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GlyphGryph posted:Criticize Ossie Davis for lauding Malcolm X as being disgusting if you want, man. I'm not gonna stop you. But it comes across as "manhood" more in the sense of "are you a man or a slave?" and I imagine he thinks its something women should aspire to as well rather than being an especially gendered version of the label. Ossie Davis, as an historical figure, is one thing. He was speaking in 1965, and it would be unfair to criticize him for a lack of understanding of gender that was unavailable to him at the time. Maybe I am wrong in the interpretation, but lauding positive traits as associated with gender is definitively problematic. Maybe I’m being overly sensitive, but in 2017 I think we can do better than to put it in gendered terms.
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Dec 20, 2017 16:18
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BarbarianElephant posted:Schumer’s isn’t. The rich-not-billionaires of NYC are actually getting screwed by this. Wall Street traders etc are really screwed by the bill. Do you not think there are billionaires in NYC? Nobody gives a gently caress about the people who trade on wall st, they care about the people who own wall st.
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Dec 20, 2017 16:20
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GlyphGryph posted:And I think that's at the core of West's criticism of his, and why I think it's legitimate. You can disagree with the criticism - a criticism being legitimate doesn't make it correct, it just makes it a reasonable thing to argue. oh absolutely not, that was purely about obama. malcolm x is not a failure in any sense of the word. but i'm also not really talking about what i think about malcolm x or obama here in any way, all i'm doing is trying to explain what i think TNC is trying to say. and i agree: that is legitimate criticism and a reasonable thing to disagree about. quote:(I also expect you're going to want to accuse me of basing my definition of success and failure on "what I want to happen" or some other bullshit, which I assure you is about as far from the truth as you could happen - I recognize many people I hate and who work against my interests as notable successful. It's part of why I hate them so much, and why the struggle against them is so important! So please don't.) 
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Dec 20, 2017 16:23
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GlyphGryph posted:See? This sort of statement is exactly my point, botany. Malcolm X was a man because he stood against cowardice and accomodation - Obama seems to be lauded and defended for being a symbol of it. Maybe you should stick to quoting posts by the person you're arguing with before launching off into fantasy strawman land. Nobody has "nodded along" with what I posted by the time you quoted it and my post has gently caress-all to do with what botany has been posting.
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Dec 20, 2017 16:25
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botany posted:oh absolutely not, that was purely about obama. malcolm x is not a failure in any sense of the word. Okay, sorry about that last bit - it's happened to me a few times before and it gets old, so it might have been a bit of premature defensiveness. But yeah I guess I can sort of understand TNC's points - but I can also see why West has such a strong negative reaction to it. TNC is coming at that legacy from a very specific angle - and it's that angle that West seems to be criticizing. Thank you again for mentioning the Ossie Davis piece though, it really was very good. I should read more stuff he has said. biracial bear for uncut posted:Maybe you should stick to quoting posts by the person you're arguing with before launching off into fantasy strawman land. Please, spend more time talking about how Obama is a Coward and Actually That Is Good
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Dec 20, 2017 16:35
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GlyphGryph posted:Please, spend more time talking about how Obama is a Coward and Actually That Is Good It's easy to sit back and call another man a coward that has faced more direct death threats and harassment than you ever will. Some Pinko Commie fucked around with this message at 16:42 on Dec 20, 2017 |
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Dec 20, 2017 16:35
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botany posted:
 You're doing great. I'm actually surprisingly interested in how this convo is going. I'm recusing myself briefly because all this poo poo is so wrapped up in my identity it's hard not to get heated. But on the other hand this shows why non-black allies are important. I can drop this argument for my own sanity and here you are picking up the torch.❤
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Dec 20, 2017 16:36
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Oh look, Paracaidas is posting too many words again. I actually hadn't considered the West-Obama dynamic tied to eight years in power. If you didn't read it and/or were generally unaware (don't worry, you're in good company with West): The title comes from a quote from state legislator in the reconstruction era south, looking back at their accomplishments before the heavily black government was pushed out in reconciliation and Jim Crow. It was both pride at what was accomplished and mourning what was about to be lost (because the social order would have collapsed if it had to acknowledge competent black self-governance). Given Coates' penchant for connecting current moments to historical abuses, I believe he's applying both sentiments to the reflection on and teardown of the Obama legacy (a teardown that started in earnest in Nov 2010, for which he is assigned most of the blame). Speaking now for myself and explicitly not for TNC (though I share some of his views) I can understand an immense frustration at watching his legacy be torn down by the racist right while a selfaggrandizing subset of the allegedly egalitarian left insists there were no accomplishments in the legacy to begin with. The frothingly brokebrained takes we've seen upthread are representative of this largely white group - one that demographically and behaviorally would have predominantly supported Crow and Reconciliation- a group that Coates already experienced in the aftermath of pointing out that the pragmatism of Bernie and many of his supporters only came out when reparations were discussed. More frustrating, then, would be watching one of America's preeminent public intellectuals (and still likely the preeminent black public intellectual) join with the overwhelmingly white bipartisan chorus and give credence to the view that Obama was always bad (personally and presidentially) and did no good. This is exacerbated when the man in question diminishes Obama's blackness and aggressively questions the authenticity of those in the community who are insufficiently fervent in their opposition to him. Denying and diminishing his accomplishments while battering him for not acheiving the thus-far theoretical perfect counterfactuals plays into a pattern with a long and dark history. This is without getting into the deeper discussion of how to assess incremental improvements to catastrophically awful systems-especially when Obama, unlike the 43 before him, came into power in spite of these power structures and not because of them. None of the above is to say that Obama and his administration cannot be criticized. If you don't believe that TNC has repeatedly done exactly that, on drones, on foreign policy, on respectability politics, on economics, on morality, then you are spitting takes on a topic you know precisely fuckall about and believe me-we see you.
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Dec 20, 2017 16:49
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biracial bear for uncut posted:It's easy to sit back and call another man a coward that has faced more direct death threats and harassment than you ever will. If this bothers you so much, then perhaps you should stop calling him a coward as an attempt to defend him? You seem to see him as far more cowardly than I do, to be honest. (If it's so easy to sit back and call another man a coward that has faced more direct threats than the speaker ever will, it should be easy for you to call Malcolm X a coward. Why don't you do that, next?)
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Dec 20, 2017 16:49
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as a white guy, regarding the dispute between Cornell West and TNC on the subject of Barack Obama's legacy as the first black president,
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Dec 20, 2017 16:52
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self unaware posted:Do you not think there are billionaires in NYC? Nobody gives a gently caress about the people who trade on wall st, they care about the people who own wall st. And I think the sorta-rich are starting to realize that.
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Dec 20, 2017 16:59
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Democrazy posted:Ossie Davis, as an historical figure, is one thing. He was speaking in 1965, and it would be unfair to criticize him for a lack of understanding of gender that was unavailable to him at the time. Maybe I am wrong in the interpretation, but lauding positive traits as associated with gender is definitively problematic. Maybe I’m being overly sensitive, but in 2017 I think we can do better than to put it in gendered terms. This kept kind of nagging at me too, just as a dumb aside, so hey maybe we're overly sensitive together. 
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Dec 20, 2017 17:16
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Americans privileging the symbolism of a presidency over its substance is par for the course. There's nothing remarkable about it, and it's not hard to understand.
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Dec 20, 2017 17:21
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Typical Pubbie posted:Americans privileging the symbolism of a presidency over its substance is par for the course. There's nothing remarkable about it, and it's not hard to understand. And criticizing that is eminently fair and legitimate. West has suffered more unfair attacks and criticism over the last 48 hours than Coates ever did.
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Dec 20, 2017 17:35
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Yardbomb posted:This kept kind of nagging at me too, just as a dumb aside, so hey maybe we're overly sensitive together. Out of curiosity, what non gendered label would you prefer to be used for the positive constellation of traits being referenced? Although if I am discussing someones work and words I think it is appropriate to use their language with the audience understanding the context and actual meaning of the terms considering it was explicitly laid out here as something that is clearly not "masculinity" but rather some variant of unashamed independent personhood.
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Dec 20, 2017 17:36
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Koalas March posted:
Yea I am staying out of it because its exhausting and not really something we should have to do all of the time. White folks can handle all of the hand wringing about Obama while we stare down Armageddon.
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Dec 20, 2017 17:40
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joepinetree posted:And criticizing that is eminently fair and legitimate. West has suffered more unfair attacks and criticism over the last 48 hours than Coates ever did. I'm assuming you didn't now but part of the reason it seems Coates deleted his twitter was because Spencer's neonazi fanboys where attacking him and sending him personal threats. Including (from what I was told) threatening to lynch him.
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Dec 20, 2017 17:40
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Fluffdaddy posted:Yea I am staying out of it because its exhausting and not really something we should have to do all of the time. White folks can handle all of the hand wringing about Obama while we stare down Armageddon. 
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Dec 20, 2017 17:41
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GlyphGryph posted:A bunch of bad-faith argument I'm not the one that called Obama a coward you loving dipshit.
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Dec 20, 2017 17:49
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USPOL: Reality has an Obama Bias
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Dec 20, 2017 17:53
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biracial bear for uncut posted:I'm not the one that called Obama a coward you loving dipshit. Yeah, you did.
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Dec 20, 2017 17:53
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Out of the two people Hillary Clinton lost to I have to say I much prefer Obama.
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Dec 20, 2017 17:55
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Majorian posted:That's going too far. As milquetoast as he was, he did put things like the CFPB in place, was net-positive on minority rights, and significantly cut back in our involvement in the Middle East, even when taking fuckups like Libya into account. Stuff like the watering-down of the ACA happened because he didn't pursue maximum demands, and because of bad-faith actors like Lieberman and Lincoln. He cut back our ground presence in the Middle East, but vastly expanded our overall involvement. When he left office, the US was actively meddling in the affairs of like three times as many Middle Eastern countries as under Bush - even taking into account the fact that Libya isn't part of the Middle East. The half-bakedness of the ACA happened because he approached it from the very beginning with the plan of having the insurance industry heavily involved in writing the bill - his thinking was that the health insurance industry wouldn't lobby against the bill if he let their lobbyists write most of it in the first place. When that failed, he gave concessions to corporate-funded opposition while telling the bill's other critics to pound sand. That was his main strategy when it came to regulation: he'd try to get the industry on his side by offering heavy concessions from the start, while at the same time trying to convince them that the regulation would actually help them. He thought that if he placated industry from the start, they wouldn't lobby against his regulations and therefore everything would pass with no real opposition. A lot of people dismiss this as just optimism and poor negotiating ability, but I think that's a naive take that misses the real issue: Obama fundamentally saw regulation as a way to protect capitalism from itself, rather than to protect consumers from capitalism. He saw private industry as partners, and repeatedly tried to get their buy-in on regulation schemes that he framed to them as being for their own good. He was never going to nationalize the banks - he's part of the same Democratic tradition that gave us Nancy "We're capitalists and that's just the way it is" Pelosi. From a political perspective, Obama was just another president. botany posted:i'm not sure i understand where you disagree. for ossie davis, malcolm matters primarily because he gave black people a self-identity and pride. he was a symbol of defiance and manhood. for TNC, obama did the same thing. when he won, it was a symbol that, just maybe, black people could become equal after all. that's the comparison. malcolm x was the "living black manhood" because he represented a sign that kneeling was no longer necessary, that the oppressed could stand up and face their oppressors. obama, decades later, was a symbol that black people no longer needed to rely on well-meaning white people to make things better, that they could simply stand up and lead. the symbolic value of that is obvious and immense. They can try to split off just one aspect of a person while ignoring the rest, but other people are under no obligation to play along. If Coates wants to just focus on the accomplishments and power that Obama was able to obtain, while ignoring what he actually did with those accomplishments and power, he's free to do so, but people are well within their rights to criticize him for slicing off just a few tiny slices of Obama's legacy while ignoring the rest. After all, people try to do that all the time for historical figures, and usually it's for the sake of erasing or avoiding problematic parts of a legacy that's become defined by those problematic parts. I wouldn't go quite so far as to say that about Obama (although Malcolm X probably fits that statement well enough), but it's hard to talk about a man who became president while banning any discussion of what he did as president.
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Dec 20, 2017 17:58
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I mean, at this point I'm pretty sure Obama's going to go down as 'he was a black president' with his actual accomplishments being mostly forgotten pretty quick. Lionise that if you want, but America needed better, all things considered.
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Dec 20, 2017 17:58
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Fans posted:Out of the two people Hillary Clinton lost to I have to say I much prefer Obama. Same tbh. Obama made a lot of mistakes, but he is not nearly as hawkish and I feel like, despite his bad choices I feel confident in his character that he weighed his options and genuinely believed he was doing the right thing at the time. He has also shown that he is up to admitting those mistakes (see: that book excerpt that was posted) and I believe he is intelligent enough not to repeat them if given the chance. Which by far makes him leagues above almost everyone else in politics right now.
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Dec 20, 2017 17:59
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Inescapable Duck posted:I mean, at this point I'm pretty sure Obama's going to go down as 'he was a black president' with his actual accomplishments being mostly forgotten pretty quick. Lionise that if you want, but America needed better, all things considered. I mean, you can argue that, but there was no better choice running at the time. Remember our other options were Hillary, Romney, and McCain/Palin.
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Dec 20, 2017 18:01
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obamacare isnt perfect but also, he actively pushed for healthcare reform. i can imagine a lot of dems giving up that fight halfway through or settling for just making minor tweaks to the bush-era system. i think that'll be his legacy, more than anything.
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Dec 20, 2017 18:03
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GlyphGryph posted:Yeah, you did. You were literally the person that described Obama-surviving-his-Presidency as "cowardice". GlyphGryph posted:How can you simultaneously say Obama exists in the mold of Malcolm X while constantly falling back on how he was defined by, and only succeeded to the extent he did because of, his cowardice? Literally the first person to describe it that way (while ignoring the part where I never made any sort of correlation between Malcolm X and Obama) in response to something I posted. You're also completely ignoring the actual interview I linked where Obama defended his actions while in office and explained why he did things the way he did. Read what the man himself said about why he did things the way he did. gently caress all third party commentators and arguments that stem from said comments. I never said Obama was a coward, I said him behaving in the way you seem to be saying he should have behaved would have resulted in him being assassinated. In case you're that loving dense that I need to clarify what I meant by the post you are projecting so much bullshit onto: Obama doing what he could without triggering that assassination response, and surviving his terms in office, are victories in themselves. gently caress you for putting words in my mouth and doubling down repeatedly on it. Some Pinko Commie fucked around with this message at 18:07 on Dec 20, 2017 |
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Dec 20, 2017 18:05
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Ok so I'm curious; where do we go from here w.r.t. black people and the white house? Where do you see things going? Does Obama surviving and thriving even in the face of ludicrous opposition and still coming out of it more in the position of "America's dad" than any other president, change what is possible for the next black president? Does being bookended by what will no doubt go down as the absolute worst administrations in history help that? Will the next black president have a greater leeway to express themselves more because of Obama's charm, or is it all demographics and waiting for reactionaries to burn out and die? (Obv what I'm saying is Nina Turner 2020) Car Hater fucked around with this message at 18:14 on Dec 20, 2017 |
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Dec 20, 2017 18:11
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The Groper posted:Ok so I'm curious; where do we go from here w.r.t. black people and the white house? Where do you see things going? Does Obama surviving and thriving even in the face of ludicrous opposition and still coming out of it more in the position of "America's dad" than any other president, change what is possible for the next black president? Does being bookended by what will no doubt go down as the absolute worst administrations in history help that? Will the next black president have a greater leeway to express themselves more because of Obama's charm, or is it all demographics and waiting for reactionaries to burn out and die? I think those are good questions but I think we need to start with: "Will we actually see another black president in our lifetimes?" first. Honestly, I'm not sure.
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Dec 20, 2017 18:13
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I don’t think Dems ever get much done without all three Branches because the Republicans have made it crystal clear they will block any attempt to do anything in a way that the Democrats seem afraid to even go near. So the White House is not enough anymore, gotta be a clean sweep and the House looks nightmarishly difficult to pull off.
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Dec 20, 2017 18:14
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I'm not actually sure if anyone would have managed to kill Obama if he had acted differently given the right wing rage machine was already operating at full blast for his entire Presidency. We already have apparatuses of unaccountable killers and spies working specifically to snuff out any possible legitimate threat to the President before it starts, with consequences on this very forum, and it's not like we have a history of Presidents being successfully assassinated because they piss lots of people off; so far the ones that succeed or come close tend to be crazy lone gunmen because they're the hardest to predict and plan for, and even then it's been nearly half a century since the last one succeeded. Kind of a point the left has had is that the Republicans already act as if anyone not in lockstep with them is a godless Muslim Nazi Commie, to the point where actual socialists have made political gains since they've rendered the term defanged and meaningless as the Cold War fades from memory and it turns out a capitalist Russia is probably just as bad if not worse than a Communist one.
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Dec 20, 2017 18:17
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GlyphGryph posted:I'm not talking about their politics. I just don't understand how you think this piece is supposed to support the argument you're making. This is a really good post
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Dec 20, 2017 18:19
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biracial bear for uncut posted:I never said Obama was a coward, I said him behaving in the way you seem to be saying he should have behaved would have resulted in him being assassinated. This seems like a super low bar to clear. He had the Secret Service protecting him and he lived in the most secure location in the world. I think he could have prosecuted some bankers and still lived.
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Dec 20, 2017 18:20
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Inescapable Duck posted:I'm not actually sure if anyone would have managed to kill Obama if he had acted differently given the right wing rage machine was already operating at full blast for his entire Presidency. We already have apparatuses of unaccountable killers and spies working specifically to snuff out any possible legitimate threat to the President before it starts, with consequences on this very forum, and it's not like we have a history of Presidents being successfully assassinated because they piss lots of people off; so far the ones that succeed or come close tend to be crazy lone gunmen because they're the hardest to predict and plan for, and even then it's been nearly half a century since the last one succeeded. This is part of the divide. I did not have faith in any of those institutions keeping him 100% safe. Again, a lot of people in the black community were holding their breath because historically, that's what always happened.  Please watch this, everyone.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rA9QBZr8WEg&t=25s
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Dec 20, 2017 18:21
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Inescapable Duck posted:I mean, at this point I'm pretty sure Obama's going to go down as 'he was a black president' with his actual accomplishments being mostly forgotten pretty quick. Lionise that if you want, but America needed better, all things considered. Hey, so far he's the greatest President the 21st century has known. If he's solely remembered for the color of his skin, that suggests a new golden age coming, with many wise and enlightened Presidents. You are such a sunny optimist, Mr Slightly-racist!
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Dec 20, 2017 18:23
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Koalas March posted:Everybody sits around and acts like he never had giant teams of people giving him advice 24/7 but you, random goon (general you) are the one who cracked the case and knows what he should've done without all the benefits of experts, a degree in constitutional law and intelligence briefings. This is from a while back, but I feel the need to respond to it since it's a kind of commonly made point. The problem with this logic is it can be used to defend literally anything a president does. You can always make the argument "are you saying you're smarter than all the experts working with the president?" The issue is unrelated to experience, but rather to ideology. Obama and the people assisting him did not have the same goals as a lot of the people criticizing him, and as a result did not pursue those goals. One could make the argument that Obama still couldn't have succeeding in doing _______ (though I think that argument's bullshit with respect to the things Obama actively chose to do, like appoint Geithner, not actively go after the banks/individuals responsible for the Great Recession, etc), but that's ultimately irrelevant because Obama never wanted to do those things in the first place. If Obama could press a button and magically make our country socialist and alter the power relationships within our society such that capitalists aren't holding the reins, he would not press that button. And, even if he couldn't accomplish certain things (like giving us genuine UHC), he still could have openly and vocally advocated for such ideas (and make them more acceptable and mainstream in the eyes of the public as a result). Obama is better than someone like Bill Clinton, but there's no reason to act like he was actually an ally to anyone on the left. Some other poster asked "is there any President who you were satisfied with/thought was good?" Why does there need to be? What is the harm in having the opinion that all past US presidents have been pretty bad? Are you (general you, not referring to KM) afraid of hurting the feelings of past presidents or something? There are systemic reasons why the people who end up in positions of power tend to not be good, and there's no harm in acknowledging this. BarbarianElephant posted:He was pretty good. But as you say, he was imperfect. And I'm sure if we lived closer to his time we'd be more aware of many minor fuckups. If we were posting on the internet of 1866, I'm sure there would be plenty of people here saying "He sucked, I'm glad he's dead." Like this, for example. So what? I'm pretty sure all presidents have been wealthy, and all wealthy people are bad people almost by definition. What's wrong with acknowledging this? BarbarianElephant posted:It's *good* to criticize our leaders. It's *bad* to say things like Obama was bad for black people because he wasn't 100% perfect as president, or even to regret voting for him because of the same. Would McCain or Romney have been better? The choice was not between Obama and perfection, but between Obama and McCain/Romney. You're conflating criticism with a decision not to vote. It's entirely possible for someone to say that the Democratic candidate is actively bad (not just "not perfect") but should still be voted for as a pragmatic decision to prevent a Republican presidency. I think the reason you choose to deflect things into the "ARE YOU SAYING THE REPUBLICAN WOULD BE BETTER?!" angle is because you realize you don't actually have any other argument against what people are saying. Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 18:31 on Dec 20, 2017 |
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Dec 20, 2017 18:24
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Apparently The Rock is actually giving serious consideration to running, so there's a chance! Keith Ellison would be great, but I dunno if he'd get elected. I guess we need to drop that line of thinking and run the best candidate, not "who would win" since "who would win" lost in a horrifyingly disappointing was last time.
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Dec 20, 2017 18:28
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The crazies were convincing each other that Obama was an illegitimate communist usurper and the literal antichrist even when he was behaving like the avatar of decorum itself, so I don't see how him acting differently would result in a greater danger to his personal security. You could argue that there'd have been a political cost if Obama were more assertive, but who else exactly would have tried to whack him over that? Now don't get me wrong, there were obviously people who would have liked to take a shot at Obama, and I'm not disputing this part. What I'm saying is that the pool of potential assassins is most likely not affected by what Obama actually did or didn't do, because the racist crazies don't care about that.
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Dec 20, 2017 18:28
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Koalas March posted:I think those are good questions but I think we need to start with: "Will we actually see another black president in our lifetimes?" first. Honestly, I'm not sure. If the process of converting politics into celebrity entertainment continues, absolutely 100% we will. We will see a woman president riding that same trend into office before we see America elect a woman because she's competent and has good policies.
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Dec 20, 2017 18:29
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