/a30762/audiences-havent-become-too-sensitive-but-comedians-have/ 


    FWIW, lots of lefty intellectuals working on cancelling any Turkish-state-sponsored cultural institutions:

    Nearly 300 cultural figures—including Noam Chomsky, Brian Eno, and Michael Taussig—have come together to sign a petition against Turkish state-sponsored academic and cultural institutions. https://t.co/pWOFUWAc60 pic.twitter.com/QMwxyhwTYn

    — artnet (@artnet) October 25, 2019

    Two points:

    I lean to the side that this is teh stoopid, you end up hurting people who work in those institutions and many of those might be sympathetic and could be made allies. Though I might be convinced otherwise.

    I am surprised there is such lefty support for the (until recently) Kurdish allies of the hegemon America. You know, the ones who have attacked ISIS and such as if passionate radical Islamists were a danger to Western civilization. When did this happen? I thought anyone who hung with the U.S.A. and were anti-Assad and anti-Erdogan were evil and made up propaganda about their enemies....I'm not complaining on that: welcome back, Chomskyites!


    China cont lrolling culture

    Guess we're melding ways.

    https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/china-movie-censorship-communist-p...


    wow, that's an awful sophisticated article, including reading comprehension level, for the CNN audience. Guess you can do that if you're the writer, you're trying to sell your book, and you're also a senior producer. It's really great stuff.


    They have 5 articles up on China at CNN, so someoneone's kid got research focus day?


    Meghan Daum’s merciless take on modern feminism, woke-ness and cancel culture

    Book review by Rosa Brooks @ WashingtonPost.com, Oct. 24

    It takes a certain amount of chutzpah to write a book called “The Problem With Everything,” but chutzpah is something essayist and cultural critic Meghan Daum has always possessed in spades.

    In “The Problem With Everything: My Journey Through the New Culture Wars,” Daum offers a merciless take on modern feminism, woke-ness and cancel culture. If these topics are not precisely “everything,” it’s probably fair to say that they have been, in recent years, uniquely beguiling to media elites — and, Daum argues, the recent ascendancy of Donald Trump has induced a kind of reactionary psychosis within the political left. “By framing Trumpism as a moral emergency that required an all-hands-on-deck, no-deviation-from-the-narrative approach to political and cultural thought,” she writes, “the left has cleared the way for a kind of purity policing.”

    Part memoir and part jeremiad, “The Problem with Everything” is replete with examples of what Daum views as intolerant, self-righteous woke-ness: She highlights the young-adult fiction authors forced to withdraw their books “when social media mobs attacked them” for purported “racial insensitivity” or cultural appropriation, for instance, and the “self-congratulatory reverence” displayed by white liberal admirers of Ta-Nehisi Coates, the “unofficial paterfamilias of the wokescenti.” Commenting on the controversies surrounding Brett M. Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court, Daum writes that although she found Christine Blasey Ford’s allegations of sexual assault “moving, compelling and entirely credible,” she was “less moved by the sloganeering that rose up around them.” The “Believe Survivors” trope, she argues, draws no distinction between violent rape and lesser forms of male creepiness (groping, leering), and sacrifices due process for the accused to outraged assertions of male sinfulness [....]


    words fail me surprise

    Decolonising Design

    @DecolDesign

    A platform for all the voices from the fringes, the voices of the marginal and the suppressed in design discourse.

    The Margins

    decolonisingdesign.com


    The site's quite dead since 18 months (unsurprisingly? Ran out of marginalized people?)


    It seems that then only thing been done is looking at how different cultures view art.

    https://eyeondesign.aiga.org/what-does-it-mean-to-decolonize-design/

    How is this a big threat?  Black artists have been marginalized historically, a fact mention in a recent NYT article featuring three black female artists.

    Historically speaking, work by black American artists has long been overlooked or excluded from major American museums and galleries. But recently, that position has started to shift, as institutions reconsider their longstanding biases. A wave of black scholars and academics are being appointed to curatorial roles, shaping (and reshaping) exhibitions and landmark solo shows and revising collections to honor the contributions of black artists. The heightened visibility has also led to a commercial frenzy, including record auction prices. Last year, for example, Sean Combs, the music producer, bought the painting “Past Times,”by Kerry James Marshall, for $21.1 million, which was the highest price ever paid for an artwork by a living African-American artist.

    On a warm September afternoon, three accomplished artists met at the bar Ode to Babel in Brooklyn. With incense burning in the background, the women gathered on soft leather couches with tea and snacks to discuss their observations and reflections on this moment in time.

    https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/10/08/magazine/black-women-artists-conversation.html

    I don't understand your dismissive attitude. It seems that many institutions realize that they marginalized ethnic minority artists.

     

     

     

     

     

     


    You don't understand period. Design is not the same as fine art and what you posted has nothing to do with it. A clue: visualize this: a bunch of indigenous peoples educated lefty brats pretending to speak for indigenous peoples of the world advising Michele Obama what to do with her new estate on Martha's Vineyard. These people are ten times worse than NCD's example of American lefties sending heirloom seed bank to Venezuela. I laughed at the lack of images on their site and the twitter feed. They don't have any because they haven't a clue what de-colonialized decorating will look like. All they know how to do is spew is agitprop and invective with little practical meaning. What is basically going on is that they ventured into the wrong major in college and don't like the field, they should have majored in anthropology or poli-sci, as Design is their enemy.


    Let me try this again. A small group of artists wants to decolonize design. They have a website that has not been updated for months. They apparently contributed to a journal in 2018 that requires $35 to access without an institutional subscription. They have a small number of other articles. Why are they a problem? Is the world of design under siege?


    They are not a "problem," they are ridiculous. Just like extreme right wing Christian agitprop. We give them D- grades when they try to hand in papers using their lingo. And when we are not in academia, we laugh at them. Because they sound like a parody of political correctness, so ridiculous that the whole site might actually be a parody.

    Let me try this again: go back and read the whole thread.

    I am not threatened by any of these people. I am ridiculing them. 


    Hot tip: It would really be productive for you to understand when this stuff sounds ridiculous to people educated in history and culture. You're going to want them on your side, and not rolling their eyes or laughing. Just sayin'.


    It could be that the history teachers are relying on inaccurate data. The Lost Cause interpretation of events causing the Civil War was wrong, but it was the accepted history until recently. The idea that black Confederates were fiction would have been considered laughable.

    An interesting perspective from a Canadian professor of design explaining decolonization of design to design students at the University of Minnesota by taking a new look at how including people of other cultures was important 

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEUyGrgqaAM



    Obama also called out what he perceived as a “danger” among younger people.

    “There is this sense sometimes of ‘the way of me making change is to be as judgmental as possible about other people, and that’s enough,’” he said, then offered an example: 

    Like if I tweet or hashtag about how you didn’t do something right or used the wrong verb. Then, I can sit back and feel pretty good about myself because, ‘Man, you see how woke I was? I called you out.’ I’m gonna get on TV. Watch my show. Watch ‘Grown-ish.’ You know, that’s not activism. That’s not bringing about change. If all you’re doing is casting stones, you’re probably not going to get that far.

    https://www.huffpost.com/entry/barack-obama-twitter-activism_n_5db9292ee4b0bb1ea3716bb7

    There are young people not only criticizing their elders via social media, but taking public action.

    Parkland kids on gun control

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/parkland-students-unveil-sweeping-gun-control-proposal-and-hope-for-a-youth-voting-surge-in-2020/2019/08/20/145f4574-c36f-11e9-9986-1fb3e4397be4_story.html

    Greta Thunberg and others on the environment

    https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/28/world/youth-environment-activists-greta-thunberg-trnd/index.html

    Color of Change on electing prosecutors 

    https://www.fastcompany.com/90211561/how-color-of-change-is-moving-from-activism-to-electing-das

    Woke culture is active in more places than social media.


    Another option is to be woke and vote. Voice anger on social media and cast a vote in the upcoming election.

    https://hellogiggles.com/news/politics/dont-get-angry-vote-why-cant-i-do-both/

     

     


    Both "influencers", so their read is of interest:

    I agree with all this, but I read Obama a little differently: I think he's making an argument that a woke politics is strongest if it's trying to bring people into the fold, rather than read them out of it. You need to create a path that encourages people to join you.

    — Ezra Klein (@ezraklein) October 31, 2019

    Obama on Call-Out Culture: ‘That’s Not Activism’

    The former president challenged young activists for being judgmental. “You should get over that quickly,” he said.

    By Emily S. Rueb and Derrick Bryson Taylor @ NYTimes.com, Oct. 31, 2019

    Former President Barack Obama on Tuesday challenged youth activists on their “purity” and “judgmentalism” during an interview about youth activism at the Obama Foundation summit.Credit...Scott Olson/Getty Images

    Former President Barack Obama made a rare foray into the cultural conversation this week, objecting to the prevalence of “call-out culture” and “wokeness” during an interview about youth activism at the Obama Foundation summit (link to complete video) on Tuesday.

    For more than an hour, Mr. Obama sat onstage with the actress Yara Shahidi and several other young leaders from around the world. The conversation touched on “leadership, grass roots change and the power places have to shape our journeys,” the Obama Foundation said, but it was his remarks about young activists that have ricocheted around the internet, mostly receiving praise from a cohort of bipartisan and intergenerational supporters.

    “This idea of purity and you’re never compromised and you’re always politically ‘woke’ and all that stuff,” Mr. Obama said. “You should get over that quickly.”

    “The world is messy; there are ambiguities,” he continued. “People who do really good stuff have flaws. People who you are fighting may love their kids, and share certain things with you.”

    Mr. Obama spoke repeatedly of the role of social media in activism specifically, including the idea of what’s become known as “cancel culture,” which is much remarked upon, but still nebulously defined. It tends to refer to behavior that mostly plays out on the internet when someone has said or done something to which others object. That person is then condemned in a flurry of social media posts. Such people are often referred to as “canceled,” a way of saying that many others (and perhaps the places at which they work) are fed up with them and will have no more to do with them.

    Mr. Obama talked about conversations he’s had with his daughter Malia, who is a student at Harvard with Ms. Shahidi.

    “I do get a sense sometimes now among certain young people, and this is accelerated by social media, there is this sense sometimes of: ‘The way of me making change is to be as judgmental as possible about other people,’” he said, “and that’s enough.”

    “Like, if I tweet or hashtag about how you didn’t do something right or used the wrong verb,” he said, “then I can sit back and feel pretty good about myself, cause, ‘Man, you see how woke I was, I called you out.’”

    Then he pretended to sit back and press the remote to turn on a television.

    “That’s not activism. That’s not bringing about change,” he said. “If all you’re doing is casting stones, you’re probably not going to get that far. That’s easy to do.”

    The audience erupted in applause, which was echoed by conservative pundits like Ann Coulter.

    “Good for Obama,” Ms. Coulter tweeted on Wednesday night, adding a parenthetical: “Not sarcastic!”

    [copy of Coulter's tweet with video]

    Tomi Lahren, a conservative political commentator, said on “Fox & Friends” on Wednesday that Mr. Obama’s comments made him look like “the voice of reason” and that “that’s when you know the Democratic Party has gotten this bad.”

    “What’s really nice to hear is Barack Obama standing up for our rights and our values of the First Amendment,” Ms. Lahren said. “Just remember that we used to think Barack Obama was bad.”

    Tulsi Gabbard, a Democratic presidential candidate and a congresswoman from Mr. Obama’s home state of Hawaii, seized on his words as a campaign message for her supporters.

    “In a nutshell, Obama is saying we all need a little more aloha spirit,” she tweeted. “Being respectful & caring for one another. Not being so quick to judge. Not seeing everything as black/white. I hope you’ll join me in bringing the spirit of aloha to the White House.”

    Another Democratic presidential candidate, Andrew Yang, also championed the message on Twitter.

    “He is right on all counts,” Mr. Yang said.

    Others called out the 44th president for being “paternalistic.”

    Michael Arceneaux, the author of “I Can’t Date Jesus: Love, Sex, Family, Race, and Other Reasons I’ve Put My Faith in Beyoncé,” said he didn’t “need lessons about ‘being woke’ and ‘cancel culture’” in an op-ed for The Independent.

    “I am never quite sure if Obama really thinks this naïvely or if he’s trying to convince certain sects of the population — notably young black folks, whom he just loves to lecture — that it’s better to coddle white people about their prejudices with the hopes of growth rather than speak our minds as we see fit,” he said.

    Since leaving office in January 2017, the former president has mostly remained out of the public fray. Most of his appearances have focused on discussing the integrity of the political system and similar themes.

    Following tradition, Mr. Obama initially refrained from publicly criticizing his successor. But during the run-up to the 2018 midterms, he called President Donald J. Trump a threat to American values while speaking to students at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

    He has occasionally returned to the campaign trail to rally black voters and, more recently, has been working behind the scenes to advise Democratic presidential hopefuls. But he has yet to make an endorsement.

    Jonah Engel Bromwich contributed reporting


    Ball waxing new frontier, aka another hill to die (dye?) on.
    https://spectator.us/yaniv-case-gender-identity-ideology/

    https://www.thepostmillennial.com/there-are-only-losers-in-the-sad-saga-...

    And presumably the type of article that earns Meghan Murphy so much ire:
    https://www.feministcurrent.com/2019/10/09/there-is-no-problem-with-tran...

    Of course women aren't typically assaulted by "trans (now) women" - they're assaulted by asshole males of any label who have penises and too much testosterone and hate/vanity - whether they're transitioning, intending to transition, or just typical unstable dudes.

    But this seems too much to maintain a Twitter account in these woke times, nor to talk at a library without screaming protestors wailing as if they mistook it for an abortion clinic.

    While I don't much like visually shaming people, it should be understood that this person is *demanding* strangers wax his/her balls (& largely by default his/her cock):


    The BC Human Rights Tribunal has determined Jessica Yaniv intentionally used gender identity to try to exploit women.


    Can the women Yaniv tried to extort sue him now that court has ruled? There will always be people trying to game the system.


    Shibuya stealing our cultyah


    New York tries to keep up, but comes across as a bunch of dinosaurs.


    oh that's like it is everyday, very pre-historic atmosphere now, T-Rex's ripping off people's heads, no big deal


    Guess we can miss post-modern goodbye. In the end it's the primordial urges that win.


    You say. But when it turns into a fad? There's only so much ripping people's heads off that they'll take. Like immigration, turns into a blood sport.

     


    You call it a fad. They claim it's all in good fun, dressing up in TRex costumes. But they're announcing them selves. The lizard people who control our government and our world.

    According to a Public Policy Polling survey, around 12 million people in the US believe that interstellar lizards in people suits rule our country. We imported that particular belief from across the pond, where professional conspiracy theorist David Icke has long maintained that the Queen of England is a blood-drinking, shape-shifting alien.

     Go ahead, laugh. But they are in control. They're no longer worried about losing that control. Now they can just take off their people suits and run down the streets in their true form.

    What's next?


    Yeah, they try to pacify us with the calm 50's music and the "people dressed as" bit. I'm not stupid - I know an alien attack even if dressed up as icecapades.


    that's one really fucking scary video!


    there Sully goes again with his "life is complicated, not a propaganda war" shtick:

     


    More serious "cancel" stuff. Certainly similar to alt- right:

    “I Don’t Have A Problem With It”: Professor Declares Support For Violent Attacks On Journalists and Others Holding Opposing Views

    by Jonathan Turley @ JonathanTurley.org, Nov. 1


    Beautiful, Turley finds a *Nordic Studies* prof at a school few of us have heard of (3100 students, a Norwegian religious school in the NW?) to launch his defense of Andy NGO, a liar, troll, faux journalist, and inciter of publicity roughly in the vein of James O'Keefe. Did I mention charlatan?

    https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-featur...



    Been dealing with a bit of Early Childhood Education & Development of late, and this prolly wipes out much of first couple years observation and jumps straight into numbers.


    Those People We Tried to Cancel? They’re All Hanging Out Together

    Depriving people of a platform works — in unexpected ways.

    By John McDermott @ NYTimes.com, Nov. 2, 2019


    Don Trump Jr's woke - *THRILLER*!!!


    Trump was probably fooled by the vitiligo.


    That's far from fully woke, though, as Don Jr. doesn't even mention the gender and sexual-preference issues involved with green lighting that particular play mate.


    But it's a positive that he didn't ask, right? Neither before nor after, I presume.


    Racists have always made exceptions for black people famous in the entertainment industries.



    Heh, I saw this on teevee last night. Methinks HuffPo​st is doing a little bit of cancelling itself by not mentioning that he also apologized for dressing as a "Chocolate Lab" last year. But refused to apologize for chasing the black mailman because he is literally colorblind.


    Well let&s not make fun of the handicapped, or "otherwise color enabled", shall we?


    It was bugging me, but you pegged it, that's what J.C. Penney is missing in this ad! Handicapped!!! Nobody is even wearing glasses. Plus would it really have been that hard to include a black cockapoo along with everyone's favorite dog?


    Look at the privilege written all over the Retriever's face - all for just being blond.


    I recall he was always into blurting out exactly what he sees:


    Work romance: 'I was sacked for falling in love'

    By Robert Plummer, Business reporter, BBC News, 2 hours ago

    Australian businessman Gary Lyon still thinks it was "bizarre" that he lost his senior management job for dating a junior colleague.

    But it all turned out for the best in the end - he has been married to Tamra for 12 years and they have an 11-year-old daughter, Charlotte.

    Now Mr Lyon and his wife have their own company in Brisbane and he says he would be perfectly happy if two of his employees fell in love.

    "It wouldn't bother me in the slightest," he says, "as long as it didn't affect their work."

    Mr Lyon contacted the BBC after reading that McDonald's had fired its chief executive Steve Easterbrook after he had a relationship with an employee.

    The US fast food giant said the relationship was consensual, but Mr Easterbrook had "violated company policy" and shown "poor judgement".

    The issue has shed light on the difficulties that staff can face if they find romance at work, especially if one is more senior than the other.

    'Hammer dropped' [....]



    Hear, hear, Simon! You go guy! Definitely deserved: Most Excellent and Chivalrous.


    This one is hilarious. Unfortunately it's happening because there is such Sikh/Hindu/Muslim animosity right now:

    He's got a fucking Victoria Regina imperial crest on his chest that basically says "property of Empire" and they are arguing about the turban!

     


    What can I say, people specialize - some like shoes, beard trimmers, whatevs. I hear the Queen's a master with hats and broaches.


    I saw that. I find it interesting that while comedians have had angst and arguments about all of this, they very much seem to be working it out amongst themselves. In some instances, most appropriately, with humor and teasing. They are such a crucial part of societal glue in times like this.


    Trump calls people who vote for him his enemies. He WOC to go back where they came from. The GOP suppresses votes and obstructs justice. Cancel culture consists of isolated groups of people voicing their opinion. Trump and the GOP divisive policy initiated by one political party. Cancel culture is free speech. There is no comparison. White Evangelicals overwhelmingly support Trump. So- called cancel culture is actually debated by Progressives internally.

    Kanye West was canceled, and has the number one album in the country. Dave Chappell was canceled and just won a Mark Twain award.


    What exactly don't you get about Trump being a direct product, a reaction to, the whole Political Correctness and Identity Politics thing? That he got where he is by mimicking the same tribalizing and divisive techniques for his tribe, a tribe that was so sick of it and just waiting for someone to do it for them too that they don't give a damn what he does as long as he's their Identarian?

    Being a divider instead of a uniter will get you: nowhere. Especially within a big tent party that is trying to big tent it more.


    Division was present from the beginning. There were slave rebellions because black people were enslaved simply for existing. There was a rebellion of enslaved people in 1811 in Louisiana being re-enacted this weekend. There was the Red Summer in 1919. There was Jim Crow. There was mass incarceration of blacks. There is voter suppression. All this happened before the excuses of political correctness, identity politics, cancel culture, etc. The core problem is white supremacy. 

    Democrats are winning elections because voters realize the danger of the authoritarianism represented by the GOP. The Democrats have a big tent extending from Manchin to Sanders. The real identity politics is on full display by the GOP. Democrats can disagree on race and gender issues, and still unite at election time. Homophobic blacks vote for Democrats with agendas that support LGBT Americans. If you stray from the Republican Party line, you are ousted.

    Political correctness, identity politics, discussions about cultural appropriation does not create racists, the racists were already there. Jeff Sessions is running against Doug Jones. Sessions chances of winning are high. Is Doug Jones too politically correct?


     does not create racists, the racists were already there

    And it has been successful in changing their minds?

    What exactly does it accomplish?

    You live in the same country, and it's a democracy, somehow you have to get along, unless you want to go back to civil war, that is.


    Fuck the racists. It is not my responsibility to change their minds. MLK couldn't change their minds. Change came via changes in the law. The racists ran to the GOP where they happily reside today. Trump is the symptom, not the disease. The disease is the GOP base.

    20% of black voters in Ohio cast votes for GW. The vote was to protest Gay marriage, should those voters have been coddled?

     

     


    I think you're a racist, and I try to talk to you, communicate with you.

    Edit to add: you confuse voting with trying to change culture. They are two different things.


    Ok, let's give it a rest for a bit.


    Modern social justice and cancel culture are secular reboots of the evangelical Christian crusading of decades past, with one big difference: Christianity is replete with forgiveness and redemption narratives, while the secular version has none.

    These are the first words of this post. The words do not represent the truth.

    Robert Jefferies 

    Trump loyalist the Rev. Robert Jeffress, the head pastor of 13,000-member First Baptist Dallas, is on something of a tear. Over the last few days, he has warned of a potential civil war, accused Democrats of worshipping the pagan god Moloch, and said his critics either can’t read or “are too stupid to understand what we’re saying.”

    The extended riff began during a Sunday interview on Fox & Friends, when Jeffress mocked House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s call to be somber and “prayerful“ in the approach to impeachment. He also warned that if Democrats remove Donald Trump from office, it would lead to “a Civil War–like fracture in this nation from which this country will never heal.”

    https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/10/who-is-robert-jeffress-civil-war-trump-impeachment.html

    Paula White and Jim Bakker

    Apopka preacher Paula White, who gave Tuesday's invocation in front of the Orange County board of commissioners meeting, recently appeared on a televangelist program where she said defying President Donald Trump was akin to "fighting against the hand of God." 

    Without specifying how big that hand might be, White said God was responsible for Trump's presidency on a television show hosted by Jim Bakker, a disgraced televangelist convicted of fraud who has been telling people that Christians will start a civil war if Trump is impeached.

    https://www.orlandoweekly.com/Blogs/archives/2017/08/30/apopka-preacher-paula-white-says-defying-trump-is-fighting-against-hand-of-god

    Evangelicals do not have the same spirit of forgiveness found in Christianity. Cancel culture is in no way equivalent.

     

     


    I think this describes 2016 much more than 2020. The Democratic front-runners are two progressives who focus mainly on economic issues, and one centrist who promises nothing more than a return to normalcy. All the candidates whose primary appeal was wokeness flamed out. https://t.co/drUdrffuHZ

    — Noah Smith (@Noahpinion) November 8, 2019

    Edit to add: note Luce says in his tweet (to which Smith is replying) about his essay: Me on why this culture war looks more like a religious one. Which takes us back to the top of this thread.


    From Luce's article

    Paula White, the White House’s new head of faith outreach, said: “To say no to President Donald Trump would be to say no to God.”

    White wants us to pray to Trump, that is terrifying.

    In swing states, 92% of Democrats and 67% of Independents support the Green New Deal.

    https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/11/07/when-92-democrats-and-67-swing-voters-key-battleground-states-support-green-new-deal

    Democrats won seats in the midterms. They are winning urban areas and the suburbs. Let's keep Paula White talking, it helps Democrats. 
     

    Edit to add

    Rep Louie Gohmert and pastor Rick Wiles threaten civil war if Trump is impeached

    https://www.newsweek.com/ex-rnc-chair-michael-steele-blasts-republicans-threat-civil-war-trump-impeachment-1469451

    Franklin Graham says the country would unravel if Trump is legally impeached 

    https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/464198-franklin-graham-impeachment-could-cause-us-to-unravel

    MLB umpire threatens civil war if Trump is impeached

    https://www.huffpost.com/entry/rob-drake-umpire-ar-15_n_5db14055e4b0131fa999932b

    Pastors Jeffress and Paula White threaten civil war. White now has an office in the White House.

    The other side complains about blackface, Confederate statues, and jokes told by comedians.

    The two sides are not the same. One side is a clear and present danger. That side repeatedly threatens violence and has direct connections to Trump.

     

     

     

     


    For the record, @ NYTimes.com op-ed section in Nov.:

    How the Insufferably Woke Help Trump

    Democrats are insulting and condescending to the swing-state voters they need the most.

    By Timothy Egan, Contributing Opinion Writer, Nov. 8, 2019

    Ta-Nehisi Coates: The Cancellation of Colin Kaepernick

    “Cancel culture” has always existed — for the powerful, at least. Now, social media has democratized it.

    By Ta-Nehisi Coates, Mr. Coates is the author of “Between the World and Me", Nov. 22, 210

    (The latter with a separate Dagblog news thread with comments here.)

     

     


    Is It Time Gauguin Got Canceled?

    Museums are reassessing the legacy of an artist who had sex with teenage girls and called the Polynesian people he painted “savages.”

    By Fareh Nayeri @ NYTimes.com, Nov. 18

    LONDON — “Is it time to stop looking at Gauguin altogether?”

    That’s the startling question visitors hear on the audio guide as they walk through the “Gauguin Portraits” exhibition at the National Gallery in London. The show, which runs through Jan. 26, focuses on Paul Gauguin’s depictions of himself, his friends and fellow artists, and of the children he fathered and the young girls he lived with in Tahiti.

    The standout portrait in the exhibition is “Tehamana Has Many Parents” (1893). It pictures Gauguin’s teenage lover, holding a fan.

    The artist “repeatedly entered into sexual relations with young girls, ‘marrying’ two of them and fathering children,” reads the wall text. “Gauguin undoubtedly exploited his position as a privileged Westerner to make the most of the sexual freedoms available to him.”[....]

    In the international museum world, Gauguin is a box-office hit. There have been a half-dozen exhibitions of his work in the last few years alone, including important shows in ParisChicago and San Francisco. Yet in an age of heightened public sensitivity to issues of gender, race and colonialism, museums are having to reassess his legacy.

    A couple of decades ago, an exhibition on the same theme “would have been a great deal more about formal innovation,” said Christopher Riopelle, a co-curator of the National Gallery show. Now, everything must be viewed “in a much more nuanced context,” he added.

    “I don’t think, any longer, that it’s enough to say, ‘Oh well, that’s the way they did it back then,’ ” he said.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    “Contes Barbares” (1902). The French title translates as “Barbarian Tales.”Credit...Museum Folkwang

    [....]

    That's the way the Tahitians did it back then, too, though....


    Probably 95% of the famous politicians and artists that lived 100 or more years ago was a misogynist racist shit. If we're going to cancel then we'd have to cancel almost everyone.


    Probably 95% of people were misogynist racist shits. Fixed that for you.


    well, I gotta say it, here's evidence of perviness back in Paris in the early 90's, I never saw this photo before, where he's got no damn pants on laugh, that wasn't typical of the era. Especially when you were having your photo taken! This is why decent wimmin didn't hang out at artist's studios:

    Paul Gauguin playing Mucha’s harmonium in his studio ca. 1893-1894, Rue de la Grande Chaumière, Paris pic.twitter.com/fypcQyCpyo

    — CARAA (@CARAA_Center) December 8, 2019

    Against the ‘wokescenti’

    More dispatches from the front line of the culture war

    By Terry Eagleton @ the-TLS.co.uk, Nov. 29

    IN THIS REVIEW

    THE MADNESS OF CROWDS

    Gender, race and identity
    288pp. Bloomsbury Continuum. £20.

    Douglas Murray

    THE PROBLEM WITH EVERYTHING

    My journey through the new culture wars
    256pp. Gallery. $27.

    Meghan Daum

    Article summary from aldaily.com:

    As America’s identity wars go on, the combatants forget a simple truth: Holier-than-thou-ism is as old as the country itself...


    The Strange Liberal Backlash to Woke Culture

    Why Meghan Daum, Bret Easton Ellis, and Wesley Yang reject social justice movements on the left

    By Ryu Spaeth @ NewRepublic.com, Nov. 25

    There is a certain kind of liberally inclined writer who sees Donald Trump’s America as a nation in crisis. At every turn, in every tweet, she is confronted by the signs of an ongoing catastrophe, from which it may be too late to escape. An ugly, vicious intolerance spread on social media; the collapse of norms once considered sacred; a crass narrow-mindedness surreally celebrated by some of this country’s most powerful institutions—these are all elements in the gathering storm of a new, distinctly American fascism. The twist is that this crisis has its source, she contends, not in the person of Trump, but in his frothing-mouthed opposition: the left.

    That, roughly speaking, is the thesis of a group of writers who, since Trump’s election in 2016, have chastised the left for its supposedly histrionic excesses. Their enemies extend well beyond the hashtag resistance, and their fire is aimed, like a Catherine wheel, in all directions, hitting social justice warriors, elite universities, millennials, #MeToo, pussy hat–wearing women, and columnists at Teen Vogue. Everyone from Ta-Nehisi Coates down to random Facebook commenters is taken to task, which makes for a sprawling, hard-to-define target. These writers might call their bugbear “woke culture”: a kind of vigilance against misogyny, racism, and other forms of inequality expressed in art, entertainment, and everyday life.The title of Meghan Daum’s new book—The Problem With Everything—conveys just how far she believes the woke left has overstepped. Its publication follows similar works of polemic recently by [...]


    One vote for "quite silly":




    Yeah, comes back to some I harp on - war death's steadily declined from WWII to 70s to 90s to naughts to now; extreme poverty fell from 30+% globally to 8%, birthrate's in check everywhere except sub-Saharan Africa, and we now have the transport/battery/factory production/charging to counteract global warming. Combine with new food tech which will lower our livestock/seafood footprint and possibly microsolar combined with desalinization sheds, we have a lot of tomorrow's problems in check. Health/disease/psychiatry has some work to do, but... And education - how to keep from making boneheaded mistakes on a popular level, is high.



    The Black Swan warns against the Bell Curve because it normalizes extremism. Plus there's Woke and then there's SuperWoke, and you won't find that in your color discriminatory graph. Why is red "Nazi"? An insult to socialist and a soft color framing for fascism.


    admit I didn't watch more than 10 min. of this video, but I am plopping these two tweets regarding it here because I may some day and because this is like the oddest coupling evah to recommend it:


    see whole thread


    A vote for "as bad":

    Wokeness is against everything the liberal left historically stood for.

    Cancel culture
    Ideological self-segregation
    Excommunicating instead of engaging
    Identity fetishes
    Shaming people into conformity

    These are *right-wing religious conservative* behaviors.

    Take back the left.

    — Ali A. Rizvi (@aliamjadrizvi) February 17, 2020

    He self-describes as Pakistani-Canadian author of The Atheist Muslim (SMP/Macmillan). Co-host of @SecularJihadist podcast.


    past is past warning:


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