The irony of the New York Times� 1619 Project...

[seer]

The example I gave, that you responded to, was of North Carolina Republicans commissioning a study on photo identification for a Voter ID law, not gerrymandering.

We could get into why extreme partisan gerrymandering often uses racial discrimination as a method (again using North Carolina Republicans) but the example in question was NC Republicans specifically targeting black voters by commissioning a study on photo identification by race and using the data to disenfranchise them.

If you look at that and say "That's not raced based because Republicans just want to win elections" then you've got more basic work to do before you can tackle the competing claims around the 1619 Project.

--Sam

Nonsense Sam, I will ask again, if the majority of blacks were voting Republican would this have happened - yes or no?

[seer]

It is impossible to separate it like that.
Jim

No it isn't Jim, again if the majority of blacks vote republican would we even be talking about this - no, and you know it.

[Sam]

Nonsense Sam, I will ask again, if the majority of blacks were voting Republican would this have happened - yes or no?

That's racist, man, and you don't go further if you're going to subjugate the rights of black Americans to partisan whims. Don't go further with me, at least.

--Sam

[seer]

That's racist, man, and you don't go further if you're going to subjugate the rights of black Americans to partisan whims. Don't go further with me, at least.

--Sam

Again Sam, it is not about race but political affiliation, like all gerrymandering, that is why you won't give a direct answer to this question: if the majority of blacks were voting Republican would this have happened - yes or no?

[oxmixmudd]

No it isn't Jim, again if the majority of blacks vote republican would we even be talking about this - no, and you know it.

If you had read my post, you might understand why that is irrelevant.

Jim

[Mountain Man]

And you did not answer this question - what history was kept in the shadows?

I, too, would like this question answered.

[oxmixmudd]

Again Sam, it is not about race but political affiliation, like all gerrymandering, that is why you won't give a direct answer to this question: if the majority of blacks were voting Republican would this have happened - yes or no?

Seer, the fact that it wouldnt happen if 'they' voted rebublican is just as racist as it happening because 'they' tend to vote democrat. And the fact you and so many don't understand that is a big part of the problem.

Why is it racism: Because it is the privileged class (white america) deciding what voice the unprivileged (black america) will have. In an equal, non-racist society, the color of a person's skin can never be a determining factor in any aspect of their place or voice within our society.

Thus, what 'they' do should NEVER be part of the equation. Once it is, and especially if it limits 'their' voice, it IS racism.

Jim

[seer]

Seer, the fact that it wouldnt happen if 'they' voted rebublican is just as racist as it happening because 'they' tend to vote democrat. And the fact you and so many don't understand that is a big part of the problem.

No Jim, it means the intent is political not racial.

Why is it racism: Because it is the privileged class (white america) deciding what voice the unprivileged (black america) will have. In an equal, non-racist society, the color of a person's skin can never be a determining factor in any aspect of their place or voice within our society.

Would you said this if they redistricted poor white Democrat voters? Of course not, meaning it is not about skin color but political affiliation.

[oxmixmudd]

No Jim, it means the intent is political not racial.



Would you said this if they redistricted poor white Democrat voters? Of course not, meaning it is not about skin color but political affiliation.

But they arent redistricting poor white voters, are they?

Sorry seer, this is racism, and until people thinking like you are wake up to that fact, racism will continue to be a problem in this country.

Until then, can you at least agree that gerrymandering itself is wrong. That one party or the other should not be allowed to try to diminish the voices of the people they disagree with in order to retain power?

Jim

[Sam]

The intent is partisan. The method is race-based. The sphere is political.

If Republican or Democratic politicians had been discovered to intentionally target poor white voters (or white Christian voters or white ...) for disenfrachisment, TWeb would already have half a dozen threads devoted to the topic of anti-white discrimination in modern communist America.

And you continue, out of carelessness perhaps, to conflate partisan gerrymandering with voter suppression via Voter ID legislation. If you can't grok a basic distinction, how confident can you be when it comes to highly detailed meta analysis?


--Sam

No Jim, it means the intent is political not racial.



Would you said this if they redistricted poor white Democrat voters? Of course not, meaning it is not about skin color but political affiliation.

[rogue06]

The intent is partisan. The method is race-based. The sphere is political.

I'm inclined to agree with Sam on this

If Republican or Democratic politicians had been discovered to intentionally target poor white voters (or white Christian voters or white ...) for disenfrachisment, TWeb would already have half a dozen threads devoted to the topic of anti-white discrimination in modern communist America.

But here we part ways.

It would have been no more than two with one saying something about "Socialist America," the other being moot and they would have likely been combined by now.

Sheesh. Exaggerate much? smiley mad.gif

[seer]

The intent is partisan. The method is race-based. The sphere is political.

If Republican or Democratic politicians had been discovered to intentionally target poor white voters (or white Christian voters or white ...) for disenfrachisment, TWeb would already have half a dozen threads devoted to the topic of anti-white discrimination in modern communist America.

No Sam, that doesn't follow, what are they targeting the poor white voters for? Because of the color of their skin or because of their voting patterns? If it was on voting patterns I would say that it not racial in intent.

[seer]

But they arent redistricting poor white voters, are they?

Sorry seer, this is racism, and until people thinking like you are wake up to that fact, racism will continue to be a problem in this country.

No Jim, you already agreed that it was based on voting patterns. Since you already agreed that this would have not happened if blacks were loyal Republican voters.

Until then, can you at least agree that gerrymandering itself is wrong. That one party or the other should not be allowed to try to diminish the voices of the people they disagree with in order to retain power?

I don't agree with gerrymandering on either side, like what the leftists did with my district a few years back. Or including illegals on the Census which it is just another form of gerrymandering in my opinion.

[Sam]

Another element to this apparent conflict:

Karl Smith goes into an argument that has a worthwhile technical correction regarding the national and international value of raw material (in this case, cotton) but maybe seems to miss the point that others are trying to argue.

I'm not sure anyone is arguing that slavery was an efficient economic model but Smith and some others appear to take this as the argument. What they argue against, in any event, is the idea that America's economic success "came from" slavery and exploitation of black labor in the South by arguing that such labor systems were inefficient and that better systems could and eventually did replace them, increasing productivity.

From my initial read, that doesn't seem to be really responsive to Desmond's essay or the supportive commentary around it, which doesn't argue that slavery was a phenomenally efficient system of labor that black Americans deserve credit for but that slavery was the predominate system of labor in America (eventually the American South) and that this system was made more efficient by brutal treatment and by spearheading modern organizational methods that would eventually become commonplace in those better labor systems. In this way, slavery and black labor were foundational and essential to the history of American capitalism without slavery being inherent or intrinsic to capitalism itself.

We might point to Amazon's warehouse labor policies, as an example, and argue that within a particular system, Amazon has used harsh labor practices and modern organizational methods to create a much more efficient system than it or other companies were able to create before using that economic model. Whether the economic model is, itself, the most efficient -- or even more efficient than other contemporaneous models -- is a separate question.

--Sam

Been sitting on this piece of commentary since early yesterday -- its premise deals largely with the more hysteric Twitterheads' response to the 1619 Project and the content still seems more likely to steer the thread into tangents and fights. But I think Levitz does get a pretty crucial difference in how many people are approaching the project and a genuine discussion point on how the project should be approached.

Levitz identifies much of the "histrionic" criticisms from folks like Erick Erickson as arising out of a desire to maintain a particular ethnic mythology — in this case, the mythology of American exceptionalism that places white groups and historical figures in the key areas of focus. The 1619 Project debuted with the publishers explicitly challenging this framing, saying that the project's intent was to realign or refocus the American mythology around the efforts, experiences, and influence of black Americans — first through their experiences during slavery and then through their experiences leading up to the 1965 Civil Rights Act and beyond.

To many, this refocusing appears intended as a complete replacement: a nullification of white accomplishment and identity to be replaced with an alien conception of black identity, like the effort to cancel out Christopher Columbus and instead celebrate Indigenous Peoples' Day. To others, it is better seen as adding to and correcting aspects of our national history and mythology, replacing the subject in a narrow field-of-view with a broader range of subjects, each its own legitimate "center" of the picture.

And that seems to be the undercurrent of debate here: some appear to be arguing that Hannah-Jones and others are wrong to center black Americans' experiences to the exclusion or reduction of white Americans' experiences. The counter-argument, as I see it, isn't that Hannah-Jones and others are so much saying "But for black Americans, these things couldn't happen" as they are saying "You can't understand American history and progress without understanding that these things did happen." The 1619 Project attempt to refocus, in other words, is not meant to replace but to more fully inform and, by informing, illuminate parts of a picture that have been kept in shadow through the use of a too-narrow spotlight.

So far as I've read (Hannah-Jones, Desmond, Interlandi, Bouie), that distinction has held true. Whether it's true for all the essays or the project in full, I won't know until I've gone through it all. But most of the non-technical arguments I've seen swirling around the project in the past few days all seem tied to a debate over which of these two things the 1619 Project is trying to achieve.

--Sam

[oxmixmudd]

No Jim, you already agreed that it was based on voting patterns. Since you already agreed that this would have not happened if blacks were loyal Republican voters.

No seer - whether or not the gerrymandering would be done if black people voted a different way does not make what is happening not an instance of racism. That is the part you will not admit, the part of the problem you ignore or try to hide when you cut the critical elements that show the problem out of my posts when you reply.

Not too many years ago, there were literacy tests that people had to pass to be able to vote. The reason for the exam was ostensibly to prevent people incapable of making an informed judgement from voting. But these tests where essentially vehicles for racial discrimination, because the years and years of discrimination and abuse of black people left a larger majority of them unable to pass that test than white people. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 made the use of those tests much less capable of being used for their racially biased purpose and even though technically they are not 'illegal', their use has been virtually eliminated.

Placing a large group of black voters in a single district to limit the power of their votes is no different than what was happening with literacy tests seer. People can 'claim' it's 'just' political, you can postulate this wouldn't be done if black people voted republican, but the bottom line is that the voice of black people is being silenced. Black people are not free to vote their conscience and have that count the same as a white person's vote. And that is racism.

I don't agree with gerrymandering on either side, like what the leftists did with my district a few years back. Or including illegals on the Census which it is just another form of gerrymandering in my opinion.

I am glad we can at least agree there. Voting should be 1 person, 1 vote. Race, political persuasion, religion, No element of who a person is should change the effect of that person's vote. If 500 people vote in an election, then their 500 votes should count the exact same amount in the outcome of that election regardless of whether they are white, hispanic, black, Christian, Muslim, or atheist, male of female.

Gerrymandering violates that basic principle. And ANYTHING that violates that principle becomes just one more way racist people can underhandedly restrict the effect of a minority race's vote while hiding behind some other 'non-racist' excuse, just like happened with literacy tests.

And quite simply it should be illegal.

Now - to amplify that point. There is hard drive data that shows that in NC the gerrymandering that happened there was NOT based on 'political' data, but RACIAL data. And proof was revealed in 2017.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/north...b0b08cf7eb18fb

Source: above

, the lawyers said.

© Copyright Original Source

and

Source: above

Stephanie Hofeller told The New York Times in an interview that allies of her father were putting pressure on her to keep the hard drives private. That pressure, she told the Times, only made her more resistant to do so.

© Copyright Original Source

Jim