Joe Biden, Senator from Citibank (oops, DELAWARE), to Run for President

pretty sure the evidence points to shame being ineffective tbh

The problem is that nothing actually works.

:(

yeah if shame was effective trump wouldn't have a single voter

or, like, exist

The problem is that nothing actually works.

― shout-out to his family (DJP), Wednesday, August 12, 2020 4:39 PM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Some cultures/nations/societies are definitively more racist than others, I find it disheartening to believe it’s all due to randomness.

lol so I guess Core Civic (Big Prison) stocks jumped yesterday afternoon for some reason

building a robust working class opposition movement couldn't hurt :) xp

we're doing that in the prisons!

in the decades since the '60s civil rights era, most liberal folks kids have been raised to learn that racism is/was discrimination, segregation, meanness, and acts of deliberate harm or negligence - especially against blacks. it's past-tense, with a few exceptions.

if this is the story that a kid is raised with, it's easy (and honest-feeling) for the adult that grew up from that kid to say 'i'm not racist because I don't discriminate, i don't support segregation, i've got black friends, and i would never allow harm to occur on the basis of race. hell, i really liked hamilton.'

i am pretty certain joe biden is one of these people.

at work, i've seen that when the above-type person is confronted with the statement 'all white people are racist' they honestly believe that it is hyperbolic and assaultive because, given way they were raised, they 'know' they are not racist. it lands like a slap in the face, and it doesn't cause shame or reflection – it causes retreat and anger. sometimes these 'not racist' people just shut down, and sometimes they deferentially mouth 'yeah, all white people are racist' without believing it, because they don't want to have to engage negatively w/ bipoc folk with whom they're afraid to disagree (because their liberalism impels them believe in the overall idea of anti-racism, without actually listening to the most impacted people).

however, little 'nitpicky' tweaks to language, e.g. talking about the 'historical idea of whiteness' or 'racist institutions' (which everybody knows are white-coded) sneaks important ideas in under the radars of these 'good, not-racist people.' it keeps hackles down, it lets people who perpetuate white supremacy recognize their racist tendencies, and it gives them space to say 'ahh, i DID benefit from the status quo' and acknowledge their own complicity with some cover. it's easy to say this is 'catering to fragility' and yes it really sucks a lot of the time, and yes it makes more work for brown folx, but also it *can* be useful as a way to change minds.

too bad our stupid geezer maybe-president needs somebody to sit down and have this conversation with him.

xxp ok walking that back—Core Civic just moved to a new index, hence the jump

& also i believe it works best when it is paired with frank and immediate labeling of racist behavior

Every racist relative in my life is only ready to call an act "racist" when (a) a black person is murdered by an overt neo-Nazi (b) separate public facilities.

xposts

The problem is that nothing actually works.

― shout-out to his family (DJP), Wednesday, August 12, 2020 4:39 PM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Some cultures/nations/societies are definitively more racist than others, I find it disheartening to believe it’s all due to randomness.

― Van Horn Street, Wednesday, August 12, 2020 3:44 PM (twelve minutes ago)

hopefully it's closer to "no single approach works all the time". the direct confrontation approach that works well with some people will completely alienate others, even radicalize them in some cases. people respond to the idea of "all white people are racist" in different ways. one person hears that and thinks about the racist structure and their own role in that, and what can be done to change it. another hears the same thing and thinks "then why is it my problem, if it's inevitable?" or just tries to think of individuals they know who don't seem racist and refute it that way. some people feel liberated by the idea of being part of a larger problem, others react very negatively to that idea.

with my dad, i feel like i almost made things worse by calling out his actions as racist so many times to his face over the last few years. he never, once, tried to refute my assertions that his speech, writing, and actions were racist. instead he seemed to double-down on the religious underpinning of his beliefs, as if to say "if the 'world' thinks that i am a racist, so be it, amen". in some ways i feel like i raised this idea that he was racist to his face, one that he wasn't thinking about, and then caused him to double-down on it. when my "you're a goddamn racist" approach didn't work, i told him that i thought _I_ was a racist too, and that i thought everyone was. i talked about the racist structure, gave him a couple book recommendations, stuff like that. he had absolutely no reaction. now, my dad is the dumbest fucking person in the entire universe, so i'm not saying most people are like him.

so in some cases, maybe nothing actually works. nothing i can think of. but i hope, for most people, some approach does. but it's really hard to make a general statement about what approach works for any given person

the direct confrontation approach that works well with some people will completely alienate others, even radicalize them in some cases

Now there's an understatement. 'All white people are racist' scans as obvious trolling to a significant segment of the population, not all of whom are supposedly 'white'. Ime cooly and 'neutrally' (even if there is no such thing) discussing the topic with racists and subtly exposing them to patterns of thought they otherwise tend to reject outright because the 'liberal' label is patently affixed to them generally works better in the long run, although it goes without saying that lost causes are the norm (see the right-wing brain worms thread) and that you also need to attend to your own inevitable psychological distress when undertaking such rhetorical labour. But I don't live in a country where an all-out race war has been unfolding for generations (or rather not quite to the same extent), so feel free to take my approach with a grain of salt.

The problem is that nothing actually works.

― shout-out to his family (DJP)

insofar as there's nothing anybody can do to turn anybody else from Not Racist to someone who supports, even in the most milquetoast and provisional way (/me waves), action against white supremacist power structures, i agree

this is i suspect core to the ongoing processes of breakdown and fragmentation. i used to judge the hippies really harshly for abandoning political action, but what could they hope for from it, really? nothing to do but shrug and walk away and take what one can where one can get it.

I hope it's clear when I wrote "All white people are racist" is not a slogan, nor is it intended as a T-shirt phrase or strategy.

my personal fave is when you try to hector someone out of a racist position and they ultimately concede the point but actually just go on thinking the same old shit anyway (hi dad)

"all white people are racist" also invites a completely absurd corollary that is easily disproven and renders the entire discussion worse than useless.

as above, better to describe behaviors as racist, and not call people racist as if it's an intrinsic property, even if it kind of is (cf Alfred's excellent post above about chauvinism)

i do feel like maybe more people are getting it, but yeah, the way i go about it i do make a lot of enemies, which is unfortunate because i have enough fucking enemies already. and against that there is the constant thrum of the centrists who, apparently to keep hold of their own tenuous sanity, convince themselves that those of us who really don't like biden, who really won't _vote_ for biden, are simply some deranged hyper-minority, that we're not real, that we don't exist.

it wears on one.

Dunno, with my own dad, I've seen progress. Last year it seemed like even a recent topical conversation where he ultimately agreed with me had been relegated to oblivion the very next day but in the ensuing months I could tell he no longer leaped to the same conclusions as easily and sometimes even abandoned those positions altogether. It takes time, which fucking sucks, but I have no idea how else we're supposed to do this.

2xp to Simon

what if i told you there was a pill that could make it happen instantly, and the pill is called hydroxychloroquine

Biden and Harris speaking live.

Biden likened Trump to Hitler.

the bitterest pill (is hard to feed to my dad)

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMzJhNTM0NzItZjRiYi00YjhmLTliOTItYjM5NDc3MzJlOTgwXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMTAyMzYwNzgw._V1_.jpg

Please, tell me more.

Damn, Paul Weller has aged

It's this mofo btw:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Didier_Raoult

oh I thought that was trump's last doc

He basically started the trend and is now an inglorious French meme but unlike his 'research', his name doesn't appear to have gained much traction in the English-speaking world (this is a good thing).

i only saw Harris' part of the appearance. she was good! she said some disappointing things, of course (it's a bummer how quickly their position has solidified into "build on the affordable healthcare act"), but she always speaks well, and she makes the case against trump more effectively than biden, i think, which is useful.

"whining is what Donald Trump does best" a solid Biden line. He was his usual querulous self but the teleprompter helped.

She was great talking about her family. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think, at some point, they have to square their debate skirmish--it's the first thing I thought about when Harris was talking about Biden on civil rights.

Better to pretend it never happened. Who's going to care?

Good politicians are good actors. Biden's been doing avuncular since the Ford years.

Not going to stop Fox News or Trump from bringing it up, no Biden voter is going to not vote for him if they don't, "independents" probably don't even know it happened.

I should rephrase: good eternal politicians

One guy in Canada--I'm the only one...I don't know; if you saw it, I think it's hard to pretend you didn't see it. I'm not saying dwell on it, just come up with something. For Biden, it's mostly an advantage--magnanimous, I was wrong, doesn't hold grudges, etc. But maybe something from Harris.

It'll come up in the debates, maybe from one of the questioners; why not head that off?

Nope. Ignore it until one of the debate questioners brings it up (because as you say, they'll be unable to stop themselves) and then answer with a variation on, "Are you still talking about that? That was like a year ago, and I don't know if you've noticed, but a lot of shit has happened since then. So let's talk about [pet issue]..."

"We've had our differences - that's politics - but fundamentally we agree that..." is prewritten language, easy to tuck in somewhere.

But I also don't think the candidates should dignify every "why haven't you addressed..." question with a response.

For the same reason you don't let Trump bait you into taking a test or whatever.

xp - That you're posting in this thread means you pay more attention to American politics than 90% of the people who'll vote in November.

Some thoughts from reading recent updates to this thread:

Race isn't real, but racism is, and is an intimate part of this country's founding and continuing myth creation. I lecture about this to almost every class I teach. What is most important for people who aren't Black or Indigenous to recognize is that being an anti-racist must be a part of who one is, so that it becomes part of one's learning and living processes. My anti-racism has evolved (and evolves) over time to become more nuanced and understanding of complexities of white supremacy and oppressive structures in this country and elsewhere— it's not set in stone.

One of the biggest problems with a lot of white liberals is that they don't take into account the continued learning that MUST be a part of being an anti-racist. They take it as an identity rather than a learning process, and thus when they are called out on something racist, they take it as an assault on their identity rather than an opportunity to grow. In this sense, white liberal anti-racism is well-intentioned some of the time, but is inextricable from and complicit in the very structures of white supremacy and anti-Blackness that it purports to be against...because white liberal anti-racism's default position is *whiteness*.

As far as Biden and Harris go, of course I don't know what's in their hearts (lol), but to think that Harris is some sort of progressive when she has a literal record of jailing poor black people, excusing their murderers, and doing nothing about Nazis stabbing people in California state capitol, well...it's just really disappointing that the politics of representation has come to this. The woman is a literal enemy of Black people and poor people, not to mention an enemy of undocumented people. Nothing that any white liberal or older Black moderate (or any conservative for that matter) says can change that fact.

(xpost) Maybe. I wouldn't handle it that way. What's happened since doesn't erase what was said then. I say this as someone who was 1000% hoping Harris was the VP pick.

here's a piece laying out the argument for her being "the most progressive DA in California," seems a little thin to me:

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/voices/2020/08/10/kamala-harris-progressive-pioneer-san-francisco-da-column/3334668001/

(it's a bummer how quickly their position has solidified into "build on the affordable healthcare act")

In which Joseph demurs on whether he'd still veto #MedicareForAll if it came across his desk, and still refuses to support it outright.

"It's not gonna come across my desk." pic.twitter.com/tdjM26Ldw2

— HootHootBerns🌹🌺 (@HootHootBerns) August 12, 2020

he's right about that

Good to know he's letting him them know not to bother

it's not like Pfizer and Glaxo are gonna need to pay for a big splashy inaugural

"It's not gonna come across my desk."

i mean he's basically telling us to not vote for him, isn't he?

Why the fuck would he even say that? He really has zero ability to pivot. "There are a wide range of ideas, but one thing we all agree on" etc.

god he sucks so bad