If we were to return to the tested and proven standard of "racism is bad, period" and applied it across the board, regardless of who the subject of bigotry is, it would do a lot to heal some of this instability. We basically had a rule that said it's not OK to discriminate overtly or covertly against any group, and gave that perfectly fair standard away in favor of in-group signaling by letting people hate on one group of people in particular because of vague historical oppression reasons.
Creating an intractable, low-grade race war seems to be a largely intentional vote-driving strategy from both parties (or the uniparty, depending on your flavor). By this point we've gotten pretty good at industrial grievance extraction. Lefties were happy to take the first step by "punching up," and then the Trump reaction was happy to take the ball and run with it. Perhaps it's naive to act like this started in the 2010s, though.
I would be careful about the mass cancellation bit, as I think most anti-white rhetoric is espoused by a very small minority, in the same way anti-minority beliefs are really uncommon. There are a lot more people on both sides who think "I just want to protect my side, and my ill will comes from other people threatening them" than who actually spend time threatening the other side. Anti-whiteness is more a looming threat for most, and does more to harm people psychologically than practically in most cases.
A late-stage liberal internationalist attempting to suppress cultural radicalism through managerial discipline in order to stabilize the global order; this is a pruning operation in order to save globalism, cosmopolitanism and free movement. I get it. I just do not think this will happen. The managers have no incentive to "cut them down" They would have to reform the whole direction of their system. Illiberal radicalism is the playground that they give the dumb kids and the bloodthirsty to play in.
I agree that what I am suggesting seems unlikely, but I don't think it is impossible, and I think it would work, so I will advocate for it. I think reform is actually necessary and inevitable and it is the status quo which is unstable and impossible to maintain. It will either come about from smart leftists who are committed to deeper principles than signaling, or from competent rightists who humiliate their shallow opponents.
Spot on analysis of the problem, though I’m skeptical that a mass cancellation of people espousing anti-whiteness would achieve anything other than a massive backlash and end up only engendering even more anti-white feeling. I think to do this successfully you can’t lay things out so nakedly - you would have to make it about combating “anti-Americanism” or “anti-Western” people instead. Something that is clearly an analogue of sorts for “whiteness” to a lot of people but that doesn’t trigger the great modern bogeyman of racism.
As you say the problem is psychological and spiritual - it was not caused by direct assaults on white people but rather by people denigrating America and the West (projects understood to have been founded almost exclusively by white men) as uniquely evil. If a liberal white man feels bad about his race (hands up guilty this used to be me in my more gullible years) it’s because he sees his cultural heritage as morally bankrupt and his ancestors as villains in the arc of history. Make everyone proud of America and Western culture/ideals/society and I think you would immediately see much of the “white men are evil” discourse dry up.
Censorship works quite well and the backlash theory is a myth.
Look at the electoral strength of the right-wing before and after Elon bought Twitter.
I would even say: look at the cultural power of American Naziism before and after 1940, Stalinism before and after 1946.
You can literally just ban Hasan Piker and force politicians who use anti-white rhetoric out of office. You can fire all anti-white professors.
I'm not proposing a campaign against "liberals," and this is where the argument gets very specific. Conservatives sometimes believe that you could get rid of "liberals," which is a much more ambitious and unlikely task.
I'm actually talking about a promotion of a reformed liberalism which sees a hard line imposed and explores other avenues of exploration. Sort of like how after Stalinism died in America, the far left began to explore NAMBLA, drug use, free love, etc.
I'm not saying we can censor the left as a whole; that's not my purpose. It's to clearly delineate the bounds of discourse around race.
If we were to return to the tested and proven standard of "racism is bad, period" and applied it across the board, regardless of who the subject of bigotry is, it would do a lot to heal some of this instability. We basically had a rule that said it's not OK to discriminate overtly or covertly against any group, and gave that perfectly fair standard away in favor of in-group signaling by letting people hate on one group of people in particular because of vague historical oppression reasons.
Creating an intractable, low-grade race war seems to be a largely intentional vote-driving strategy from both parties (or the uniparty, depending on your flavor). By this point we've gotten pretty good at industrial grievance extraction. Lefties were happy to take the first step by "punching up," and then the Trump reaction was happy to take the ball and run with it. Perhaps it's naive to act like this started in the 2010s, though.
I would be careful about the mass cancellation bit, as I think most anti-white rhetoric is espoused by a very small minority, in the same way anti-minority beliefs are really uncommon. There are a lot more people on both sides who think "I just want to protect my side, and my ill will comes from other people threatening them" than who actually spend time threatening the other side. Anti-whiteness is more a looming threat for most, and does more to harm people psychologically than practically in most cases.
I used to have nostalgia the 70s but after reading and seeing pictures of how things were back then….yeah, no thanks.
As a pro tip, many people especially old school types prefer the term "reverse racism".
A late-stage liberal internationalist attempting to suppress cultural radicalism through managerial discipline in order to stabilize the global order; this is a pruning operation in order to save globalism, cosmopolitanism and free movement. I get it. I just do not think this will happen. The managers have no incentive to "cut them down" They would have to reform the whole direction of their system. Illiberal radicalism is the playground that they give the dumb kids and the bloodthirsty to play in.
I agree that what I am suggesting seems unlikely, but I don't think it is impossible, and I think it would work, so I will advocate for it. I think reform is actually necessary and inevitable and it is the status quo which is unstable and impossible to maintain. It will either come about from smart leftists who are committed to deeper principles than signaling, or from competent rightists who humiliate their shallow opponents.
Spot on analysis of the problem, though I’m skeptical that a mass cancellation of people espousing anti-whiteness would achieve anything other than a massive backlash and end up only engendering even more anti-white feeling. I think to do this successfully you can’t lay things out so nakedly - you would have to make it about combating “anti-Americanism” or “anti-Western” people instead. Something that is clearly an analogue of sorts for “whiteness” to a lot of people but that doesn’t trigger the great modern bogeyman of racism.
As you say the problem is psychological and spiritual - it was not caused by direct assaults on white people but rather by people denigrating America and the West (projects understood to have been founded almost exclusively by white men) as uniquely evil. If a liberal white man feels bad about his race (hands up guilty this used to be me in my more gullible years) it’s because he sees his cultural heritage as morally bankrupt and his ancestors as villains in the arc of history. Make everyone proud of America and Western culture/ideals/society and I think you would immediately see much of the “white men are evil” discourse dry up.
Censorship works quite well and the backlash theory is a myth.
Look at the electoral strength of the right-wing before and after Elon bought Twitter.
I would even say: look at the cultural power of American Naziism before and after 1940, Stalinism before and after 1946.
You can literally just ban Hasan Piker and force politicians who use anti-white rhetoric out of office. You can fire all anti-white professors.
I'm not proposing a campaign against "liberals," and this is where the argument gets very specific. Conservatives sometimes believe that you could get rid of "liberals," which is a much more ambitious and unlikely task.
I'm actually talking about a promotion of a reformed liberalism which sees a hard line imposed and explores other avenues of exploration. Sort of like how after Stalinism died in America, the far left began to explore NAMBLA, drug use, free love, etc.
I'm not saying we can censor the left as a whole; that's not my purpose. It's to clearly delineate the bounds of discourse around race.