Photo by Russ Ward on Unsplash
By Dave S., Mark Mamerow, Dennis Curley, and Geoff Carter
(Recent Dialogue)
I’ll spare you my take, other than the subject line….as, in counterbalance to our recent, dialogue (as seen above).
–Dave
McWhorter pulls a fast one in his column. The thesis is that we are all being forced to parrot leftist fictions. The Emperor isn’t wearing any clothes, and we are all being pressured to ignore that.
But he offers precious little evidence for his assertion. He goes on at length about a job description for a California physics professor position, shaking his head at the anti-racist and anti-discriminatory qualifications that applicants must possess. Fine, it does sound like that job description was written by an absurdly “woke” committee. But McWhorter’s claim is that everybody is afraid to talk about that. Only HE is a bold enough truth teller to point out these absurd, non-physics related qualifications.
He eviscerates some “guide” put out by the AMA, that supposedly requires doctors to refer to low-income patient as culturally oppressed. First off, it’s highly doubtful that there are any regulatory teeth behind this guide. Large organizations will tend to publish drivel from time to time. But McW provides zero evidence that doctors are paying any attention to this guide, much less are afraid to talk about it.
Finally, he rhetorically spikes the football by quoting a FICTIONAL character in a FICTIONAL play! A character in the play based on Alanis Morrisette’s work doesn’t allow other FICTIONAL characters to mention that FICTIONAL black daughter might be a beneficiary of affirmative action! Goodness me, a playwright went a bit too far.
“My point,” says McW, “is that the existence of various forms of affirmative action in admissions is a fact and saying otherwise is fiction.”
Fine & dandy. Is anybody saying otherwise?
Great job, John McWhorter! You have successfully set up the straw man & demolished him.
-Mark
Yeah Mark.
That’s what I say — McWhorter’s done a classic straw man set-up. You might notice he throws in a “quote” from a doctor writing a diagnosis of an underprivileged patient in over-the-top woke-speak and sorta tries to pass it off as a real quote rather than some possible scenario he’s envisioning. A possible scenario I envision is this will be fodder for next week’s conservative talk shows
–Dennis
Ahem…I beg to differ but appreciate the critique.
Bigger picture: We all need to understand, folk who ain’t woke. We think they’re loonies, they think we’re loonies. One way of understanding their point of view—and I know you know this—is to look at some of the extremes of the extreme of the left—and put yourself in their shoes. And I thought McW picked a couple decent examples—the play gaffe notwithstanding. At dinner last night with (2) 20 somethings—In SF—they inform me there is some trend out here to open every meeting acknowledging Native people who once lived here. My future daughter in law was taking a continuing education lesson, virtual, re speech therapy. The instructor opened it with “respect for ancient tribes that used to live here”. Huh? Okay….
Thursday, I attended a new building dedication—10 speakers, most of them pretty good. The opening statement did exactly the same thing—recognized the native inhabitants. Most of us kind of looked around and thought…okay…not directly relevant to this type of facility, but we could all use the reminder. Generally, a left leaning crowd.
Well… the right would not be so patient—not sure the middle left wouldn’t roll their eyes too. No one likes to be preached to indiscriminately.
-Dave.
Hey Dave,
Thanks. I was just ruminating on the history of SE Wisconsin and all the native tribes that frolicked on these lands before the white man erected corn fields and breweries here.
Yes, this is some slightly ridiculous claptrap, but I think you missed the point of my response. I am not denying that some absurdly woke rhetoric is being deployed by individuals & institutions. I am disagreeing with McWhorter’s grievance that wokeness is somehow smothering and unavoidable. His claim is that tyrannical political correctness is silencing the great Silent Majority, who are afraid of losing tenure or employment, or being shamed on Twitter, if they don’t kowtow to this leftist bullying. That’s a monstrous exaggeration for which he provides exactly zero evidence. The reaction to wokeness has become a moral panic.
You have to wonder sometimes why most right-wing political opinion is almost always constructed on complaints and grievances about the Left. Is it because they lack ideas?
Allow me now to catalog, for comparison, a few of the absurd non-woke conventionalities which all participants in our public square must adopt or be shunned. One example is the deep religious faith that animates our political leaders, of both parties. It’s 230+ years since the First Amendment was ratified, and there is yet to be a politician who doesn’t acknowledge his or her faith and reliance on the Divine. You simply cannot be an atheist and get elected in this country! (Trump was actually refreshing in this respect. His declarations of faith were so baldly insincere that they gave aid & comfort to the faithless!)
Another convention we must obey is to invoke American “exceptionalism”. Our country is the best! Physically, morally, spiritually! Hey, I won’t argue that the US isn’t the best and richest place to live that this world has ever known. But from what I’ve seen, it’s not due to the exceptional intelligence, morality, or generosity of our citizens.
One more shibboleth is the constant positive references to “small” business and “family” farms. Those are somehow worthy of constant uplifting and recognition. When you prefix “family” to the noun “farm”, it becomes an unassailable icon of rectitude and blamelessness. Who cares if they are actually running an 8000-cow CAFO, emptying the aquifer, and dumping cowshit in every nearby creek and river? It’s a FAMILY farm (and a small business, to boot!)
So, buck up, my friend. We will soon learn to shrug off these unending paeans to our Native forerunners and pay no more mind to them than our current conventions. Maybe they can be included in a second stanza of the Pledge of Allegiance or National Anthem!
-Mark
Ahh. Good points about faith requirements in politics and the sanctity of the family farms.
BTW.
Did you happen to read the Atlantic article that McWhorter referenced (or rather, cribbed much of his essay from)? It offers more details on the AMA’s wokespeak recommendations. Wow! And here I thought ol’ John P. McWhiteman was exaggerating. Here’s what the AMA’s Task Force on Social Justice spent the last couple years on: “A strategic plan that serves as a three-year roadmap to plant the initial seeds for action and accountability to embed racial justice and advance health equity for years to come.”
The AMA did what I think many large organizations do as a Cover-Your-Ass move to appear pro-active in the battle against social injustice — they hired a “chief-equity officer”, formed a task force and created a mission statement. Apparently, the task force was a bit overzealous, maybe its members got carried away trying to one-up each other with woke-spoken virtue-signaling. As Dave says, despite their good intentions, it just sounds “loopy” to most people. Man, talk about fodder for conservative pundits.
(Ah, to be a fly on the wall at their task force meetings…)
Have you ever had to be part of a “task force” that creates a “mission statement”? I was volunteered twice at MPS. Excruciating experiences. My general input as a task force member was that if an organization must have a mission statement it should be succinct—cleanly written and to the point—maybe even just one sentence long; otherwise no one would read it much less take it seriously. The other members actually agreed to try the one sentence idea—but committee members kept adding to the sentence and it became such a ridiculously long, convoluted run-on sentence that my one sentence idea was scrapped. The mission statement became an impressive three paragraph tome with like 11 bullet points. The task force was proud, district administrators were pleased, but I’m not sure if many people actually ever read that overwrought, jargony mission statement.
Likewise, I’m not sure many doctors will actually ever read the AMA’s social justice road map, much less take it seriously or do anything different because of it. The AMA head poo-bahs probably considered their social justice work complete now that their asses had been draped in the rich, virtuous fabric of social justice woke-speak. As the backlash builds when conservatives trot it out as another example of liberal excess, they’ll probably be kicking themselves for not actually reading their Social Justice Task force’s plan before approving it. “By God, Jenkins, I thought you said you read it… Didn’t have the time? Neither did I. Ah well, understandable. …Have the caddy fetch me my nine-iron.”
–Dennis
Dennis is right on point with the Eduspeak gobbledygook. Instead of actually presenting real ideas, I think some of these educators, and bureaucrats in general, just want to look sincere while saying nothing because what exactly do they have to gain by changing the status quo?
These blanket ideologies, like loving the country and God—and equity— have gotten more strident, but I think that’s polarization. The bigger the rift, the deeper the line in the sand. But social change has happened. The Gay Rights movement suddenly and unpredictably became viable. Even though our government is doing precious little about climate change, some businesses and individuals are starting the change from within. From the consumer side. So, who knows? Perhaps the lip service to Native Americans and veterans might do some good in the end.
Does language change thought or vice versa?
–Geoff
One other thought. Health equity actually is a real issue. Black and brown people do so poorly, health wise, compared to the white majority. It’s no joke. But it does turn into a bit of a joke with the absurd woke references!
–Mark
Mark: So, spot on. 2 bits furthering this.
‘nother no joke: Heard a compelling story about systemic racism (SR) in algorithms (and SR is not quite the right term…maybe machine profiling is better…whatever). It is akin to what insurance companies used to do—still do—red line low-income neighborhoods and charge higher rates. The ladder out becomes steeper. This (radio piece—sorry I can’t remember who), talked about data that is very hard to extract…goes back to the 50s. Facial recognition was one topic. Wasn’t really pointing the finger at individuals—more the data and the algorithm.
But I digress. I’d add to your health care inequity. Housing in bad air (and water) cities. Gary Indiana was the poster child in the 60s-80s. It is far better because steel now comes from China (where the regulations are less, btw). But there are plenty of examples. The Port of Long Beach CA is a huge intermodal hub with terrible air. The first neighborhood downwind? Compton. Flint Michigan also springs to mind.
-Dave.