Any statement which the speaker or writer feels the need to preface by saying "I'm not a racist, but ..." is bound to be racist, right? That's not a logical rule, but the empirically observed regularity is striking.
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A Theory
22 May 2008 02:41 pm
Comments (70)
We're all bigots of one sort or another. Pretending otherwise is living a lie.
Yeah, like when someone says "It's not about the money" or, even better, "trust me."
I'm not a racist, but I am a n-
Did this occur to you after watching that Al Jazeera story you posted earlier? Because I thought the exact same thing.
We're all bigots of one sort or another. Pretending otherwise is living a lie.
Yes I hate paedophiles
Not exactly a new theory. But broadly true.
Others:
"I know it's not exactly PC to say this, but..."
"I don't care what color a person is, be it..."
I'm not a racist, but Mark Ambinder is poop on a stick and could be replaced by an intern without anyone batting an eye.
In my experience, if I'm going to say something racist, its best to just say it plainly and brazenly.
Prefacing it with "I'm not a racist, but..." just puts people on their guard.
I'm not a racist, but I sure am a racist.
That's right, Matt. Keep sticking it to the hicks. Those unshod hillbillies are the cause of all of our nation's racial problems. City-dwelling middle-to-upper-class north easterners can rest smug on that.
You could not be more correct, Matt. Whenever I hear someone saying this, or, following some awful bigoted statement with "But it's the truth!"
I run for the hills...
Thanks Eric. Are you going to say he's fat too? Lord, those chins.
I'm not a racist, but today is opposite day.
I'm not a racist, but certain (unnamed) Canadians (with their floppy heads and beady little eyes) who have a strange attachment to Senator Clinton are pretty creepy.
Just saying.
"I don't care what color a person is, be it..."
Especially if the person goes on to list colors that no one is, like purple. This is always a prelude to a racist statement.
That said, I agree with Steve Duncan. Identifying who is or is not "a racist" is impossible and beside the point. Everyone has some internalized prejudice. What matters are your words and actions.
We're all bigots of one sort or another. Pretending otherwise is living a lie.
No. We all have prejudices of varying degrees against different types of people, but that's not the same as being a bigot, which entails a strong or extreme form of prejudice.
I'm not a racist, but white people need more melanin.
Yes I hate paedophiles
Posted by M | May 22, 2008 3:04 PM
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
M, there are a lot of children in the world that have no one pay any attention to them. Why wish for your wife to have the body of a 15 year old again if you can have the real thing? C'mon, let's move to Texas!
I don't hate fat people, but Americans are fat disgusting pigs. They need to exercise more and stop stuffing themselves full of Krispy Kremes and french fries.
"Poop on a stick"? Stop gender-baiting, you misogynist.
I'm not a racist, but certain (unnamed) Canadians (with their floppy heads and beady little eyes) who have a strange attachment to Senator Clinton are pretty creepy.
Just saying.
The problem arises, of course, because of Clinton's argument that she is the most "electable." And she has a point: The results out of WV and Kentucky shout loudly that Obama has (let's use the euphemism) "a problem with working class whites in Appalachia."
I'm not a racist, but its true that a lot of Appalachians just will not vote for the black guy. They would listen to the Democratic message if it comes out of Hillary's mouth, but they will just turn it off if it comes out of Obama's mouth. And that really may be the difference that ends up putting McCain in the White House.
Is it racist to point out the electoral consequences of a racist reality?
Everything before the word 'but' is a lie.
I always thought it was o.k. if you mentioned that some of your best friends are black. No?
Matt: Any statement which the speaker or writer feels the need to preface by saying "I'm not a racist, but ..." is bound to be racist, right? That's not a logical rule, but the empirically observed regularity is striking.
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RobMac:That's right, Matt. Keep sticking it to the hicks. Those unshod hillbillies are the cause of all of our nation's racial problems.
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words not in matt's post: hicks, unshod, hillbillies.
somebody's overly sensitive, i think
Everything before the word 'but' is a lie.
blah, you're a genius! Imagine, glazed french fries. The best of both gluttonies! Krispy Kreme has to do this! I'm on the phone now......
Welcome to today's "MattY's 3 Second Hate", in which MattY throws out red meat and, most spectacularly of all, only spends 3 seconds of thought doing it. Normal bloggers spend minutes or hours thinking of what they're going to write, but MattY is so good he only needs seconds or, in some cases, mere milliseconds. Now, some will complain that in the current case he completely ignores that what is and isn't "racist" is generally a far-left construction, but let's leave things like that to the "minutes or hours" variety of bloggers.
SoCalJustice wins
where's Sailor when you need him?
Yeah Rob Mac's response was pretty weird. Who's talking about hicks? I would think it's the urban fauxgressives who would preface racism with the "I'm not racist but..." whereas those in a less PC environment would just come out and say it.
a blast from the past, how a republican "construction" on to play the racism
card:
In 1981, the late Lee Atwater gave an interview , explaining the evolution of the Southern strategy:
“You start out in 1954 by saying, ‘Nigger, nigger, nigger,’ ” said Atwater. “By 1968, you can’t say ‘nigger’ — that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff. You’re getting so abstract now [that] you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things, and a byproduct of them is [that] blacks get hurt worse than whites.”
Who's talking about hicks?
Matt was referring to one of the hicks in the Al-Jazeera video.
Wow, I never expected the words "hick" and "Al-Jazeera" to belong in the same sentence.
Anyone who says "I'm not racist" is. But really, everyone is racist so it's sort of a moot point. The idea is not to punish youself for having thoughts or emotions, the idea is to be aware of those feelings and guard against treating people differently.
I could call him a sadistic beastial necrophiliac, but that would be beating a dead horse.
Is it racist to point out the electoral consequences of a racist reality?
No it wouldn’t be. And I’m perfectly willing to listen to objective observers analyze the election and make the case that Obama’s got problems based on race.
However, that’s not the current situation. We’ve a candidate in Clinton that’s perfectly willing to stir up racial animus and use it to her advantage. She’s actively involved creating the conditions under which an African American would have a hard time winning in certain areas.
There are only two things I can't stand in this world. People who are intolerant of other people's cultures...and the Dutch.
To paraphrase Chris Rock, if you can count the number of black friends you have, you're a racist (or live in Vermont).
I wonder how saying "I'm not racist" before saying something racist actually works in the racist's head. "If I have a preface, they'll believe that and not the thing after!" I wonder if criminals do this with cops: "I'm not a serial killer, I just like picking up hitchikers and feeding them into woodchippers." Then Chief Wiggum goes, "Oh, I thought you were a serial killer, but then you said you weren't." Not only is anybody who says "I'm not a racist, but" a racist, they are also calling you stupid when they say it because they think you'll buy their snake oil.
Ambinder notes McCain's new website, which is very Obamaized. While I miss the "reichsvolk" militaristic charm of his first site, parts of the new one are funny too.
For instance, there's a "cause greater than self" volunteering section (sadly, they did not go with Bush I's more poetical "thousand points of light") that should have been a little more thought out.
It has a a "tell us about your volunteer work" that has a mandatory drop-down list of organizations you have to pick from in order to tell them about your volunteering--but without an "other" entry!
So, I guess if you volunteered for the Red Cross, it doesn't count. But your work for the IRS Volunteer Income Tax Assistance Program won't go unnoted.
Weird.
where's Sailor when you need him?
Some conditions are simply never met.
While we're at it, any statement starting with "Those people ..." isn't likely to be heading to a very healthy place either.
TLB translated: I'm not a racist, but I have a website full of racist rants. Oh noes, the PizzaDeliveryBoy has a tan! Run!
"While we're at it, any statement starting with "Those people ..." isn't likely to be heading to a very healthy place either.
Posted by stuck in 200 | May 22, 2008 4:16 PM"
Making it even worse:
"Those people sure are tasty!"
Did this occur to you after watching that Al Jazeera story you posted earlier? Because I thought the exact same thing.
Posted by Eric
I even got to the middle of typing a similar response, but I was trying to ask why it's so important to identify yourself as not a racist only to proceed full steam ahead to say something racist.
Is there supposed to be some sort of a big difference between being a racist person who holds racist views and being a non-racist person who holds racist views?
Or is being a "racist" supposed to mean that you're some unbalanced neurotic as opposed to being a fine, upstanding citizen who happens to hold racist views?
That's not a theory, it's a hypothesis.
Is it racist to point out the electoral consequences of a racist reality?
It's racist when your response to that reality is to validate it, and claim openly that you're the candidate with the best appeal to the white racist vote; rather than denouncing that racism and making some kind of effort to change or marginalize it.
Welcome to today's "MattY's 3 Second Hate", in which MattY throws out red meat and, most spectacularly of all, only spends 3 seconds of thought doing it.
Welcome to Chris 'TLB' Kelly's 24/7 Brown Menace Obsession, in which the MostSelfLoathingAngeleno spends yet another day hiding under his bed, his Technorati search on 'immigration OR racist OR Mexican OR Lou Dobbs horse porn' set to 30-second refresh.
"I don't care what color a person is, be it..."
My favorite is when they follow this up with ridiculous colors, as in "I dont care if someone is black, white, yellow, or purple ...". In my experience, what usually comes next is either self-evident or racist, as in "I dont care if someone is black, white, yellow, or purple. I just think everyone should ACT white. I don't care what color you are - I care what color you act."
Is there supposed to be some sort of a big difference between being a racist person who holds racist views and being a non-racist person who holds racist views?
Americans have been arguing about racism from the beginning. Way back, most of them thought racism was right, either because God wants it that way or for pseudo-scientific reasons. Only very recently, Americans who think racism is wrong have been winning the argument. So now even racists agree that something called "racism" is wrong. But they don't believe that their racism is wrong, so they don't think their racism is racism.
I'm not a racist.
I don't have time.
I'm too busy hating humans to notice a little color or ethnic difference. You've seen one chimpanzee, you've seen them all, whatever the color.
'Course, I have to cut some slack for babes, or I wouldn't get any.
Oh, wait...
My fellow Americans, I am not a crook.
I am not a racist, but Jonah Goldberg calls me a fascist to sell his book. Such is the sorry state of Conservative thinking when they can barely rise above second grade playground abuse.
Its an old schtick thats wearing somewhat thin. You can be sure of course that calling the Bush gulags in Gitmo or Iraq gulags would result in a hyperventilating hissy fit which Russert, Mathews and the rest of the establishment media would loudly condemn.
"It's racist when your response to [a racist] reality is to validate it, and claim openly that you're the candidate with the best appeal to the white racist vote; rather than denouncing that racism and making some kind of effort to change or marginalize it."
So you think HC should have denounced and marginalized the racists in WV and Kentucky? Maybe in her victory speeches after these primaries she should have said something like this: "I know the only reason I won by 40% or so is because this state is filled with racist crackers." And this would have accomplished what, exactly, besides guaranteeing McCain's election?
Any statement which the speaker or writer feels the need to preface by saying "I'm not a racist, but ..." is bound to be racist, right? That's not a logical rule, but the empirically observed regularity is striking.
Or, alternately, any time a speaker says "I'm not a racist, but..." he is about to point out a fact inconvenient to those who practice the religion of total equality of all people; and is hoping in vain that saying this will somehow shield him.
For no other reason than I can't believe no one got there before me:
I'm not a racist, but I play one on television.
"It's not about the money..." = it's about the money.
"Hey, I love women..." = I'm a misogynist.
"To be perfectly frank..." = I'm not going to be frank.
"It's not you, it's me..." = It's you.
"I'm not a racist, but..." = I'm a racist.
"a fact inconvenient to those who practice the religion of total equality of all people"
Well, there is the Western liberal ideal that all people are 'equal', which I guess is meaphysical (how do you calculate the 'worth' of a person in a way that isn't?). But then there's the science that holds that race is an arbitrary and meaningless category, and that human diversity is randomly distributed across culturally constructed divisions of 'race'.
"So you think HC should have denounced and marginalized the racists in WV and Kentucky? Maybe in her victory speeches after these primaries she should have said something like this: "I know the only reason I won by 40% or so is because this state is filled with racist crackers." And this would have accomplished what, exactly, besides guaranteeing McCain's election?
Posted by dogface | May 22, 2008 7:40 PM"
The problem is that she is making her electoral argument on the implied fact that her supporters are racist. When you keep on going on about how you have the support of "hard-working white Americans" and somehow imply that they will never vote for him despite being Democrats, you are calling your supporters racist and then saying this a reason you should be the nominee.
those who practice the religion of total equality of all people
Ah, don't worry yersel', Glaivester -- my catechism still has plenty of room to distinguish between humanity in general and individual cockheads like you.
How many black friends does Matt Yglesias have?
I'm not regionally biased or anything, but can we all stop talking about the anti-Obama vote as "working class whites"? The opposition to him is coming from Appalachian working-class whites.
Thank you, Captain Obvious.
I'm not a racist, but I think that whites are inherently genetically superior to all other races.
I'm not sexist, I just think that women are incapable of performing important tasks.
I don't discriminate based on age, I just think everybody should be sent to Carousel at age 30.
The Bishop and friends need to check the numbers.
Obama has lost the working class white voters in every primary but Wisconsin and Oregon.
Even in Oregon, he lost whites with no college education. Obama even lost this group in his home state of Illinois.
This is no suprise to the Obama campaign since they didn't set out to win downscale white Democrats.
Well, there is the Western liberal ideal that all people are 'equal', which I guess is metaphysical (how do you calculate the 'worth' of a person in a way that isn't?).
In the political sense, yes, I like the idea of the equality of mankind. That is, that no man is to be master. In terms of abilities, however, not only are all people obviously not equal, but people of different ethnic backgrounds on average have different strengths and weaknesses.
But then there's the science that holds that race is an arbitrary and meaningless category, and that human diversity is randomly distributed across culturally constructed divisions of 'race'.
To argue that race is amere social construct and that genetic diversity is totally uncorrelated to race is like arguing that there are no significant diferences between St. Bernard's as a category and Chihuahuas a a category.
In terms of abilities, however, not only are all people obviously not equal, but people of different ethnic backgrounds on average have different strengths and weaknesses. =
(from Glaivester's blog)
"... what makes Asians a model minority is that they have (as an average) a lower crime rate than whites, and they don't respond to welfare by huge increases in illegitimacy. Plus, they can compete with whites on race-blind tests, unlike other groups where the majority have to be given a large handicap to have any chance to compete for things such as higher-tier colleges. Also, they don't tend to burn down their cities when they feel slighted.
I suppose that it may be racist to congratulate Asians on this. But you know, if it bothers them that much, all they need to do is start committing more rapes and murders, and to encourage their children not to do well in school and then to blame the fact they don't do well on white racism and I am sure that eventually they will be able to escape that pesky label... "
Corollary: when someone uses Asian Americans as a baseball bat to bludgeon other races and disprove the existence of racism in America, he is entrenching racism.
Comments closed June 05, 2008.
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Heads in the Sand
I'm not a racist, but Mark Ambinder is poop on a stick and could be replaced by an intern without anyone batting an eye.
Posted by Eric Blair | May 22, 2008 2:58 PM