Nobody thinks those specific views are racist as stated, with no other context. But neither were they what he was challenged on in the relevant threads.
To pick an analogy not related to that poster, imagine if I said “I’ve been called racist for stating the belief that the voting population should be literate”. There’s nothing racist at all about that belief…until you discover that what I was really doing is defending Jim Crow laws. Context and framing are important.
What that shows is that you are trying the hardest to hide the craziness of the sources you rely on by hiding under a reckless accusation that all the ones that point at the flaws in your arguments are just pointing at racism.
Most of the time, craziness or willful ignorance by your sources of information or “leaders” that you follow is what is taking place.
I wanted to comment on your nice post here. It is basically what I was getting into.
The current focus of the conservative “leaders” (they are really followers of appalling conspiracy theories nowadays) is what you pointed out. In old times the Republicans and conservatives talked a lot about meat-and-potatoes kind of ideas. Nowadays they are mostly pumping the nuts and banana ones.
In that kind of information bubble, it is not strange that the consumers of that fruity cereal (and it is worse on right wing internet sites) also get to repeat misleading talking points and conspiracy ideas. Racism is just one out of many froot loops in that bowl. **
That leads to a lot of chances to find out that most posters in the SDMB will go from demanding cites first and then go all the way into putting the contrarian’s feet over the coals in the BBQ Pit after seeing that contrarian doubling down based on already demonstrated tainted sources of information.
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** Yes, you got it, I’m having breakfast. 
I know it’s all bullshit, because I was called racist in the Pit for opposing the replacement of a race-blind admissions process with one that discriminates against Asian Americans in favour of white, black and Hispanic students, and for thinking this was racist. 
There’s no context where that is reasonable.
If you say so.
How about you pick one of my examples of your choice and show why it was Actually Racist using the real posts instead of the “well you could have meant…” thing?
Because that was already explained in the relevant threads and doesn’t need to be relitigated in ATMB.
Can we please not turn this into Yet another School Admissions Thread?
You got called racist. You disagree. In fact you claim the other guy is racist. COOL STORY. Why do you feel the need to run to the mods and ask them to stop the mean people from calling you a racist?
Right. Don’t do that. Or take it to the Pit, or heck, Great Debates. But this is ATMB and is not an appropriate place to litigate specific arguments.
I think we have heard that many conservatives feel that “reasonable conservative opinions are attacked as racist” and that many others feel that “those opinions actually ARE racist in context” I don’t believe that disagreement can be resolved here, and this really isn’t the proper venue to attempt to resolve it.
If there is more that people want to say about how this message board is or should be run, go for it. But again, this is NOT the place to re-litigate specific charges of racism.
If I may suggest, it’s outrageous to think that a rule should resolve this disagreement. Often the very reason folks think the conservative opinion is flawed is because they think it’s racist. Hell, that’s sometimes the reason that conservatives think a liberal opinion (e.g., support for Affirmative Action) is flawed.
Right. If you disagree that your policies are racist, make the case that they aren’t. If you think the liberals are the REAL racists, make that case. Don’t run to the mods and ask them to stop people from discussing racism just because you don’t like what the mean people said about you.
All of that can be and was done in GD, and @puzzlegal is right, we shouldn’t be relitigating it here. The only thing you can’t do outside the Pit is attack other posters personally, which is the part I and other people are objecting to. It doesn’t help prove anyone’s point, it doesn’t make the board a better place (if anything it’s the reverse as the grudges spill over into other forums), and due to the make up of the board it’s not an even fight but more of a bullying scenario. The main justification seems to be that certain posters enjoy the chance to band together with ‘us’ to try and hurt ‘them’. A very human motive, but hardly a laudable one.
What I see in the Pit is a lot of people, well mostly the same people over and over, who are self-appointed Protectors of the SDMB and think that 500 posts on a poster is somehow important and making a difference. They’re also the same people who monopolize any thread in GD and P&E, making sure that any sort of wrongthink is called out. The software has a block list. Use it instead of making interminable Pit threads about a poster that isn’t engaging.
But the focus of the board is to fight ignorance.
What if the case is that many of the ideas that the right wing are harping about are conspiracy theories or coming from La-la-land? Even with the partisanship removed, the results would be very similar to what we see in the SDMB.
One could make the case that there is anonymous bullying in the board, but in this particular example the context also includes the extreme bullying and threatening of the lives of minority scholars and teachers in the real world. Of course many conservatives that post here are not involved on that, but it is noticeable IMHO that that part of the issue is ignored when it is also an example of why there is a reason that people that research injustice do exist.
I don’t enjoy pit pile ons and very rarely will I join in. But it is very frustrating to participate in a thread in which the OP makes a bunch of claims that are false or predictions that fail to occur and then refuses to come back to say they were wrong. That doesn’t feel like fighting ignorance, it feels like I took the bait.
I definitely understand wanting a place to call that sort of activity out.
What is the threshold for something to be a “pit pile-on”, I wonder?
If someone says something demonstrably false, how many people are allowed to address it before they become a “mob”?
If they all agree that the statement is false, does that make them a “hivemind” for all holding the same view, even if they all reached that conclusion independently?
Are we saying that if one person is deliberately repeating misinformation on this board, there’s a maximum number of people allowed to respond and/or counter that misinformation? Or that we should only approach them one at a time, like some cheap martial arts film battle?
And what if that person is doing so in multiple threads? Is it a first-come, first-serve sort of thing, where only the person who starts the Pit thread is allowed to call them out on it?
No, it doesn’t. Mostly it is because posters here have self-selected to be those who agree on a basic worldview and on many ideas - not least because constant attacks in the Pit have driven away most of those with different viewpoints (see Bricker) If it was a subject where determining truth and falsity were simple and unambiguous, the thread would be in GQ, not GD.
And it’s not that posters in the majority are necessarily behaving any worse in the Pit, either. It’s the fact they are in such a majority that makes pitting other posters problematic.
Do you have anything new to add, or are you just agreeing with the crowd? That’s how I decide whether to post.
So it’s not possible to make unambiguously true or false statements in GD?
I am, by no means, a “conservative”. That argument is not, in any way shape or form, just a Conservative poster stance.
No. The accuser must make the case that they are.
Excellent points.
Yep.
Which you do by facts, cites and debating, not name calling.
They DO, in the Pit. And you don’t like it so you want the mods to tell them they aren’t allowed to make those kinds of arguments. Well, sucks to suck.