What, exactly, is CRT?

[Bomb#20]

Perhaps I misunderstood you.

If by "misunderstood", you mean "made a damaging trumped-up false accusation with malice and reckless disregard for the truth", then yes, that was you misunderstanding me.

You do accept that racial disparities are the result of social constructions of race, then?

At least some of them are; that's obvious. As to whether they all are, I don't know that sociology is a sufficiently scientific discipline for sociologists to figure that out. I try to keep an open mind about questions we do not yet have scientific answers to.

(It should be noted, by the way, that "the result of social constructions of race" and "the result of racism" are not the same thing. For example, a disparity resulting from most people being more sexually attracted to those they perceive as the same ethnicity may well be a result of a social construction of race without being a result of racism. Not having the hots for someone is no more racist than it is sexist.)

 

[Bomb#20]

You said claims were being made. Then you said they weren't, it seems. Maybe you misspoke? So, what are the claims being made? I mean, the claims that are not all that radical? Those are claims, right? Are they falsifiable?

If you're not going to read the post itself (in which I explained the whole thing in exhaustive detail that was predictably ignored) I sure as hell am not going to type it all again.

A person working within a certain paradigm or methodology may well make claims. These would be their hypotheses, not "what CRT claims". Then, too, some of the grounding assumptions of CRT were themselves once hypothetical claims, and these were the topic of my (deceptively quoted) post above.

I pointed out what you said. That's not "deceptively quoted". That's just plain "quoted". You have zero cause to accuse me of deception. The circumstance that now, after I pointed out that you contradicted yourself, you're reacting by following Thomas Aquinas's advice for this situation and drawing a distinction, does not retroactively make it have been deceptive for me to notice the contradiction and point it out. You are of course free to draw a distinction between the claims of a theory and the claims of its theorists, and you're free to insist that you meant the latter. But the fact is, you did not draw that distinction in the post I quoted and make clear that you weren't talking about claims of the theory itself -- indeed, there was no talk of theorists at all in that post, as anyone with the patience to wade through the wall of text about enculturation and polyvalence that was post #53 can verify for himself.

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

How do we know that CRT is not itself racist? No one has given any reason why it's not just as racist as anything else.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_race_theory
Institutionalized racism is normative, sometimes legalized . . .

Isn't CRT "normative" and "legalized"? Isn't it being accepted in Academia, and being taught in the law schools? Isn't its theory being applied in some legal cases? So how is it not part of what is "normative" and "legalized"?

. . . and often manifests as inherited disadvantage.

Weren't most of the CR theorists born into the upper classes, inheriting a higher-than-average lifestyle?

It is structural, having been absorbed into our institutions of custom, . . .

Isn't CRT part of the American structure? arising out of the university/educational establishment? and being absorbed into the institutions and customs? Doesn't that make it "racist" along with everything else fitting that description?

. . . our institutions of custom, practice, and law, so there need not be an identifiable offender.

Doesn't CRT fit that description? being part of our institutions of custom, practice, and law? with its promoters personally not identifiable as offenders?

Indeed, institutionalized racism is often evident as inaction in the face of need, manifesting itself both in material conditions and in access to power.

Doesn't that describe CRT? There are plenty of needs in the face of which CRT is inactive. How is CRT not just as guilty of "inaction" as anyone else? What special action is CRT doing that makes it superior to anyone else? Why can't CRT be accused of "inaction" as much as anyone else can be? And don't the CRT scholars have good "material conditions" and "access to power" which most Americans do not have?

With regard to the former, examples include differential access to quality education, . . .

Haven't CR theorists had better access to quality education?

. . . sound housing, gainful employment, appropriate medical facilities, and a clean environment.

Haven't CR theorists had better than average access to housing, employment, medical facilities and a clean environment? They are probably better off, in this regard, than 90% of Americans. Probably better off than 95% of Black Americans.

So how is CRT also not racist, or a part of systemic racism in America?

The question was asked earlier, how CRTers are not themselves racist as much as anyone else, according to their own analysis of structural racism. And no one could give any answer.

 

[Politesse]

Perhaps I misunderstood you.

If by "misunderstood", you mean "made a damaging trumped-up false accusation with malice and reckless disregard for the truth", then yes, that was you misunderstanding me.

You do accept that racial disparities are the result of social constructions of race, then?

At least some of them are; that's obvious. As to whether they all are, I don't know that sociology is a sufficiently scientific discipline for sociologists to figure that out. I try to keep an open mind about questions we do not yet have scientific answers to.

(It should be noted, by the way, that "the result of social constructions of race" and "the result of racism" are not the same thing. For example, a disparity resulting from most people being more sexually attracted to those they perceive as the same ethnicity may well be a result of a social construction of race without being a result of racism. Not having the hots for someone is no more racist than it is sexist.)

They are if you're starting from a CRT framework. Part of the whole appeal is the greater objectivity that comes from looking at structural racism as opposed to someone's self-reported personal feelings as the problem to be addressed. Feelings are not the measure of equity, from a CRT perspective, but rather the measurable, observable material circumstances and outcomes that disproportionately affect people of minority race.

 

[Politesse]

So how is CRT also not racist, or a part of systemic racism in America?

The question was asked earlier, how CRTers are not themselves racist as much as anyone else, according to their own analysis of structural racism. And no one could give any answer.

I have a hard time imagining any CRT scholar defining themselves as unaffected by racism. The whole point is that race concepts well-ingrained in the way Americans are taught to see the world, that includes scholars as well as anyone else. We're all components of the same racist system, until we're all not. Individual and collective liberation from these ideologies can only come together. This is one of the reasons why CRT theorists and leftist political projects are so often at odds; Democrats love to pat themselves on the back and declare themselves pure of heart, thus blindly accepting status quo answers to social problems that are not yet, in fact, solved.

 

[ZiprHead]

Just placing this here for reference.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I don't see anyone arguing that historical racism wasn't a severe problem. You're attacking the wrong thing.

The question is whether what we see now is racism, or the aftereffects of racism. The former can be cured by removing the racism, the latter can't be.

True, but it can addressed by acknowledging the reality instead of denying it.

The problem with this is the "cure" is anti-racism measures.

You're a doc in the ER trying to cure a broken arm with a seat belt.

 

[Bomb#20]

You said claims were being made. Then you said they weren't, it seems. Maybe you misspoke? So, what are the claims being made? I mean, the claims that are not all that radical? Those are claims, right? Are they falsifiable?

If you're not going to read the post itself (in which I explained the whole thing in exhaustive detail that was predictably ignored) I sure as hell am not going to type it all again.

They also ignore the whole post where TGG talks about all the things you described, happening as described.

Really, "theory" is a misnomer. It's really more of a phenomena, and the theory of it's operation is actually dependent solely on Human Apathy, Ignorance, and Tribal Behaviors all of which are well accepted.

TGG talks about a couple of things:

No, it is a STUDY of how the current state of social stratification has emerged from a continuation of fully institutionalized social designations based on race, which were foundational to the establishment of the Union of States.

You're making my point here. Your "evidence" is historical. I don't believe anyone on here is denying the historical origins. The question is what is the current situation. CRT takes it on faith that it's current racism, as opposed to legacy effects from prior racism.

I've lived in five different states in which I've encountered overt racism. The only state in which I did not encounter racism by whites against blacks and natives was spent in military service never wandering far from base. When I moved to my present location 30 years ago and bought a home I was greeted with "We're so glad a white family bought this home." So, yah, racism is alive and well across the U.S.

The systemic racism I encountered was around Chicago where certain communities required that new homebuyers be affirmed by two present residents. Needless to say there were no blacks there, but the practice is obviously legal.

He's talking about current racism in the common usage sense: people discriminating and/or having negative attitudes against people of other races.

It's a methodological paradigm based on an assumption. It's a method for analyzing the function of law through the lens of the assumption that the law is incontrovertibly racist in structure.

It explicitly REJECTS any possibility of the law being neutral or colorlind.

What's the big deal? I don't understand your point. Are you telling me systemic racism, because it occurs within societies is okay?

You are certainly not saying that it isn't real, or that the KKK is colorblind or that we haven't had laws that were systemically racist in their intent and application.

Do you think you spend too much time in ivory towers?

And he's talking about past racism in the common usage sense: the law not being neutral and colorblind in intent or in application.

These things TGG talks about are or were intentional racial discrimination. They do not appear to be what you guys are talking about.

Not to mention that CRT pointedly says "it's not overt or even intentional behavior that is being jargonally referred to as "racism" in CRT" but rather things like politically empowered people criminalizing drugs they personally don't use, not accounting for the difficulty to enter certain social systems (or accounting for it specifically in some cases...), and the difficulties endemic to having few familial connections to wealth.

These are real things that are in the discussion of "CRT" "systemic racism". Note that few if any require overt or even intentional "continuance of legacy". It just requires SOME well placed malice and lots of ignorance or apathy.

Also in direct contradiction to the actual descriptions of CRT up thread.

How many times have we all pointed out "overt, gnostic, intentional racism is merely a tiny part; mostly it is a set of otherwise agnostic systems made in ignorance or apathy operated in ignorance and apathy, with the pointed effect of preventing economic mobility generally along cleavage lines of racially self-identified communities?"

Everything is viewed with a lens of "ignorance and apathy".

You and the other CRT peddlers appear to be using "systemic racism" to mean pretty much any old "otherwise agnostic" aspect of society you feel tends to contribute to socioeconomic inertia, whether it was introduced and whether it continues to exist for purposes of racial discrimination or not. The difficulties endemic to having few familial connections to wealth get called "racism" because they tend to preserve legacy effects from prior racism, even though it isn't for the purpose of preserving those effects that it became useful to be related to rich people. But getting the job because you're the nephew of the boss is not what normal people mean by "racism". As you say, what's being referred to as "racism" in CRT is being referred to as "racism" in CRT jargonally. So when you say TGG talks about all the things a CRT peddler described, happening as described, you're committing an equivocation fallacy. There's no logical reason to call the difficulties endemic to having few familial connections to wealth "racism". Funny story about that: in India, "Critical Caste Theory" is a thing. No doubt its peddlers call the disadvantages of being from a poor family "Casteism". But people helping out their family members is no more for purposes of keeping down the Dalits than it is for keeping down the Black Man -- it's no more casteism than it is racism; it's just nepotism. That one and the same phenomenon gets attributed to racism here and casteism there is a consequence of viewer agenda, not objectivity.

So "systemic racism" in CRT is jargon. The jargon does not appear to have been chosen for purposes of data compression when specialists talk sociology with other specialists. It appears to have been chosen to help CRT peddlers persuade the rest of us that observations like TGG's are grounds for the public at large to apply the same moral opprobrium to "otherwise agnostic" aspects of society that we apply to intentional racial discrimination. I.e., you guys are using an equivocation fallacy for propaganda purposes.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

If by "misunderstood", you mean "made a damaging trumped-up false accusation with malice and reckless disregard for the truth", then yes, that was you misunderstanding me.


At least some of them are; that's obvious. As to whether they all are, I don't know that sociology is a sufficiently scientific discipline for sociologists to figure that out. I try to keep an open mind about questions we do not yet have scientific answers to.

(It should be noted, by the way, that "the result of social constructions of race" and "the result of racism" are not the same thing. For example, a disparity resulting from most people being more sexually attracted to those they perceive as the same ethnicity may well be a result of a social construction of race without being a result of racism. Not having the hots for someone is no more racist than it is sexist.)

They are if you're starting from a CRT framework. Part of the whole appeal is the greater objectivity that comes from looking at structural racism as opposed to someone's self-reported personal feelings as the problem to be addressed. Feelings are not the measure of equity, from a CRT perspective, but rather the measurable, observable material circumstances and outcomes that disproportionately affect people of minority race.

And then CRT just redefined "racism", and one of the problems is confusion. Another one is the accusation of innocent people.

Another one, and going back to a point B20 made:

But in fact geneticists have performed exactly that experiment using modern DNA sequencing technology, and the tree algorithms rediscovered the Caucasoids, the Negroids, and a pretty close approximation to the Mongoloids.

https://frdbarchive.org/viewtopic.php?p=6787486#p6787486

If say, Classic Mongoloid people (or close enough) do overall better than Caucasoid people in college in the US, that is much more likely due to features of their respective cultural background than due to racism, using the word 'racism' in English. So, here we have a social difference between races that is very probably not due to racism. Sure, you can redefine 'racism' so that Classic Mongoloids owe their overall greater academic success than Caucasoids to racism, but that would only confuse matters and result in accusations as above.

ETA: and even then, you'd have a lot of trouble showing that their overall greater academic success is due to the social constructions of race.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

You're claiming that racism is [as] elusively difficult to observe as the Godhead?

Right. This isn't economics 101.

Historical systemic racism is definitely real. No assumptions are necessary. Let's discuss.

Perhaps an actual historical example is in order that illustrates the error of those preceding few sentences. Offer up such a specific error so that I and others can understand your position.

I don't see anyone arguing that historical racism wasn't a severe problem. You're attacking the wrong thing.

The question is whether what we see now is racism, or the aftereffects of racism. The former can be cured by removing the racism, the latter can't be.

That answer is such bullshit. You'd be spouting the same garbage anytime between 1870 and 1960. You'd be claiming that the darkies are all free and have been for generations, that slavery ended and look how the darkies are still struggling to be as successful as white people. Them darkies have them civil rights now. Huh?

Do we need to call it Critical Enslavement theory? How about Critical JIM Crow Theory? How about Critical Separate But Equal Theory? How about Single Family Zoning Theory?

 

[DrZoidberg]

And not to knock Stephen King. But he's not a great author. He's a great craftsman of sentences. He's great at putting together sentences. A master of style. But his books are shallow as shit. That guy has nothing to say. He just does it very well.

Some yes, some no. I've found King to be very dichotomous. Some of his books are shallow and uninteresting. Others are more complex. While it's not a perfect categorization, I generally feel that books written within the paradigm of the Dark Tower universe are better than those written outside of it. With the exception of Cujo, which I still think is one of his better books... although perhaps not for the reasons that most people would assume. I never found it particularly scary, I mostly found it sad. But the writing from the perspective of the dog was fascinating and well done.

He's got an awesome book about how to write, "On Writing" where he describes his method.

 

[fromderinside]

King's a Hack. Rushdie actually knows how to write. More in the vein of Tolstoy, Dickens and Dante.

As for thread. CRT is Me too version of Tribal struggle story.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I don't see anyone arguing that historical racism wasn't a severe problem. You're attacking the wrong thing.

The question is whether what we see now is racism, or the aftereffects of racism. The former can be cured by removing the racism, the latter can't be.

That answer is such bullshit. You'd be spouting the same garbage anytime between 1870 and 1960. You'd be claiming that the darkies are all free and have been for generations, that slavery ended and look how the darkies are still struggling to be as successful as white people. Them darkies have them civil rights now. Huh?

Do we need to call it Critical Enslavement theory? How about Critical JIM Crow Theory? How about Critical Separate But Equal Theory? How about Single Family Zoning Theory?

CRT is just a new face on the notion that disparate results prove racism. It didn't before, it didn't now.

Yes, there has been plenty of actual racism but that does not prove your point, especially given how most discrimination "research" ignores the elephant in the room of whether it's actually seeing racism or socioeconomic effects. "Racism" has a strange habit of disappearing when you properly control for socioeconomic effects.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

I don't see anyone arguing that historical racism wasn't a severe problem. You're attacking the wrong thing.

The question is whether what we see now is racism, or the aftereffects of racism. The former can be cured by removing the racism, the latter can't be.

That answer is such bullshit. You'd be spouting the same garbage anytime between 1870 and 1960. You'd be claiming that the darkies are all free and have been for generations, that slavery ended and look how the darkies are still struggling to be as successful as white people. Them darkies have them civil rights now. Huh?

Do we need to call it Critical Enslavement theory? How about Critical JIM Crow Theory? How about Critical Separate But Equal Theory? How about Single Family Zoning Theory?

CRT is just a new face on the notion that disparate results prove racism. It didn't before, it didn't now.

Yes, there has been plenty of actual racism but that does not prove your point, especially given how most discrimination "research" ignores the elephant in the room of whether it's actually seeing racism or socioeconomic effects. "Racism" has a strange habit of disappearing when you properly control for socioeconomic effects.

And obviously your claim is that past racism cannot and does not affect present socioeconomic reality.

It would seem you are making the argument that socioeconomic reality is the culprit and that it causes racism to occur. Would that be an accurate take on your position?

 

[Politesse]

I don't see anyone arguing that historical racism wasn't a severe problem. You're attacking the wrong thing.

The question is whether what we see now is racism, or the aftereffects of racism. The former can be cured by removing the racism, the latter can't be.

That answer is such bullshit. You'd be spouting the same garbage anytime between 1870 and 1960. You'd be claiming that the darkies are all free and have been for generations, that slavery ended and look how the darkies are still struggling to be as successful as white people. Them darkies have them civil rights now. Huh?

Do we need to call it Critical Enslavement theory? How about Critical JIM Crow Theory? How about Critical Separate But Equal Theory? How about Single Family Zoning Theory?

CRT is just a new face on the notion that disparate results prove racism. It didn't before, it didn't now.

Yes, there has been plenty of actual racism but that does not prove your point, especially given how most discrimination "research" ignores the elephant in the room of whether it's actually seeing racism or socioeconomic effects. "Racism" has a strange habit of disappearing when you properly control for socioeconomic effects.

What do you mean by "proves racism"? If there are substantial disparate legal and economic outcomes for different citizens that can be predicted by their race independent of any other factors, that is the very definition of structural racism as per the CRT outlook. Science is not and has never been about "proof", but we do believe in following evidence where it leads, until such time as an idea is improved upon or disproven.

 

[Trausti]

What do you mean by "proves racism"? If there are substantial disparate legal and economic outcomes for different citizens that can be predicted by their race independent of any other factors, that is the very definition of structural racism as per the CRT outlook.

This is why we need a conversation on Asian Privilege.

 

[laughing dog]

I don't see anyone arguing that historical racism wasn't a severe problem. You're attacking the wrong thing.

The question is whether what we see now is racism, or the aftereffects of racism. The former can be cured by removing the racism, the latter can't be.

True, but it can addressed by acknowledging the reality instead of denying it.

The problem with this is the "cure" is anti-racism measures.

Not in the world where I live. Whether you will admit it or not, racism is alive and well (if not as blatant and widespread as it was 50 years ago) and it still has lingering legacy in our society. So how do we go about addressing those issues? I may not have many answers, but I know two of them is to stop denying its existence or its legacy effects.

You're a doc in the ER trying to cure a broken arm with a seat belt.

I wonder if it is as tiring to come with your nonsensical analogies as it is to read them.

 

[Trausti]

Structural racism is like a riddle wrapped in a mystery wrapped inside an enigma.

 

[ZiprHead]

I did a search on YT for "getting into law school with a low gpa" and saw just as many posts by white people, and at least one Asian, as black.

Yet the poster above chose to only show the black posters.

I wonder why that is?

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

So how is CRT also not racist, or a part of systemic racism in America?

I have a hard time imagining any CRT scholar defining themselves as unaffected by racism. The whole point is that race concepts well-ingrained in the way Americans are taught to see the world, that includes scholars as well as anyone else. We're all components of the same racist system, until we're all not. Individual and collective liberation from these ideologies can only come together. This is one of the reasons why CRT theorists and leftist political projects are so often at odds; Democrats love to pat themselves on the back and declare themselves pure of heart, thus blindly accepting status quo answers to social problems that are not yet, in fact, solved.

Or maybe the perception that there's a social problem needing to be solved is itself a racist perception arising out of the systemic racism that infects all of us, including anyone claiming to have answers or solutions to an alleged problem, or anyone casting doubt on someone else's answer.

In fact, anyone who ever says anything, no matter what, is just expressing more racism of their own, no matter what they say, or how much they pretend to be on a crusade against racism.