I want to agree, but then you have things like all the anti-Muslim asshats claiming that President Obama is a secret Muslim (even though they know damn well he attends Christian churches because they spent his first campaign ripping him apart over one of his former pastors). That’s not a claim they made about Hillary Clinton or any other white politicians.
At any rate there’s enough overlap between the two breeds of asshats to make the distinction largely meaningless.
Racism needs a verb form. It’s not very useful to put people into stable persistent boxes, “Racist”/“Not Racist”. We are all racist at times, and most of use have moments when we overcome our racism.
Sometimes I call people racist, others I say they’re being racist or what they’re doing is racist. I’m pretty careful about when I use each. Some people (like the subject of the video) are racists, i.e. that’s a defining characteristic they’ve embraced (whether they accept the label or not). In other words, yes everyone does racists things from time to time or benefits from systemic racism. How each person responds to that determines whether they are a racist. YLMV (Your Lexicon May Vary).
I think Jay Smooth laid out the “what they said” vs. “what they are” conversation pretty well.
I agree with what he says, but if I consider someone to be a racist, I won’t engage them, so I never have that conversation. When I call someone a racist, it’s in referring to them, not talking with them.
And yes, I’m keenly aware that I’m privileged to be able to do that.
I’m not saying it’s as bad as, but I think it’s a way to look at it. You can understand their perspective a bit via your own. Understanding is the first step sometimes.
To be honest I’m just not that interested in trying to understand things from the perspective of a racist who feels discriminated against for being a racist.
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