The Right Way, the Wrong Way, and the Buckley Way — Post by Dafydd ab Hugh
This post is written by Dafydd ab Hugh, who is no longer related by embryonic stem-cell therapy to Patterico…
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Followup to my last post here, Racial Ratiocination: I object in principle to examining a single paragraph, or even a single essay, and concluding that it constitutes “racism.”
Racism implies intent; even if the speaker is racist merely through ignorance, he must at least believe that one race is inferior to another race, even if he doesn’t understand why that belief is wrong.
But such an attitude should show up again and again in speech and writing; if a person believes in a heirarchy of races, it will permeate his world. Therefore, if the snippet you are investigating is unique — if there are no other examples of alleged racism from the same author — it’s almost certainly not racist, but rather clumsy phrasing at worst, or perfectly reasonable, but misunderstood by the reader, at best.
The proper way to examine whether such and such is racist is to determine whether the author (so and so) is racist; if so, and if such and such walks and quacks like a duck, it probably is. But if so and so cannot be shown to be a racist himself, it’s unlikey he has written something intentionally racist.
For the proper way to hunt for racism, I recommend the William F. Buckley, jr. essay “In Search of Anti-Semitism,” which originally appeared as an extended article in the National Review in 1988 (I can’t find the exact number). He expanded it to book length, and you can buy it used from Amazon.
Buckley examines whether either Joe Sobran or Patrick J. Buchanan is antisemitic; contrary to the Publishers Weekly book review, I distinctly recall Sobran being found guilty and sentenced to banishment from the pages of NR, while Buchanan was acquitted by the master. PW announces just the opposite, but I suspect its author was driven more by his own Buchanan hatred than anything Buckley wrote.
(Since then, Buchanan has gotten even more radical; and I believe his radicalism has finally pushed him from merely being anti-Israel to full-blown antisemitism; but this was not so 21 years ago.)
In any event, if we wish to examine whether Robert Stacy McCain (no relation) is an antisemite, or whether his article or e-mail was antisemitic, we really should look at the totality of the man and his writing… not just a single paragraph in a single monograph.
“That’s just the f-ing way it is.”
— Dafydd ab Hugh
UPDATE BY PATTERICO: I agree entirely (and have said throughout this contretemps) that McCain should not be evaluated by one statement. However, I think McCain ought to be clear about whether he said it or not. As the updates to this post show, he has not been entirely clear about it — and is still muddying the waters to some degree.
Well, if you’re gonna insist on using the actual definition of the word, the debate’s gonna change dramatically!
Chuck Roast (1d0de3) — 12/8/2009 @ 12:58 amBut that *is* the definition of racism. Either two races are equal on the face of it, or they are not. You may very well hate Jews because they’re on the verge of taking over the world (and hence they’re superior), but that still implies belief that one race (Jewish) is superior to another (white/brown/black/whatever).
Gregory (f7735e) — 12/8/2009 @ 2:09 amWell,
Curtis (653a53) — 12/8/2009 @ 2:50 amhard to believe that I had the balls to read Immanual Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason on a train from DC to Newport. Silly me, I could have been killed by a savage frog who objected to objectification.
The problem is that Jews are not a race. Actually, the correct definition of Judaism is neither race nor religion, nor tribe, as the modern world defines them, but a mixture of all three. Antisemitism is a mental illness that refuses to acknowledge that human beings must act morally. Jews are the “canary in the mine” and antisemitism is the disease that shows the desire to act with barbarism and savagery with no moral limits. That is why the left are basically antisemites. They have the illusion that once all mankind has been reduced to slavery, they will be the ones in charge. Of course, “there can be only one” and they will be the first to be eliminated. When Stalin took over, he eliminated all the early Communists because he wanted to make sure that he was “safe” from everyone who were willing to take action.
Sabba Hillel (153338) — 12/8/2009 @ 5:19 am“Racism implies intent; even if the speaker is racist merely through ignorance, he must at least believe that one race is inferior to another race, even if he doesn’t understand why that belief is wrong.”
Speaking of Buckley, from 1957:
“The central question that emerges–and it is not a parliamentary question or a question that is answered by meerely consulting a catalog of the rights of American citizens, born Equal–is whether the White community in the South is entitled to take such measures as are necessary to prevail, politically and culturally, in areas in which it does not predominate numerically? The sobering answer is Yes–the White community is so entitled because, for the time being, it is the advanced ace. It is not easy, and it is unpleasant, to adduce statistics evidencing the median cultural superiority of White over Negro: but it is fact that obtrudes, one that cannot be hidden by ever-so-busy egalitarians and anthropologists.”
imdw (e66d8d) — 12/8/2009 @ 5:29 amI disagree with your definitional requirement that racism requires a belief that one race is inferior to another. There are a number of racial separatists out there who believe that the races should be kept separate from each other, while taking pains to emphasize that they don’t consider any races superior or inferior to the others. Now perhaps that is merely protective window-dressing on their part, to give them cover, but it is at least conceivable that they sincerely hold that belief.
Assuming they were sincere, I would still consider them racists, by virtue of their belief that racial traits should be considered part of our fundamental identity and determine with whom and how we should spend our lives.
PatHMV (003aa1) — 12/8/2009 @ 5:52 amBuckley’s quote on Buchanan: “I find it impossible to defend Pat Buchanan against the charge that what he did and said during the period under examination amounted to anti-Semitism, whatever it was that drove him to say and do it”
I agree with you that racism is unlikely to show itself with a single instance; even a ‘careful’ racist is unlikely to keep glimmers of his racism from showing through.
But I disagree (if this is your point) that one ignores one’s writings in lieu of looking at the ‘person’ to judge racism; in the case of Buchanan (if I remember Buckley’s piece correctly), Buckley effectively found Buchanan guilty primarily on the basis of his writings.
steve sturm (369bc6) — 12/8/2009 @ 6:06 amSomewhere the Frankfurt School members are looking down on us and smiling. (Looking up?)
Best wishes,
MFS (5184ef) — 12/8/2009 @ 6:14 am[…] Also, Dafydd ab Hugh has written me by e-mail a defense of McCain, and I invited him to blog it or post it in a comment. He has offered to make it a guest post here, and I accept that offer. [UPDATE: Here it is.] […]
Patterico's Pontifications » R.S. McCain Responds; UPDATE: Appears in Comments, Claims I Am Somehow Misquoting Him (e4ab32) — 12/8/2009 @ 6:20 amThe problem is that Jews are not a race. Actually, the correct definition of Judaism is neither race nor religion, nor tribe, as the modern world defines them, but a mixture of all three. Antisemitism is a mental illness that refuses to acknowledge that human beings must act morally.
Antisemitism is the failure to ignore or pretend to ignore the intense ingroup favoritism practiced by many Jews. E.g. I have yet to hear the patriots here question why Rahm Emmanuel ran off to a foreign country and enlisted in its armed services (or an ‘adjunct’ therefore) during a time that the US was at war. Imagine if John Kerry had had a chief of staff that had joined the French Foreign Legion during the Gulf War — the collective Patteritite head would explode.
You know, I used to visit this site, but stopped because it became pretty banal– how many times can you read ‘socialist’ ‘medicine’ Obama without getting bored. But I revisited because I thought — you know — Patterico’s pretty patriotic, at least he, alone (except for the Pinay Malkin) among the conservosphere, will have a bit on Pearl Harbor day.
I was greatly disappointed — not only nothing about Pearl Harbor, but an inquisition about a paragraph RS McCain wrote 13 years ago, a contest to prove who is the most fanatical miscegenationist , and the usual ‘oooh, that PJB is such an antisemite’.
I thought I was going to Patterico — guess I dialed up Kos instead.
a concerned conservative (11d38a) — 12/8/2009 @ 6:26 amIf you want Pearl Harbor, I suggest you go to Chicago Boyz where there is an interesting discussion. I too get bored by some topics but this is the owner’s blog, not the Church of All Things.
On the other hand (or maybe the same one), lawyers earn a very nice living by picking nits out of stacks of paper and those of us who are bored by that have other diversions when the picking gets too intense.
I could not care less if Rahm serves in the Israeli Army. When your co-religionists are under attack by primitive tribes of rag heads, you are entitled to participate. Lots of Boston Irish contributed to the IRA.
Mike K (2cf494) — 12/8/2009 @ 6:51 amHow did we get these Stormfront fruits here?
nk (df76d4) — 12/8/2009 @ 7:16 amI could not care less if Rahm serves in the Israeli Army. When your co-religionists are under attack by primitive tribes of rag heads, you are entitled to participate. Lots of Boston Irish contributed to the IRA.
Rahm joined the IDF ‘adjunct’ when my reservist buddies were being called up to go fight in Desert Shield and Storm. Did lots of Boston Irish join with and fight in the IRA while this country was actually at war? Did those individuals become grand vizier to B Hussein Obama? I have no problem at all with American Jews who make Aliyah — I do have a problem with taking the benefits of this country while showing that when the chips are down, Israel comes first.
Will check out Chicago Boyz, though.
a concerned conservative (11d38a) — 12/8/2009 @ 7:23 am[…] 2: I was so intent on my own writing I didn’t see update here, here and here at […]
My take on the Patterico business « DaTechguy's Blog (2b7e85) — 12/8/2009 @ 7:53 amThanks for the discussion Dafydd and Patterico. Can we now convict OJ?
tyree (9d7ff3) — 12/8/2009 @ 7:56 am“he must at least believe that one race is inferior to another race, even if he doesn’t understand why that belief is wrong.”
Please don’t get mad at me for playing devil’s advocate here: does that mean that some psychometricians are wrong when they assert that there are measurable differences in mean IQ among races?
gp (72be5d) — 12/8/2009 @ 8:10 amgp, it depends on exactly what those psychometricians are asserting, and on what basis they are making the assertion. Have they, for example, controlled for socio-economic status of the individual? For the conditions in which the individual was raised? That is, did they compare black people raised in poor, substandard environments with white people raised in similarly poor, substandard environments? Are the psychometricians asserting that the measurable differences they have observed are based on race-correlated hereditary factors?
For that matter, are they attempting to discern actual ancestral lineage rather than simple skin color? That is, do the ones you are thinking of distinguish between a black person who is descended from Australian aborigines and a black person who is descended from Ethiopians, or either of those from a descendant of sub-Saharan Africans? Or have they labelled all of those very different, very widely separated gene pools with the simple and misleading moniker of “black”? (And, for that matter, have they done the same with “whites,” measuring separately descendants of celts from descendants of romans from descendants of slavs?)
My own reaction to such studies is to be very suspicious of any such claims. They would have to be very thorough and very solid, and very precise in their claims, for me to give them much credence.
PatHMV (140f2a) — 12/8/2009 @ 8:26 amAgain with the tying one’s self in knots to ignore the obvious bigotry. Why else would you object to your sister marrying a black person, if not racial prejudice? And racism is not just believing people of a race are inferior; if someone said “White people are better architects than people of other races” that would be a racist statement. McCain’s quote is racist and there’s no need to bring Buckley or Buchanan or Rahm Emanuel into the discussion. Maybe he doesn’t think this anymore and maybe this is the only racist thing he ever said and we can disagree with how racist he is, but the statement is racist.
feefob (ed42bd) — 12/8/2009 @ 10:01 am“Why else would you object to your [non-black?] sister marrying a black [male?] person, if not racial prejudice?”
This whole thing was explored in the movie “Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner.” In that movie, both fathers (Spencer Tracy, the white card-carrying FDR man, and black Roy Glenn) explain non-self-racist reasons that an interracial marriage may be problematic. If I remember correctly, one problem they brought up is the pushback that the newlyweds would have to overcome from racist others _outside_ the family. Of course, that was 1967, and it was just a movie.
On the specific case at hand, I think it is fair to say that R.S.McCain is a lover of the culture of the Old South, and that love tangles him up in a lot of racist fetters. If I were publisher of, say, American Spectator, I would probably decline to carry his writings, because I wouldn’t want to have to expend energy defending him.
Speaking for myself, an extremely pale white male, I would be delighted if Condi Rice wanted to marry me.
gp (72be5d) — 12/8/2009 @ 11:58 amSpeaking for myself, an extremely pale white male, I would be delighted if Condi Rice wanted to marry me.
Barking up the wrong tree, if you know what I mean.
Why else would you object to your sister marrying a black person, if not racial prejudice?
Because you value your phenotype, and your own population group? No other group produces blonds, or folks with blue eyes. Perhaps more arguably, no other group produces civilizations like ours — certainly there is no evidence in Africa of something like our civilization. Likewise, there is nothing in Asia that approaches, ironically, our civilizations openness. You don’t see the Japanese or Koreans opening up their societies to mass immigration, for example.
dp and PatHMV — assuming you are in good faith interested in this topic, here is a great website of psychometrician Linda Goddfriedson, which has links to scholarly articles on both sides of the issue. Let’s say to start with the issues are complex, but PatHMV, these people are pretty smart, and they do control for many of the things you bring up. Anyways, check out the articles — some are a bit technical, but it is possible to skip over the technical parts and still get the gist of the conclusions.
http://www.udel.edu/educ/gottfredson/30years/
a concerned conservative (b24992) — 12/8/2009 @ 4:58 pm“Racism implies intent; even if the speaker is racist merely through ignorance, he must at least believe that one race is inferior to another race”
No. A racist is someone who thinks in terms of race as a primary characteristic, as a relation of ‘us’ to ‘them’. It’s the belief that members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, especially but not exclusively in terms of superiority and inferiority.
“The media now force interracial images into the public mind and a number of perfectly rational people react to these images with an altogether natural revulsion.”
Whatever the reason for that revulsion it’s racist.
bored again (d80b5a) — 12/8/2009 @ 5:16 pmHitler thought Jews were intellectually superior to white Christian “Aryans.”
gp:
I make no assessment of any particular study. But that’s not what “inferior” means. Come to that, blacks tend to be taller than Orientals; does that mean they’re superior? Or are they inferior, because they tend not to do as well in school?
The problem is twofold:
Defining superior/inferior on the basis of external characteristics;
Lumping everyone with the same skin color into the same group, rather than treating each person as a distinct individual.
When I say no race is inferior to any other, I mean in a cosmic “human value” sort of way. I don’t dispute that various races, however defined, can exhibit more or less of certain good or bad characteristics than other races. I do reject the idea that this alone makes them superior or inferior as races.
But what I object to most is being told that “whites” are smarter than “blacks” but not as bright as “Orientals” (which liberals insist upon calling “Asians”) or “Jews” (which liberals insist upon calling a race). Does that mean I’m smarter than Thomas Sowell but dumber than Kim Jong-Il?
What about the heirarchy within each group? How do Germans stack up against Italians, or Portuguese against Armenians? How about Hutus, Tutsis, Somalis, Ethiopians, and Congolese? Where do Persians fall on the superiority scale — are they counted as inferior whites or superior Orientals?
And what about those who straddle groups? Where does that leave the late Sammy Davis, jr. — a Jewish black man — or Tiger Woods, a.k.a. “Mr. Cablinasian” (his portmanteau word for caucasian, black, indian, and Asian)?
The whole idea of race is a biological absurdity to me, because most people are of mixed ancestory; and for an individualist like me, I note that Sammy Davis was even smaller than I — but Yao Ming, who is still Chinese I believe, towers over us both.
Race is useful as shorthand for police descriptions; but for almost everything else, I treat people as individuals.
Dafydd
Dafydd (96b517) — 12/8/2009 @ 6:34 pmFolks:
Racist: A person who believes some races are cosmically inferior to others.
Racial bigot: A person who dislikes people because they belong to a particular race.
Racialist: A person who thinks race is always a person’s most important characteristic.
Racial separatist: A person advocating a separation of the races.
Racial supremicist: A person who believes one race should rule over the others.
Racial discrimination: Treating a person differently because of his race.
…Distinct words for distinct concepts.
Dafydd
Dafydd (96b517) — 12/8/2009 @ 6:41 pm“When I say no race is inferior to any other, I mean in a cosmic “human value” sort of way.”
Awww… shucks.
“The Bell Curve” was racist crap referring to “research” by men who had theories of cock size based on…
theories of cock size.
European studies of black and mixed race children of black GI’s Europe.
Equal.
Jews? The studies refer to Ashkenazi Jews who are mutts. At least to the Sephardim who hold themselves up as more purebred.
Your logic is that all are equal before god but maybe… maybe not before science.
And this is from the people who argo that data of global warming is part of a conspiracy.
It’s racism Daffy.
bored again (d80b5a) — 12/8/2009 @ 9:08 pmYou’re a racist, boy. Just admit it.
Sorry for the spelling, I’ve had a few,
bored again (d80b5a) — 12/8/2009 @ 9:10 pmAfter reading this post, I think I’ll go have a few more.
It’s not like we’d know if you were posting sober, so enjoy.
Stashiu3 (44da70) — 12/8/2009 @ 9:14 pmSmoke some more, Stash.
And keep dreaming your dreams.
You’re the kind of dude you gets caught in your lies and then admits to them proudly.
Go torture a kitten.
bored again (d80b5a) — 12/8/2009 @ 9:37 pmbored, are you really this defensive? What makes you think you need to fight so aggressively… so desperately? You could make your points without defeating yourself every time, if you wanted to put a little ‘chillpill’ into your malt liquor.
Dustin (44f8cb) — 12/8/2009 @ 9:44 pmStashiu, please ban bored again. You don’t have to take this crap.
Patterico (64318f) — 12/8/2009 @ 9:51 pmbored again has posted while sober?
Icy Texan (8b985a) — 12/8/2009 @ 9:51 pmAs soon as someone accuses me of torture, it’s a safe bet we’ve seen them before. It turns out that bored again is the previously-banned sleepy/AF/blah/Readnek/and others. I’m rather embarrassed that I didn’t catch this earlier. My only excuse is that I usually ignored bored again’s drunk-blogging and routine screening didn’t show a connection.
In any case, bored again is banned again per Patterico again. 😉
Stashiu3 (44da70) — 12/8/2009 @ 11:00 pmconcerned conservative: “Imagine if John Kerry had had a chief of staff that had joined the French Foreign Legion during the Gulf War…”
I for one would have no problem with that.
The Sixième Brigade Légère Blindée (6th Light Armored Brigade) was the left-most element of the Coalition attack into Iraq. The 6e BLB included three regiments of the Legion Étrangère.
Dafydd: “Does that mean I’m smarter than Thomas Sowell but dumber than Kim Jong-Il?”
Congratulations on vaporizing that straw man with a 20 megaton H-bomb.
Are men taller than women? If so, does that mean Danny DeVito is taller than Venus Williams? Obviously not, but men are, on average, significantly taller than women.
Nor does the relative intelligence of one individual member of each of two groups prove (or disprove) anything about the relative average intelligence of the two groups.
Rich Rostrom (8abb80) — 12/9/2009 @ 12:38 amDaffyd’s posts are extremely fair. As a racialist — I don’t believe that race is the most important thing, but *one* of the most important and a racial separatist also (don’t want a return to Jim Crow, but do think that there is nothing wrong with advocating marrying within your own group etc. ) he no doubt disagrees with me, but I find that he is quite fair in his descriptions and analysis. This will no doubt cause him some grief, but I am going to say it anyway.
What I do think is silly, even for mainstream conservatives, is for Patterico to rising to the left’s bait and attacking a man that may at one time have said something controversial regarding race. After all, this is the same tactic the left uses to delegitimize Amerikkka — and seeing as how folks like Thomas Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt, even Harry Truman held views far more “extreme” than McCain, they have a point if one concedes their basic premise that race must never be talked about, except to bash the white man.
a concerned conservative (ee6bbb) — 12/9/2009 @ 3:36 amI should have said “views* imputed* to RS McCain>”
a concerned conservative (7e5454) — 12/9/2009 @ 6:02 am“all are equal before god but maybe… maybe not before science” That sums it up very well. Advances in genetics, bioinformatics and other branches of science will lead to a better taxonomy of human race, and a deeper understanding of the human phenotypes. Science may end up telling us things that we won’t like about human diversity. Make sure to mark a bright distinction between objectively observed measured phenomena and the normative judgements we draw from them.
Men of all races are equal before God, before the law, and in the possession of inalienable rights. That transcends science. But it in no way invalidates an observation that a population of individuals with gene expression A1B2C3 has, say, a mean height greater than that of a different population.
gp (f596a1) — 12/9/2009 @ 3:45 pm