John McWhorter: The Neoracists A new religion is preached across America. It's nonsense posing as wisdom.

[bigbird 60,557]

3 minutes ago, AUFAN78 said:

Anyone that disagrees with you clowns is a farce right? Spare me dumbass.

No need to report to name calling.  It really diminishes any points trying to be made.

[AUFAN78 3,911]

2 minutes ago, bigbird said:

No need to report to name calling.  

True. Thanks! I made the edit.

[homersapien 11,385]

13 minutes ago, bigbird said:

Oh good the intellectually superior route. It's always good to be reminded how dumb the rest of us are.

Awwww, are you insulted?   Does the "shoe fit" or are you just afraid it might?

I didn't call you dumb.  I didn't call "the rest of you" dumb. 

But I will readily admit that there are several people on this forum that I ignore because they are literally not worthy of my response.  So excuse me for having standards.

 

 

[AUFAN78 3,911]

2 minutes ago, homersapien said:

Awwww, are you insulted?   Does the "shoe fit" or are you just afraid it might?

I didn't call you dumb.  I didn't call "the rest of you" dumb. 

But I will readily admit that there are several people on this forum that I ignore because they are literally not worthy of my response.  So excuse me for having standards.

 

 

Or that you're incapable of debating them because they are right and not you. Truth is good for your sole homey. Try it.

[johnnyAU 3,633]

11 hours ago, AUDub said:

Sowell is another one. Hell the guys stock opinion of Barack Obama is that he was basically Hitler lol. 

LOL. You are nothing if not incredibly predictable. 

[AUDub 11,153]

6 hours ago, bigbird said:

Someone has a different opinion and automatically they are now a bad person and deserve to be called names?  There's a reason why people choose not to engage with you. 

I impugned his ability to reason, not his character. I'm sure he's a good father to his kids and a generally decent guy. 

But at the end of the day abject bull**** is abject bull****, and his preconceived notions are steering him to buy into some absolute whoppers. 

Let's get down into the weeds of the OP, then.

Start with the initial framing. McWhorter makes a living off of being a contrarian at this point, but his flowery arguments all boil down to, you know, bull****. The point is that by saying "x belief is like a religion," he's trying to make the case that said belief is illogical. It's the kind of dickish attitude certain segments of non-believers have had towards religious people and religion in general for years. This attitude is especially egregious because he has essentially mischaracterized an entire modern day civil rights movement as SJW zealots, that the core of their beliefs and motivations are fantastical and imaginary. 

This is a common theme for him, setting up a convenient strawman - stopping at the superficial - to thrash rather than taking an in depth and thoughtful approach and really getting down into the weeds. Like most contrarians, he doesn't do nuance. It's like using Westboro as an example to say all evangelicals can be dismissed.

Ignore for the moment that he casts himself as an ardent believer in what he characterizes as the "1st and 2nd waves if anti-racism." This guy is one of those that would have used the same arguments in those eras to play the contrarian role. "MLK is too extreme!" Those movements were not so different as he likes to argue.

Who could’ve predicted that McWhorter would begin by giving uncharitable versions of his opponents’ positions before doing a fair bit of mind-reading while employing the same polarizing and totalizing language he critiques others of using? Oh, anyone who’s read his politics stuff before (I have, and have even wielded his arguments to support my own in the past).

Wild. 

You know it’s going to be good when he gets to calling Ta-Nahesi Coates’ Between the World and Me pathetic. There we go! That’s the honest, non-loaded kind of debate we’re after!

This is a perfect example:

"If you’re white and only date white people, you’re a racist. But if you’re white and date a black person you are, if only deep down, exotifying an “other."

I’m sure you can find someone who thinks this somewhere. But to pretend it’s anything like an even somewhat mainstream view among the anti-racist crowd is dishonest to the point of lying. Stuff any more straw into it and it’s going to ask the Wizard for a heart. 

Usually when you hear real people’s concerns about these things, they go something like: “It gets really tiring to be a black woman and be told ‘you know, I’ve never been with a black girl before...’ as though we're a ticket to punch.” Or how white guys saying “I only date black women” isn’t the star in their cap they think it is. Or the perspective that it’s a pretty racially loaded thing to have porn categories where giant, strong black men with names like mandingo provide cuck services in videos titled things like “mandingo BBC destroys innocent white girl.” 

Even if you disagree that those things are a bit sketchy, those points are on the plane of reason. Which is why McWhorter doesn’t use them and instead goes to something so totalizing that you immediately recoil from it. 

The convenient thing is that he’s doing almost exactly what he claims his opponents are. He even comes up for a title for them! Do you think it’s a title that the group would agree accurately describes their views and gives them respect as the opposition in this “debate?” Of course not. It’s a inherently mocking title, so now you can dismiss the whole group with that silly, silly name (that’s the name he gave them) instead of getting into the actual discussion. 

Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Almost like it’s just about the exact thing he’s criticizing...

Then add in the fact that McWhorter is a racialist himself, and who apparently doesn't know the first thing about genetics, yet feels the need to weigh in in the most offensive manner possible.

*sigh*

I wish I could take you guys seriously, but I can't. Again, you just can't help yourselves.

[johnnyAU 3,633]

53 minutes ago, AUFAN78 said:

Anyone that disagrees with you clowns is a farce right? Spare me.

The funny thing is that Homer and Dub think their opinions of McWorter and Sowell hold any relevance. Neither of the former could hold either of the latter's jocks...so to speak. It's rather funny to watch play out. 

Sowell is 90 years old, and would still intellectually club both of them senseless in any debate.

[AUDub 11,153]

3 minutes ago, johnnyAU said:

The funny thing is that Homer and Dub think their opinions of McWorter and Sowell hold any relevance. Neither of the former could hold either of the latter's jocks...so to speak. It's rather funny to watch play out. 

I know better than them in certain instances because I'm not a moron. McWhorter thinks black people are inherently genetically inferior even though that isn't true at all for anyone that has a base understanding of how genetics, epigenetics and demes work. I posted that video for a reason. He may run rings around me as a linguist, but he fails utterly in other regards where he's speaking out of his depth. 

[AUDub 11,153]

10 minutes ago, johnnyAU said:

The funny thing is that Homer and Dub think their opinions of McWorter and Sowell hold any relevance. Neither of the former could hold either of the latter's jocks...so to speak. It's rather funny to watch play out. 

Sowell is 90 years old, and would still intellectually club both of them senseless in any debate.

You are presenting the fallacy of the "argument from authority."

You could be better. 

[homersapien 11,385]

3 minutes ago, AUDub said:

You are presenting the fallacy of the "argument from authority."

You could be better. 

Nah, I don't think he could. 

 

[homersapien 11,385]

38 minutes ago, johnnyAU said:

The funny thing is that Homer and Dub think their opinions of McWorter and Sowell hold any relevance. Neither of the former could hold either of the latter's jocks...so to speak. It's rather funny to watch play out. 

Sowell is 90 years old, and would still intellectually club both of them senseless in any debate.

Well, then he's improved over the last 40 years or so.

His biggest problem IMO, is that he's too prolific.  He's a self-promoter who feeds on controversy and puts out a LOT of stuff - particularly in article form - which reflects a lack of real effort, much less empirical research (which he apparently doesn't do).

He was once a big critic of Trump until he did a 180 to get on Fox. So if anything, I'd say he's regressed.

[AUDub 11,153]

7 minutes ago, homersapien said:

Nah, I don't think he could. 

 

He could try. 

But it's not about "debate" for them. It's about rhetoric and scoring points.

Thomas Sowell may very well own me in a "debate" because he's an experienced "debater" with a firm handle on rhetoric, but that doesn't mean he is ultimately correct.  Just convincing. 

Whatever. These idiots value the superficial. Truth is arbitrary to them. 

[AUDub 11,153]

34 minutes ago, johnnyAU said:

LOL. You are nothing if not incredibly predictable. 

"Consistent" is the word you're looking for. 

As are you, but in a far different, far more idiotic manner.

[AUDub 11,153]

1 hour ago, AUFAN78 said:

Anyone that disagrees with you clowns is a farce right? Spare me.

Hey, remember when Obama was both a Fascist and a Socialist? Yeah, that.

Homer is correct.

[AUDub 11,153]

1 hour ago, bigbird said:

Oh good the intellectually superior route. It's always good to be reminded how dumb the rest of us are.

You expect everyone to participate here as stupidly as you do and are offended when they don't.

No.

[AUFAN78 3,911]

4 hours ago, AUDub said:

I impugned his ability to reason, not his character. I'm sure he's a good father to his kids and a generally decent guy. 

But at the end of the day abject bull**** is abject bull****, and his preconceived notions are steering him to buy into some absolute whoppers. 

Let's get down into the weeds of the OP, then.

Start with the initial framing. McWhorter makes a living off of being a contrarian at this point, but his flowery arguments all boil down to, you know, bull****. The point is that by saying "x belief is like a religion," he's trying to make the case that said belief is illogical. It's the kind of dickish attitude certain segments of non-believers have had towards religious people and religion in general for years. This attitude is especially egregious because he has essentially mischaracterized an entire modern day civil rights movement as SJW zealots, that the core of their beliefs and motivations are fantastical and imaginary. 

This is a common theme for him, setting up a convenient strawman - stopping at the superficial - to thrash rather than taking an in depth and thoughtful approach and really getting down into the weeds. Like most contrarians, he doesn't do nuance. It's like using Westboro as an example to say all evangelicals can be dismissed.

Ignore for the moment that he casts himself as an ardent believer in what he characterizes as the "1st and 2nd waves if anti-racism." This guy is one of those that would have used the same arguments in those eras to play the contrarian role. "MLK is too extreme!" Those movements were not so different as he likes to argue.

Who could’ve predicted that McWhorter would begin by giving uncharitable versions of his opponents’ positions before doing a fair bit of mind-reading while employing the same polarizing and totalizing language he critiques others of using? Oh, anyone who’s read his politics stuff before (I have, and have even wielded his arguments to support my own in the past).

Wild. 

You know it’s going to be good when he gets to calling Ta-Nahesi Coates’ Between the World and Me pathetic. There we go! That’s the honest, non-loaded kind of debate we’re after!

This is a perfect example:

"If you’re white and only date white people, you’re a racist. But if you’re white and date a black person you are, if only deep down, exotifying an “other."

I’m sure you can find someone who thinks this somewhere. But to pretend it’s anything like an even somewhat mainstream view among the anti-racist crowd is dishonest to the point of lying. Stuff any more straw into it and it’s going to ask the Wizard for a heart. 

Usually when you hear real people’s concerns about these things, they go something like: “It gets really tiring to be a black woman and be told ‘you know, I’ve never been with a black girl before...’ as though we're a ticket to punch.” Or how white guys saying “I only date black women” isn’t the star in their cap they think it is. Or the perspective that it’s a pretty racially loaded thing to have porn categories where giant, strong black men with names like mandingo provide cuck services in videos titled things like “mandingo BBC destroys innocent white girl.” 

Even if you disagree that those things are a bit sketchy, those points are on the plane of reason. Which is why McWhorter doesn’t use them and instead goes to something so totalizing that you immediately recoil from it. 

The convenient thing isher grthat he’s doing almost exactly what he claims his opponents are. He even comes up for a title for them! Do you think it’s a title that the group would agree accurately describes their views and gives them respect as the opposition in this “debate?” Of course not. It’s a inherently mocking title, so now you can dismiss the whole group with that silly, silly name (that’s the name he gave them) instead of getting into the actual discussion. 

Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Almost like it’s just about the exact thing he’s criticizing...

Then add in the fact that McWhorter is a racialist himself, and who apparently doesn't know the first thing about genetics, yet feels the need to weigh in in the most offensive manner possible.

*sigh*

I wish I could take you guys seriously, but I can't. Again, you just can't help yourselves.

John gave an opinion. I agreed. Rod Dreher agreed. None claimed to be an expert.

You gave an opinion and clearly you're no expert.

So where did this leave us? Just another dose of Ben's condescension. 

Pardon me if I can't take you seriously. 

[AUDub 11,153]

1 hour ago, AUFAN78 said:

John gave an opinion. I agreed. Rod Dreher agreed. None claimed to be an expert.

You gave an opinion and clearly you're no expert.

So where did this leave us? Just another dose of Ben's condescension. 

Pardon me if I can't take you seriously. 

This was one of Proud's favorite little rhetorical games before he was banned. Post something completely off the wall, feebly defend it when questioned and get absolutely destroyed in the process, retreat to "It's my opinion and I've a right to it!" upon said destruction. That others agree reveals nothing more than those folks being just as dense as the guy you quoted in the OP.

Actually, I take the dense part back with regard to McWhorter. He is actually a decent scholar when it comes to linguistics and knows how rhetoric works. Therefore, he is not dense like Dreher (or you). He knows exactly what he is doing. His lot is bad faith, not ignorance or stupidity.

I made several criticisms in the post you quoted, yet you choose not to engage any of them. And for good reason. McWhorter's little essay there is quite obviously loaded down with bad faith arguments. Strawmen, ad hominems and appeals to ridicule that you, being you, love simply because it's red meat being tossed your way. That fact that it's logically unsound matters not at all to you, and that's by design. His rhetoric appeals to you not because it's logical, but because it appeals to your silly and highly skewed senses of ethos and pathos. Clearly my condescension is warranted.

It doesn't take a philosopher to spot bull****. Hell, the best essay I've ever read with regard to the defense of reason was not written by a classically trained philosopher, but an astrophysicist.

[AUFAN78 3,911]

1 hour ago, AUDub said:

This was one of Proud's favorite little rhetorical games before he was banned. Post something completely off the wall, feebly defend it when questioned and get absolutely destroyed in the process, retreat to "It's my opinion and I've a right to it!" upon said destruction. That others agree reveals nothing more than those folks being just as dense as the guy you quoted in the OP.

Actually, I take the dense part back with regard to McWhorter. He is actually a decent scholar when it comes to linguistics and knows how rhetoric works. Therefore, he is not dense like Dreher (or you). He knows exactly what he is doing. His lot is bad faith, not ignorance or stupidity.

I made several criticisms in the post you quoted, yet you choose not to engage any of them. And for good reason. McWhorter's little essay there is quite obviously loaded down with bad faith arguments. Strawmen, ad hominems and appeals to ridicule that you, being you, love simply because it's red meat being tossed your way. That fact that it's logically unsound matters not at all to you, and that's by design. His rhetoric appeals to you not because it's logical, but because it appeals to your silly and highly skewed senses of ethos and pathos. Clearly my condescension is warranted.

It doesn't take a philosopher to spot bull****. Hell, the best essay I've ever read with regard to the defense of reason was not written by a classically trained philosopher, but an astrophysicist.

Yet this wasn't off the wall. McWhorter is right these antiracists tenets are nonsense. You on the other buy the crap. So who is dense here?

There is no bad faith. He succinctly nails the problem. This group think is a cancer, it strangles academic inquiry, it forces us to render time not to urgent issues but engage dangerous doubletalk, it forces us to teach our youth fallacious arguments and shroud it in the name of enlightenment. It makes black people look dumb, weak and accepting of the label. It is all nonsense. Black students aren't poster children, but rather capable beings. I see amazing stories of triumph in these kids daily and the last thing I want if for us to go backwards. Hard work matters.

Quoting John, "But a new religion in the guise of world progress is not an advance; it is a detour. It is not altruism; it is self-help. It is not sunlight; it is fungus. It’s time it became ordinary to call it for what it is and stop cowering before it, letting it make people so much less than they—black and everything else—could be."

You are correct on the last statement which is precisely why I called out yours. 

 

[Grumps 3,704]

20 hours ago, AUDub said:

I mean we have a guy that endorses base biological "race realism" being held up as some sort of luminary here. A black man that argues black people are inherently inferior by nature, and y'all just can't help yourselves. 

Absolutely laughable.

That's not how I interpreted his argument.

[Grumps 3,704]

20 hours ago, AUDub said:

Sowell is another one. Hell the guys stock opinion of Barack Obama is that he was basically Hitler lol. 

Do you have a link for that?

[Grumps 3,704]

10 hours ago, homersapien said:

"Race" has no basis in scientific reality.  It is a human social construction.

So, regarding the question you posed, the answer would be predicted by science as "yes", providing all aspects that influence "IQ" (another meaningless term) are equal.

Seriously? Are you saying that one's economic status and educational opportunities and home environment have no effect on IQ? McWhorter was talking about the IQ of adults, I'm pretty sure. Do you really think that all aspects that influence IQ are equal???

[AUFAN78 3,911]

8 minutes ago, Grumps said:

That's not how I interpreted his argument.

It's not the argument. Rather Ben's interpretation. 

Go to bloggingheads.tv and get a picture of John's sentiments for yourself. John attempts to erase young black students of the stigma. Some do their part to ingrain it. 

[AUDub 11,153]

1 hour ago, Grumps said:

Do you have a link for that?

I do. 

https://townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/2008/10/20/believers-in-obama-n122465

 

 

[AUDub 11,153]

1 hour ago, Grumps said:

Seriously? Are you saying that one's economic status and educational opportunities and home environment have no effect on IQ? McWhorter was talking about the IQ of adults, I'm pretty sure. Do you really think that all aspects that influence IQ are equal???

I literally posted videos of the guy suggesting CRISPR or "serums" as a solution for the black populace. That isn't how this works. McWhorter is a bigot. 

Grumps, you're either arguing out of your depth, a liar or a dumbass. 

Weigh what I've said carefully before continuing. 

[AUDub 11,153]

1 hour ago, Grumps said:

That's not how I interpreted his argument.

It very much goes to the heart of his argument.