Reasonable. Thoughtful. No air of infallibility. How the heck did you become a mod?
Seriously, you handled this simply, reasonably, and with aplomb. Well done.
I’ve never heard of the term “Holocaust denier” as being an insult. If it is, perhaps we can criticize the post and not the poster. It keeps the debate from getting sidetracked.
The second point you make is the distinction made on this board. “You are acting like a racist” versus “You are a racist” contains an important distinction that allows the thread from descending into a pissing contest. In the first statement, there is the implicit assumption that the poster is not the “racist” that his posts imply, but that he has made an error in judgment or a misstatement that may be corrected or rebutted in a subsequent post. The second statement contains an in your face, direct confrontation which will only descend into a “no I’m not; yes you are” three page hijack.
Agreed. His coffee mug privileges are under review. 
In my mind, there’s a clear distinction between the following categories:
- Appellations that have no bearing on a person’s debatable beliefs. Racial epithets and gender/sexual epithets fall into this category, and when the words are derogatory, I have no problem with banning them.
- Appellations that have a bearing on debatable beliefs, but that are deliberately derogatory when there are other synonyms that work just as well that are not. Religious epithets and political epithets (“Fundy,” “Commie”) fall into this category. Given my druthers, they’d be moderated in moderation: the occasional one wouldn’t be a problem, but there’d better be some substance to the poster otherwise.
- Appellations that have a bearing on debatable beliefs, and regardless of any derogatory nature are the only widely-acceptable words for those beliefs. “Christian,” “paleoconservative,” “anarchist,” and “racist” would all fall into those categories. I wouldn’t moderate these words at all, although if a person’s post consisted of nothing more than namecalling I’d moderate them for jerkitude.
Because the term “asshole” is indisputably an insult. The term “racist” or “sexist” isn’t.
Beyond that, the term “racist” doesn’t necessarily say anything about the person’s intelligence, morality, or even if that person is a good person or not.
There are many different levels and degrees of racism. People who think that black people make better running backs due to genetics are not necessarily in the same boat as people who want them exterminated. In fact it’s very possible to find people who are in many ways progressive and good yet we’d still regard as racists.
Bob Gibson mentioned how he had white friends on the St. Louis Cardinals in the 1960s whom he liked very much, who he knew fought against segregation and spoke up when hotels would try and keep him out even if it meant some personal sacrifice on their part and whom he wouldn’t hesitate to invite to his wedding and who wouldn’t hesitate to invite him to theirs or go out to dinner with him and if they were told by the manager “we can let you in but not your friend” would say “ok, let’s go somewhere else” but who would still object strongly to the idea of a white woman marrying a black man.
For that matter I knew several black people in college whom I liked and thought were good people who made it clear they really, really didn’t like the idea of white women and black men hooking up.
Also, when I was in the West Bank I met plenty of Palestinians, almost all of whom would happily make statements that all fair-minded people would have to view as anti-Semitic, whom I liked and viewed positively.
Some racists are assholes and like I said, they come in many different varieties. New Yorkers who nearly wet themselves when a black man steps into the same subway car as them are racists, but that doesn’t put them in the same category as people who want them all lynched.
Hopefully, the mods won’t think my next comments don’t overstep, but frankly while I think bita malt is a racist and thought referring to him or her as such was appropriate, I don’t necessarily think that bita is an asshole. I’ll take bita at his word and assume that he’s a bit naive, not as well-read as he could be, but somewhat intellectually curious and he’s intrigued by this intellectual fight he’s just found out about.
Kind of like the way people who are young, somewhat intellectually curious, but haven’t really read anything heavy can have a bit of a conversion experience when they read Noam Chomsky or Ayn Rand.
I’m sure we all remember those people from college.
I agree that calling someone racist is attacking the post instead of the poster, and should be sanctioned. (the same would go for other descriptions of the poster instead of their posts) But Marley has been on record as saying that calling people racist is not an insult necessarily. And, as long as he says that, I don’t think you can expect not to use it.
Plus the mods are always more lenient when people get momentarily too upset when responding to someone who is deliberately provoking them. I think it’s a trade off for letting these types of threads exist at all, despite the fact that they know they always get tempers flaring and cause problems. And despite the sketchy intentions of the people who post them–whether newbies with an axe to grind or older posters who’ve already been through this enough times to know how the thread will go.
No poster here is ever going to agree that we have to listen to clearly racist ideas without getting angry, no matter who thinks that be able to listen to opposite views. For a lot of people, it’s like listening to a pedophile talk about how the age of consent should be lowered–when you are a parent and thus constantly thinking about your kids’ safety.
There’s just no way these types of things are going to be on this board without some comments that get really close or even slightly cross the line. So, since the mods think such threads are so important to preserve, they have to be a bit lenient, or they’d wind up constantly having to shut down the threads entirely.
In fact, I’m pretty sure this is the entire point of GD. If we could not get so upset, these things could be put in IMHO.
Except the mods have specifically stated they really don’t see a difference between “you’re being an X” and “you’re an X”.
This for a good reason.
Were we to use your above reasoning, then the mods shouldn’t step in if I say “you’re being an asshole” because based on the above reasoning saying “you’re being an asshole” is directed at the posters arguments not the poster.
No, according to the mods saying “you’re being racist” is not much different than saying “you’re a racist”.
If you think I’m wrong, say to a poster, “stop being an asshole” or “stop being stupid” and see just how quickly you get nailed.
This is a great post.
Not really seeing how “Christian” and “racist” can be lumped together like that. I suppose if you taylor them specifically to make it work, maybe, but in general usage… no.
Actually, I deliberately put them at opposite ends of the spectrum of terms that refer to a belief but that are generally the best term for that belief, neither euphemistic nor pejorative.
What do you call someone who believes Jesus is the messiah? A Christian.
What do you call someone who subscribes to a Pat-Buchananlike set of beliefs? A paleoconservative.
What do you call someone who believes in the abolishment of all state power? An anarchist.
What do you call someone who ascribes certain genetic traits to a sociologically-constructed race? A racist.
For each of these terms, you may be able to think of a euphemism or pejorative that means the same thing, but these are the “just the facts” terms.
And yes, there’s plenty of disagreement over what exactly a Christian is: are Mormons Christian? Are Jews for Jesus Christian? Is someone Christian if they’re agnostic about Jesus’s divinity but think he was the greatest moral teacher of all time? Nonetheless we can use the word to describe someone without too much angst.
Same thing goes with “racist.”
That’s not what a “racist” is. A racist is someone who believes that certain racists are inherently inferior to others. A Christian doesn’t need to consider a Muslim to be inferior. Thinking “the other” is inferior is the sine qua non of racism. Not true of Christian.
I disagree with these sentiments and advocate a carve-out for the word racist, as in US society it is a 20 megaton insult. More so than sexist.
Um, no. In popular US usage it says quite a bit about whether they are a good person and their morality. It even casts aspirations on their intelligence.
That said, I understand the mod’s POV. For example, given its detail and careful use of language, I think post 45 was acceptable, assuming it’s not repeated ad nausum.
You call them, “Someone who ascribes certain genetic traits to a sociologically-constructed race” or a “Racist in early 20th century terms but not late 20th or early 21st century terms”. To be a modern racist denotes bigotry and sympathy to discriminatory practice. You can use the term, “Scientific racist”, but I frankly think that gives that group too much credit. Unfortunately “Pseudo-scientific racist”, while accurate, is also insulting. [1]
Look, I understand there’s a balancing issue here. When the stormfronters rain down on this message board, they have to be dealt with. So when I say “Carve out for the word racist”, I’m only saying that we should acknowledge the word’s connotations and not pretend this conversation is taking place during the 1920s.
[1] Damn, I’m putting Ibn in a bit of box here. Hm. Possible adjectives. Academic? Scholarly? (No). Semi-literate? Book-Larnin? Conjectural? (That might work for JaQers). Notional? Autodidactic?
I’m going to propose scholastic. Not ideal, but maybe an improvement. Because this stuff sure isn’t science.
ETA: Incidentally, there’s also a euphemism for racist which is, “I don’t think they are racist, but they may be racial”. I guess that doesn’t appear too well in print. At any rate, I think that would be inappropriate for GD anyway: I’m just adding this because we are discussing vocabulary.
I think the term you are looking for is “racialist”.
A term I’ve seen used, even here on these boards is “racial realist”. I submit that that would be accurate for many of the discussions without being flatly insulting.
I think you’ll likely find a high proportion of cases where people are saying that with the quotes included ‘He’s a “race realist”’ - which tells you what high regard the term is held in. It’s code for ‘…if you know what I mean - and I mean “he’s a racist”’
ETA: blushing at the “beloved”, Ibn
Not necessarily. I think a lot of “race realists” would self-identify as such, but how many of them would self-identify as racists?
Holocaust Deniers don’t self-identify as such and most object to that term as well.
Does that mean we shouldn’t use it?
The question is why not use “race realist” instead of “racist”? It seem you object to the former NOT having the insult component.
No, you can use it.
As long as we are adopting the laughable euphemisms of idiotic racialists I propose we also adopt the corollary term for non-racialists: “race denialist.” So, now we got the “realists” and the “denialists.”