Posted by antonsirius on 4/28/2011 4:22:00 PM (view original):
Posted by silentpadna on 4/28/2011 2:10:00 PM:
1) My point has always been that the racism in this argument is an unsupported assertion. 2) And that this line of political attack is being used because of its expediency. If Obama was not the son of a Kenyan native, had not spent his youth in Indonesia, and all the other (baseless) reasons for this attack, there would be other things the fringe would be targeting instead.
1) And my point has been that calling into question whether a black man is really an American or not is prima facie racist, for all sorts of historical reasons I can provide you with links for if you need them. I do think it's very similar to the distinction between calling Bush "Chimpy", and circulating a picture of Obama and his family as chimps. There's no long, sordid history of trying to dehumanize white people by calling them monkeys. If that's makes for a double standard, well, too bad.
2) But again, saying these things were "expedient" doesn't at all address why they were expedient. Why were these the things that got built up into a lie, and not something else? Just saying, "they were expedient" completely misses the point of why they were perceived to be the quickest route to a smear by the originators of this line of attack.
Posted by silentpadna on 4/28/2011 2:10:00 PM:
This difference between you and me in this is that I do not claim to know the motivations of the people who designed or support the political attack. You, and a host of others seem to know without a shred of proof.
If you're asking me whether there's a distinction between being racist yourself and merely pandering to racists for political gain, well, my response would be to say that's a distinction I don't care to draw.
Basically, to me, your denials of the racism of this seem rooted in an ignorance of history, which would appear to be ridiculous given the Chester Arthur reference you just tossed out. Claiming a black man is not a real American, joking about a black family being monkeys, or (to pick another example) advocating that people must pass a literacy test before they can vote -- all these things are steeped in the ugliest periods of oppession in American history. To me they don't even qualify as "dog whistles". They're far more blatant than that.
More to the point, I really, really doubt that the originators of the birther attacks were ignorant of that history and just happened to hit upon a smear with directly racist connotations by pure accident. Occam's Razor slices that idea to ribbons.
You say it's racism on its face based on historical behavor
of others. I'm saying the issue, if it had been legitimate would have zero to do with his race - as an issue. And if it was a real issue, then those bringing it forward are not guilty of racism because generations before are guilty of racism in different incidents. If there are people who jump on this issue because
they themselves are racists, it does not logically follow that those who introduced the issue are racists. Heck you could call every white person on the planet a racist based on that kind of criteria - at least every conservative white person in this country. I have been called a racist several times for disagreeing with Obama. Why? Not because I'm a racist, but because of behaviors of others in the past on things completely unrelated.
The "expedient" reference was not pointing at the racism per se, but at the fact that whatever issue some think can gain traction is what gets used.
I can tell you with 100% certainty that if JC Watts or Chris Christie or Marco Rubio was running for president, I wouldn't have one iota of a problem with wanting to ensure they were eligible to hold the job. It has zero - absolutely nothing whatsoever - to do with their race. I could not care less. I never considered the "birther" issue to be a real one.
Just to be clear. I hate racism. Hate it. I wish it didn't exist. I'd like to see King's character content versus skin color realized in my lifetime. I have my doubts.
I just think that in order for that to occur we cannot be in position to judge people's thoughts without actual knowledge. The accusations against me of being racist had nothing to do with my reasons for disagreeing with Obama's policies, and everything to do with color. And those accusations had nothing to do with with my motivations.
I think the onus is on the person making the charge to back it up. I appreciate your appeal to history and I don't deny some of its ugliness. It still doesn't prove those in the movement or those that believed it did so because of race, even if there is a percentage of people who did. Racism is an ugly charge to levy on someone. History of others is not sufficient - at least to me. (Not that you have to satisfy me of course).