#167 β A Few Thoughts on White Supremacy
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
138.15005
Summary
Trump is a buffoon, but he's also a racist, and there's no evidence of racism in his tweets about the Democratic congresswomen who came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, if they even have functioning government at all, now loudly and viciously telling the people of the United States, the greatest and most powerful nation on earth, how our government is to be run. Why don't they go back to their own countries, when, in fact, this is their country? I mean, honestly, it's like looking at one's own colonoscopy, if done by a madman. Once again, this man is not a genius. He's not a bad buffoon. And there is no doubt that he's a racist. But again, in my view, this isn't clear evidence of Racism, because these women come from countries where racism is a problem, and the problem is the problem itself, not the people on the right as far as the left is concerned. And there would have been a better way to fix the problem than telling us how to fix it than by telling us all how to run the greatest nation on Earth on the greatest planet on the earth, which is the greatest country on the planet, if we don't have a president who is also racist. Welcome to the Making Sense Podcast, in which I try to make sense of the facts and make sense out of them. Make sense of it all, and try to not let the facts get in the way of the rest of us. Make sense, and let's make sense together, shall we all agree that it's all of this is not complicated at all. -Sam Harris - Make sense? and we can all be better together. Thank you for listening to the making sense, let's all be kinder together, and more kinder, more understanding each other, more thoughtful, and less meaner, and better together, more of ourselves, more human, more like ourselves, and kinder more like each other better, more beautiful, more aware of each other. and so on, and so much more. Thank you so much for listening, and thank you for being kinder and more understanding us all, more and more of you, yay! byeeeee, more than enough, more, more love, more empathy, more respect, more gratitude, more appreciation, more sympathy, more support, and a little more.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
Welcome to the Making Sense Podcast. This is Sam Harris.
00:00:04.520
Okay, well it seems like I got into trouble in a housekeeping I did for the Judea Pearl podcast.
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I recorded that in the immediate aftermath of the mass shootings in the U.S. and El Paso and Dayton.
00:00:20.360
Many people sent me emails and tweets suggesting that I look at my subreddit,
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which apparently has been going haywire for quite some time.
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I think half the people in my subreddit despise me, so it's a perpetual state of war there.
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But my comments on the mass shootings and white supremacy, white nationalism, racism, etc.
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seem to have caused people to go fairly berserk there.
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So I looked into this. I don't usually look at Reddit.
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But I couldn't get very far. I mean, honestly, it was like looking at one's own colonoscopy,
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if done by a madman. It was not a pretty sight.
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Some people were defending me, so thank you for that.
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In any case, it seems like I could clarify a few things, which I will do now.
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One thing that people seem to have taken issue with and widely misunderstood
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was my claim that Trump's go-back-to-your-own-countries tweets were not clear signs of his racism.
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Now, I've long said that I have no doubt that Trump is racist,
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but I've often said that we have to be precise in making these allegations, right?
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My problem with the left is that it's finding evidence of racism everywhere,
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And here was a case in Trump's recent tweets against the so-called squad,
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where it was susceptible to other readings, right?
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And I thought it was counterproductive to seize upon these tweets as clear signs of his racism
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And to remind you of how overheated this context is,
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she was attacked as dog-whistling to white supremacists,
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And again, I'm giving Trump the benefit of the doubt here,
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which I think I should always do because I despise the man.
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People often accuse me of claiming that I have no biases.
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I find Trump to be one of the most repellent human beings I can think of.
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I should be bending over backwards to give him the benefit of the doubt when there is a doubt.
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And the left should do likewise, especially if they don't want four more years of Trump in office.
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So interesting to see, quote, progressive Democrat congresswomen,
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who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe,
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the worst, most corrupt, and inept anywhere in the world,
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if they even have functioning government at all,
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now loudly and viciously telling the people of the United States,
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the greatest and most powerful nation on earth, how our government is to be run.
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Why don't they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime-infested places from which they came,
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Okay, well, the president is clearly expressing contempt for these four congresswomen
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and contempt for the countries he imagines they came from.
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Now, his error here, his main error, is that only one of them is an immigrant,
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And Somalia is precisely one of those countries that fits Trump's description here.
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But the fact that Trump was wrong about the other three congresswomen,
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that is being interpreted as a symptom of his racism, right?
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Go back to your own countries when, in fact, this is their country.
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He couldn't be bothered to figure out who these people were.
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Does he know Rashida Tlaib and Ayanna Pressley?
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It is easy to imagine that he just assumed they were all immigrants
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Once again, this falls into the evil Chauncey Gardner framing.
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But again, this isn't clear evidence, in my view, of racism.
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Had these women come from Ireland, right, at the height of the potato famine,
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Trump could easily have said, go back to your own starving country and fix that
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before telling us how to run the greatest nation on Earth.
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And there would have been no implication of racism.
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And the problem is, the left is as fixated on race as the far right is.
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Anyway, that's the basis for my demurral about Trump's tweets.
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And sometimes that's the most parsimonious explanation for the chaos he causes.
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But there was much more on the topic of white supremacy.
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And it appears to be widely believed that I use a double standard
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when thinking about white supremacy and jihadism.
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Okay, well, first, intellectual honesty is really my master variable here.
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And this might sound fairly preening of me to say,
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but read my book, Lying, if you want to understand my view on honesty in general.
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And this dictates a somewhat unusual way of speaking.
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And people seem to read into it something sinister when nothing sinister is there.
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So I'll give you two examples of how this happens routinely.
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I'm not going to pretend that he's wrong just because he's a terrible person.
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A logically or factually or even ethically true statement
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is no less true if a serial killer or a neo-Nazi or some other repellent person
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And there's a related principle here, which is whatever the topic,
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An honest walk through it will flirt with points that support the side you don't like.
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And in fact, these may be points raised by terrible people
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So, for example, this is the kind of thing that came up
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in my recent conversation with Jared Diamond, right?
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and there was a point I'd heard white supremacists make
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in defense of their own immigration stance, right?
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And then when right-thinking people attack this
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The Japanese want to keep Japan for the Japanese.
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They don't want any pink-skinned barbarians living among them, right?
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You know, I'm happy to take that point from Hitler himself