What is "Woke"?

[BlackDude]

1 hour ago, nanana said:

For those of you who enjoy research into unintended consequences: [think before following links] [think before following links] [think before following links] https://networkcontagion.us/wp-content/uploads/Instructing-Animosity_11.13.24.pdf. Unfortunately even things as well indented as DEI sometimes have consequences that are the opposite of the intended result. 

Let me first say that I do not agree with DEI programs as they are instituted at all.
 

But from my understanding, the gist of that studies argument against DEI is white people telling themselves they’re really not racist and instituting reparative programs makes them really mad and more racist.
 

I don’t think that’s a legitimate argument against DEI. 

[nanana]

2 hours ago, BlackDude said:

Producing Justice is a punishment?

When it’s directed at the wrong people yes. 

[BootmanLA]

10 hours ago, nanana said:

When it’s directed at the wrong people yes. 

So who are the "right" people?

[hntnhole]

15 hours ago, BlackDude said:

But from my understanding, the gist of that studies argument against DEI is white people telling themselves they’re really not racist and instituting reparative programs makes them really mad and more racist.

Agreed. 

Any construct that allows a dominant group to continue to domineer a different group is messed up, no matter what you call it, or how you twist the original intent into something completely different.  Odd how a determined group, once they feel threatened in some belief or another, can twist all kinds of clarity into knots. 

[nanana]

On 11/27/2024 at 12:10 PM, BootmanLA said:

So who are the "right" people?

The people who can be definitively linked to an immoral act. It’s not good enough to say they “look” similar or were “born” into it. Children have no control over their circumstances, and the world is never going to be “fair.” Economic winners are always going to do something that pisses off others. As I said before, I am HIGHLY in favor of people and groups who feel that what they inherited was affected by past injustice to do something about it. However, there are two examples at different extremes of this and many examples in the middle of them: 1) build the capabilities to have the life you want; and 2) focus on taking away things from others that have been poorly distributed by past injustices. As I said there are reasons to do both, but I think the second path is likely to be less effective the farther it is in time, especially generationally, from the injustice. Also, the more unfocused the remedy is on the ACTUAL PEOPLE who did it. The wider the net especially to people who had no originating role in the injustice, the greater likelihood the remedy will be perceived as a new injustice rather than a remedy applied to the right people for the right people.  That is partly why elites love to tell stories about injustices were long past capable of doing anything about in the present, to distract from current injustice that could actually be tagged to the originator. The search for ancient injustices keeps us ricocheting and degenerates into stereotypical thinking, whereas building a skill and a legacy is harder to take away. 

[BlackDude]

1 hour ago, nanana said:

The people who can be definitively linked to an immoral act. It’s not good enough to say they “look” similar or were “born” into it. Children have no control over their circumstances, and the world is never going to be “fair.” Economic winners are always going to do something that pisses off others. As I said before, I am HIGHLY in favor of people and groups who feel that what they inherited was affected by past injustice to do something about it. However, there are two examples at different extremes of this and many examples in the middle of them: 1) build the capabilities to have the life you want; and 2) focus on taking away things from others that have been poorly distributed by past injustices. As I said there are reasons to do both, but I think the second path is likely to be less effective the farther it is in time, especially generationally, from the injustice. Also, the more unfocused the remedy is on the ACTUAL PEOPLE who did it. The wider the net especially to people who had no originating role in the injustice, the greater likelihood the remedy will be perceived as a new injustice rather than a remedy applied to the right people for the right people.  That is partly why elites love to tell stories about injustices were long past capable of doing anything about in the present, to distract from current injustice that could actually be tagged to the originator. The search for ancient injustices keeps us ricocheting and degenerates into stereotypical thinking, whereas building a skill and a legacy is harder to take away. 

The government allowed it. And we can widely identify that. And they can remedy it. This is not about jealously of “economic winners.” 

And many of the last slaves died during our parents lifetimes. I have family who was alive during Jim Crow, the GI bills, etc.   

You may have no control of the circumstances you were born under, but you do have control over the decision to produce justice. 

Edited November 29 by BlackDude

[BootmanLA]

On 11/29/2024 at 8:34 AM, nanana said:

The people who can be definitively linked to an immoral act. It’s not good enough to say they “look” similar or were “born” into it. Children have no control over their circumstances, and the world is never going to be “fair.” Economic winners are always going to do something that pisses off others. As I said before, I am HIGHLY in favor of people and groups who feel that what they inherited was affected by past injustice to do something about it. However, there are two examples at different extremes of this and many examples in the middle of them: 1) build the capabilities to have the life you want; and 2) focus on taking away things from others that have been poorly distributed by past injustices. As I said there are reasons to do both, but I think the second path is likely to be less effective the farther it is in time, especially generationally, from the injustice. Also, the more unfocused the remedy is on the ACTUAL PEOPLE who did it. The wider the net especially to people who had no originating role in the injustice, the greater likelihood the remedy will be perceived as a new injustice rather than a remedy applied to the right people for the right people.  That is partly why elites love to tell stories about injustices were long past capable of doing anything about in the present, to distract from current injustice that could actually be tagged to the originator. The search for ancient injustices keeps us ricocheting and degenerates into stereotypical thinking, whereas building a skill and a legacy is harder to take away. 

Actually I see this as a way to absolve all the currently living beneficiaries of long-repudiated policies, to allow them to keep their ill-gotten gains.

Your perspective seems to suggest - and please correct me where I'm wrong - that as long as enough time has passed, it doesn't matter how egregious the offenses were in the past that enriched certain people; their ill-gotten gains are duly whitewashed and taking the proceeds from their current owners - who, it might be noted, did nothing to earn those except to inherit them, often tax-free or tax-advantaged - would be "punishing" them. 

When the Nazis looted private collections of wealthy Jews in the 1930's, the items stolen did not magically become "non-stolen" property just because they passed through three or four or ten sets of hands between the theft and our discovery of where the item is. It's still legally (and most assuredly morally) the property of the person from whom it was stolen, and his or her heirs.

The same is true for the stolen labor of Black people who were kidnapped and sold into bondage here. The same is true for the resources of the indigenous people whose lands were stolen and who were forcibly relocated to the worst lands in the nation (again, until those lands proved to be valuable depositories of minerals, at which time they were forcibly dispossessed of those lands, too). 

[Poz50something]

18 minutes ago, BootmanLA said:

Actually I see this as a way to absolve all the currently living beneficiaries of long-repudiated policies, to allow them to keep their ill-gotten gains.

Your perspective seems to suggest - and please correct me where I'm wrong - that as long as enough time has passed, it doesn't matter how egregious the offenses were in the past that enriched certain people; their ill-gotten gains are duly whitewashed and taking the proceeds from their current owners - who, it might be noted, did nothing to earn those except to inherit them, often tax-free or tax-advantaged - would be "punishing" them. 

When the Nazis looted private collections of wealthy Jews in the 1930's, the items stolen did not magically become "non-stolen" property just because they passed through three or four or ten sets of hands between the theft and our discovery of where the item is. It's still legally (and most assuredly morally) the property of the person from whom it was stolen, and his or her heirs.

The same is true for the stolen labor of Black people who were kidnapped and sold into bondage here. 

Wasn’t there a promise to provide 40 acres and a mule? And that promise ended in betrayal when the federal government gave back those acres to former slave owners. Better have white former enemies controlling their resources than newly-freed black families. It remains an unfulfilled promise by the government towards black citizens. 

[BootmanLA]

Just now, Poz50something said:

Wasn’t there a promise to provide 40 acres and a mule? And that promise ended in betrayal when the federal government gave back those acres to former slave owners. Better have white former enemies controlling their resources than newly-freed black families. It remains an unfulfilled promise by the government towards black citizens. 

Technically, "the government" didn't make such a promise. One of the Union generals, William Tecumseh Sherman, made that promise, and it only applied to certain lands seized in South Carolina. It was never a broad policy promised to all freed slaves.

For an excellent summary, see [think before following links] https://www.pbs.org/wnet/african-americans-many-rivers-to-cross/history/the-truth-behind-40-acres-and-a-mule/ 

[Poz50something]

1 minute ago, BootmanLA said:

 

For an excellent summary, see [think before following links] [think before following links] https://www.pbs.org/wnet/african-americans-many-rivers-to-cross/history/the-truth-behind-40-acres-and-a-mule/ 

For the life of me, I was looking for this article, and Google failed me. Thanks for the info. 

[nanana]

No you didn’t get my point. I’m not saying justice isn’t good. I’m saying it gets harder and harder to administer the more removed it gets.  

[BootmanLA]

17 hours ago, nanana said:

No you didn’t get my point. I’m not saying justice isn’t good. I’m saying it gets harder and harder to administer the more removed it gets.  

Perhaps. But it seems like (again, correct me if I'm wrong) that you're more concerned about whether people today are inconvenienced (through higher taxes or whatever) than in providing long-delayed justice.

It's a fact of life that we all pay taxes for things we don't personally benefit from. Likewise, we all have to pay taxes and fees for things we didn't actually cause. But if we have to do so in order to make something right - particularly something that our government (which is a continuous entity even if the people who make it up change) had a hand in causing, or permitting, or supporting - then so be it. 

[nanana]

You have last word

[analluv27]

Perhaps reading “A People’s History of the United States” by Howard Zinn might help with some insight on how the wealthy colonialists convinced those who were in either poverty or indentured labor to see themselves better than those who were slaves. 
Now I remember growing up to be “Woke” was to have one’s eyes open to a system of oppression. To be Black a man in a lot of professions will have to work often twice as hard as someone who happens to be white to even be considered even possibly hired. 
Now the whole DEI issue, honestly a lot of those positions were throw away positions which in a lot of cases was embarrassing. Now if a major company hired a Black person as CEO or CFO that person is most likely great at what they do because no company is going risk losing money just to be come off as politically correct 

[TaKinGDeePanal]

On 11/24/2024 at 12:02 PM, BootmanLA said:

Well, with respect, it's a US acronym and its meaning here is really what mattered. If Australians had an "Indigenous Lives Matter" movement, I suspect y'all are all bright enough to realize that doesn't mean that the lives of descendants of white British colonials and the convicts they shipped over there do not matter. 

If y'all aren't please don't tell me. I want to think Australia is at least a tiny bit smarter than us about something beyond having universal health care.

Australians voted by a rough ration of 5:3 to keep Indigenous Australians basically living in third-class conditions. Wasn't helped by the fact that the PM can't campaign for shit - and pretty much phoned it in (like he has done for most of the time).