(no subject)
Please ignore. This is actually a comment in response to this conversation, but it's long so i have to post it separately.
> What message to take home?
that's easy. consider the venue. message: "buy my book". consider the audience. message: "don't be complacent. racism has been part of this culture for far too long, you can't claim you are racism-free." i can easily propose multiple plausible messages "to take home" - she spoke as a professional sociologist, a corporate speaker, etc. - any role can provide a perspective and a message
(obviously) she wasn't addressing people like you (non-americans) but a message could (plausibly) be: "think how racism persists where you are, both on institutional and individual levels; for example think of gastarbeiters (or even russian citizens) from the caucasus and central asia... - how are they treated by russian institutions? by people of your circle? by you personally?" - something along those lines....
but it feels like you weren't really trying to entertain her arguments (some are of course purely rhetoric, like that metaphor of the dock)... it seems you were more interested in matching hers up against your expectations ("universal approach", "come up with a different term", etc etc etc) and you expected (like it's a piece of fiction) to come out with a pleasant feeling at the end (not a "deeply unsatisfying" one)
now if we remove your expectations and feelings about the subject, her presentation, etc - how is it possible to assess her arguments in a rational way?
for example, "she teased me with a universal approach to the subject but did not develop it any further" becomes "she briefly considered the argument that racism is a special case of between-group interactions but rejected it because..." - options: 1) it was not relevant to her talk; 2) it does not reflect the true nature of racism; 3) it is merely an excuse to divert the conversation and avoid discussing the real problem; etc.
> she is taking it as a given that the statement "[I treat everyone equally because] I was taught to treat everyone equally" is false. ... If you heard any different and could quote relevant parts, please do so.
i had to listen to her talk around your quote, then read the chapter she quotes before your quote, then read your quote again... i believe i've figured out our difference but do correct me if i'm wrong. what i've heard is this:
1. "I was taught to treat everyone equally" (as part of the color blind narrative which she gives more examples of) is definitely true because a) it is an overwhelming official narrative taught in schools; b) particularly true where she is (Seattle) because the narrative is internalized (presumably) by many in her audience (she makes a few jokes about her progressive audience)
2. "I treat everyone equally because..." - is more likely than not untrue, because, for example, of implicit bias, of the stigma, of cultural conditioning etc. (from the book: "Despite the claims of many white young adults that racism is in the past and that they were taught to see everyone as equal, research shows otherwise. For example, polls sponsored by MTV in 2014 show that millennials profess more tolerance and a deeper commitment to equality and fairness than previous generations did. At the same time, millennials are committed to an ideal of color blindness that leaves them uncomfortable with, and confused about, race and opposed to measures to reduce racial inequality. Perhaps most significantly, 41 percent of white millennials believe that government pays too much attention to minorities, and 48 percent believe that discrimination against whites is as big a problem as discrimination against people of color. Many in this generation claim that the election of Barack Obama as president shows that we are postracial. These polls were conducted before the presidency of Donald Trump, but as his election has made clear, we are far from being postracial.")
but i think it's important to note that she is NOT talking about a particular instance ("I was taught...") per se but about the color-blind narrative ( "i don't see color, and if i see it it has no meaning" ) as a whole in many recognizable forms, "I was taught..." being one of them. and the question she actually asks: "how [did] we pull this off." - what is "this"? - "this" (as far as i understand) is the keeping of racism alive while absolving whites of any personal responsibility for it.
but even now, having rewound this particular fragment a few times, i stand by my comment that it is "a bit jumbled - she tries to be too conversational", she does not clearly formulate the question. so, purely because of proximity, i believe the question whether it is true or not may apply equally to whether a particular person's statement "i don't see color and if i do, it has no meaning" is true or not and to the narrative as a whole i.e. whether the narrative (represented in its many forms) is true or false (i.e whether it is true or false that "we", the american society, are color blind). but when i consider her line of thinking and the book together, the answers are (and i could be wrong of course, we'd have to ask her):
1) the narrative (as research shows) is false (american whites are not color-blind)
2) personal statements can be true (factually: "i've been taught...", "my parents were/weren't...") but causality and randomness ("... just happened to be ...") in them are false; moreover both statements of presumed causality of personal experience and statements of randomness of racial inequality are (on a societal level) propaganda and (on a personal level) excuses and/or honest ignorance
> she also said that "there is no such thing as reverse racism"
of course there isn't. "reverse racism" is a propaganda trick. moreover racism is not "a special case of in-group out-group interactions". here is a quote from an old article that is still (IMO) apt:
The very phrase Reverse Racism contains the argument ...: "In this country whites once set themselves apart from blacks and claimed privileges for themselves while denying them to others; now, on the basis of race, blacks are claiming special status and reserving for themselves privileges they deny to others; isn't one as bad as the other?" The answer is no. One can see why by imagining that it is not 1993 but 1955, and that we are in a town in the South with two more or less distinct communities, one white and one black. No doubt each community would have a ready store of dismissive epithets, ridiculing stories, self-serving folk myths, and expressions of plain hatred, all directed at the other community, and all based in racial hostility. Yet to regard their respective racisms--if that is the word--as equivalent would be bizarre, for the hostility of one group stems not from any wrong done to it but from its wish to protect its ability to deprive citizens of their voting rights, to limit access to educational institutions, to prevent entry into the economy except at the lowest and most menial levels, and to force members of the stigmatized group to ride in the back of the bus. The hostility of the other group is the result of these actions, and whereas hostility and racial anger are unhappy facts wherever they are found, a distinction must surely be made between the ideological hostility of the oppressors and the experience-based hostility of those who have been oppressed. https://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/politics/race/fish.htm