First Turning "purge"

[David Horn]

(08-16-2020, 01:46 PM)RadianMay Wrote: There is an interesting article on the New York times commenting about how the current intense focus on racial issues may be a distraction for what Aldoph Reed argues as the more important issue of economic class and opportunity in America.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/14/us/ad...sContainer

I largely agree with what he believes in, and what has been written before here, that a lot of the racial problems we're experiencing can be explained by the economic stratification of society at this time, with Black Americans getting the short end of the stick. I think the most important thing, for me, in this article was the comment that the experience a person has is more closely tied to their economic situation now more than ever. A poor white man and a poor black man has largely the same experience compared to a poor black man and a rich black man, for example.

Of course, there are still many other non-institutional issues with racism, such as the very real problem of discrimination, which have to be tackled separately, but I think the point that race and identity politics cannot and shouldn't be applied to everything is very important. All the large companies donating millions to BLM causes masks the real exploitation and damage to our society these companies are doing. The executives can boast about how much "good" they've done to society with a clean conscience, while the public just buys all these donations as "progress", but in reality the root of the problem is unsolved.

The class argument has been made, rejected, made again and rejected again.  It's no less true, just hard to sustain.  As soon as the argument becomes one of rich and powerful v. the rest of us, the rich and powerful circle their luxury wagons, hire whatever legal, propaganda and muscle support they need, and squash the argument (and the arguers) cold. The best that occurs, and it's rare, is a retrenchment -- think both Roosevelts as prime movers.  But ultimately, the system is not outlawed, so it reemerges, just like the weeds in your lawn.