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How should public figures atone for past bad acts?
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This is not an invitation to talk about Pelosi, I was answering a question directly.
This is something that's come out of the extremely-online corners of Tumblr & Twitter and it is, frankly, bullshit.
Allyship is conditional because literally everything in life is conditional. I'm a feminist ally, but if a feminist friend decides to go full TERF and start doxxing trans people, I will no longer be her ally. I oppose antisemitism but I've had a few people sever contact with me because I refuse to defend the government of Israel's actions in the West Bank. My allyship towards Jewish people does not include the creation of an apartheid state!
There is always going to be a negotiation, even if it's implicit, about how far our personal alliances can take us. (It isn't any different from personal relationships. No matter how much I love my partner or my family, there are conditions that could lead me to terminate those relationships.)
Now, if you un-Twitter-ify that statement (it's okay, you can use more than 280 characters here on PA) and rephrase it into something like "privileged so-called allies rarely do enough to actually help unprivileged groups, too much allyship is empty and performative, and I'm not going to give people ally cookies for just being nice without actually doing restorative work" and I'd be 100% on-board with that.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Look at what boomers are doing to both society and the planet.
“De-center yourself from power when society evolves beyond your generation” doesn’t sound like some scary dystopia to me. It sounds like a massive improvement.
That person doesn’t exist.
Here in the real world, that person’s heart makes them a doctor who provides a worse diagnosis rate to black patients resulting in worse health results because they don’t see reports of symptoms to be as pressing as they do from white people.
Being a consistent Democratic voter and leader advocating for all the normal Democratic things doesn’t make you immune to that kind of racism. And that kind of racism is so pervasive that it is absolutely not just coming from conservatives. It’s coming from all directions.
If you're making progressive choices and working for a just society today then you absolutely should NOT give up power to some hypothetical pure candidate (who by the way can run anyways and try to win).
If you're not making the right choices today then sure, get out of here.
I think there's more shades of grey here than you're willing to seriously argue from. Yes, politicians who want to make the air toxic should go away. But you've also applied this same argument to a guy who made up some articles in the 90s.
There seems to be some miscommunication here, because the argument that performative anti-racism can be bad hinges on someone actually doing racism, not just harboring a secret prejudice.
That’s how you get Crowley and not AOC, and look at how far left AOC is pushing the Overton window.
This one doesn't work on a couple points. Crowley lost because he was seen as not fighting for progressive issues and he wasn't dismissed in favor of a hypothetical candidate.
Quoting to expand as we are on the next page
If someone is doing “performative anti-racism” to paper over their “actual racism” then the “performative anti-racism” is still good and the “actual racism” is still bad. Were i to prefer between two people, one of which was performative AR and substantive R and one which was substantive R only i would prefer the Performative/Substantive mix. Because anti-racist actions are better than no anti-racist actions.
And were i to prefer between that same group and a performative AR only I would prefer the performative only because substantive racism is bad. And were i to prefer between someone who is performative anti only and someone who is substantive anti only i would literally not be able to tell the difference because i cannot see into someones heart and determine their true nature.
As such i do not care why people do anti-racist things and not do racist things, only that they do anti-racist things and not do racist things.
The argument youve been making is that “they did something racist 30 years ago therefore theyve been faking their anti-racism this whole time and theyre actually secretly trying to sabotage it and dont meant it” is bull. You dont know what is in their heart and I dont care. I care what they do
If they are doing racist things now, i dont care why they do them i care that they are. And they should be out because now is not the past. It is that simple.
How did you miss the bolded part?
This doctor is currently performing worse. Not in the past and not in an "inner feelings" way.
We're talking about the hypothetical doctor who wore a clan robe but now regrets it and doesn't let it affect their performance.
We're asking, should that doctor not be allowed to practice medicine based on their past mistakes.
How about you post what you want to post and don’t smarmily write posts for me.
But the point is very well taken and as an elaborating concurrence, I like it
It's literally how we got AOC, though - Crowley didn't step down even though he should have, and was beaten by a superior candidate despite entrenched power.
No, it's been communicated very well, actually.
Fair point. But it’s also why we had to wait so long for her and why we don’t have more.
The point being: replacing entrenched power with fresher faces is a feature, not a bug
This is good though?
A superior candidate won and we trusted that the electorate could identify someone actually working towards their current interests.
I don't understand how this is a refutation of what I wrote.
Yeah but what if people who did bad things voted for her?
Going by your earlier screeds, that means AOC is a direct representation of "the system" because people always unknowingly do racist shit I guess?
No. It does not. Not in the argument that was from the start of the quote tree. Nor from the start of the either thread.
Becuase if theyre doing racism now then we dont need to go back to 30 years ago to figure out whether or not they should be out of office. If theyre doing racism now they should be out of office because fucking duh theyre doing racism now.
The central question of the thread is only valid if the person isnt now currently doing shitty things.
As such, worrying about performative racism et al is really trying to look into their heart and judge them like saint peter.
I agree with you 100% and I think everyone else would as well.
My only comment would be what if we find out something bad about the new fresh face of progress?
I didn’t miss it. I rejected it.
The hypothetical doctor doesn’t exist. It does effect their performance, and the performance of all the doctors produced by the same system
I guess I disagree, considering that the performance is in service to being able to continue the substantive racism.
As Lee Atwater said in 1981:
The fraction of the white supremacist power structure in US government that's openly white supremacist is vanishingly small. The portion that employs the Atwater-style dog whistles is not even a plurality. And yet, we get more white supremacy and there are perpetrators who are defended from consequences in the court of public opinion by their woke public relations or even just by their rhetorical opposition to the Honest Racists even if they, for instance, vote alongside them.
That's branching far outside the subject at hand though unless we're adding "being a Party animal" to the list of things to atone for.
"Look at all the times these bad people were replaced by good people" seems like...idk a weird argument?
Not at all. One of the most frequent arguments is that we can’t hold people accountable for their long-past mistakes because losing entrenched power would be worse than keeping it.
Losing entrenched power is awesome. 5/5 would recommend
Then we find 10 more.
I was pretty willing to listen when I was 19 and moved out on my own. But there were also people willing to engage with and discuss matters with me rather than condemn me as unforgivable for life. If I knew that my previous views would label me as forever evil I don’t know that it would have been the case.
And then all 10 of them don't meet your exacting standards?
That is sufficiently unlikely as to be unnecessary to plan for.
This seems... optimistic to me.
Saying someone should willingly de-center themselves from power is not labeling them as evil
Well, so is finding 10 people who haven't ever done anything that could be considered bad in the context of this whole thing.
Yes and those people are performative AR plus substantive R and so natrually i prefer are Performative AR only. They perform anti-racism such that they can actually do racism. Such they actually do racism... such i prefer the people who dont do racism...
What you seem to be saying is that any time anyone does something that is anti-racist but you dont believe that theyre pure of heart they must be secretly racist and trying to keep people down.
And i am sayijg that i cannot tell the difference because i am not a psychic and so only look at what they do
Edit: you say these people dont exist but its literally the thesis of the thread that they do. Someone once did something racist a long time ago, now they day they are not racist and it was a mistake and also theyre not currently doing racist things should they be removed from office.
This descriptor probably encompasses a good deal of people in this thread, were they to be elected to public office. Hell I bet we have some hella racist/sexist archives on the forums for people that i would absolutely vote for to make good policy*. Does that disqualify them?
So basically what youre saying is that doctors should not exist because systematic racism exists?
Also we are kind of talking about individual actions and not unknowing actuons.
And also kind of talking about public figures and not private figures.
*in fact i am almost positive of it given the history of the board.
They fear losing power to someone unknoen and worse. Crowley's opponent doesnt apply.
Virtually every position short of the very bottom is a position of power.
I have a job that includes overseeing advancement reviews for a dozen people of varying races and genders. Should I be removed given 19 year old me was a racist, sexist ass?
I’m saying we can’t begin to work toward justice until we stop trying to cordon racism off into a corner full of bad people, as if it has nothing to do with the rest of us.
“What if the person hasn’t done anything racist since” is a question that is entirely counter factual
With respect, you cannot state that all doctors who have done racist things in their past are all worse doctors in those specific circumstances because you cannot read everyone's mind/heart.
Worse performance in this context is actively being racist , it's not a past mistake!
I think we're on the same page that if Doctor A is giving worse medical advice/service to black patients then they should be fired and/or undergo retraining to overcome this.
If Doctor A gives the same quality advice to every type of patient and the outcomes are similar then I don't care that Doctor A thinks Indian people are the best and everyone else sucks.
Doctor A in my scenario is Indian because this sure as shit isn't a white's only problem.
We've gotten to accustomed to politicians serving for a long time, so the idea of having a revolving door is alien and "unfeasible" to us. Yet we haven't tried it, despite knowing the problems long-term office holding brings.
"good" and "bad enough" are not solid points, that's the problem. I'm a socialist. What do we want to bet I'd come up with a list of people who get to keep their power that is anywhere close to most of the people in this thread?
Well what actually happens is the not-caring shitheads get in sometimes and make things horrible.
I'd rather not play the boom and bust game with human rights.