Monthly Archives: September 2021

Political correctness may lessen overt forms of bullying and workplace harassment, but without internalisation of nonprejudiced values, it may come with the side effect of promoting more passive aggressive forms of discrimination, which work against the goal of diversity, equity, and inclusion.Paris Will and Odessa Hamilton suggest how to progress from political correctness as compliance to a true internalisation of egalitarian values.

A recent poll indicates that 51 per cent of people associate the term diversity, equity & inclusion (DEI) with political correctness (RightTrack Learning, 2021). This reported coupling of terms begs the question of how perceptions of political correctness may be impacting DEI initiatives in the workplace. The reality is that most DEI initiatives fail. The importance of not just meeting compliance targets for diversity, but instead seeking culture change for true inclusion is now receiving much attention (Chavez & Weisinger, 2008; Deloitte, 2014; WIBF, 2021). In many cases, it has been found that quotas imposed by firms are not enough to sustain real change, which brings to question the commitment to DEI on an individual level. This post, therefore, reflects upon political correctness as an ideological construct, how individuals respond differently to politically correct pressures, and how it may be obstructing progress in DEI. We propose that politically correct pressures may have led to superficial change in workplace DEI through the reduction of overt prejudices, but with increased covert forms of discrimination. Lastly, we highlight some promising ways to shift toward a true internalisation of egalitarian values.

The ideology behind political correctness is predicated on a principle of tolerance, morality, and equality (Lichev & Hristoskova, 2017), which is very much in line with DEI. It reflects the Greek philosophy of equality in the eye of the law (isonomia); equal civil rights (isopoliteia); equal fortune and happiness (isodiamonia); equal respect (isotimia); equal freedom of speech, and equal political voice (isogoria; Schutz, 1976). Congruently, political correctness implies the presence of sufficient power and support to enforce compliance through informal disapproval or formal penalty. It is, therefore, additionally linked to authoritarianism, coercion, and censorship (Hoavov, 2013), which is the antithesis to the principles of DEI. Essentially, political correctness is a moderating of potentially harmful speech, behaviours or polices, toward more socially acceptable expressions that are less likely to cause offence, or result in law infringements (Sinitin, 2021).

Be that as it may, the social engineering of language can be controversial. It has been accused of advocating censorship to protect the rights of marginalised and vulnerable groups, while paradoxically censoring the right to expression of thought and infringing on a basic right of freedom of speech. This has proved to be a major point of contention, since freedom of speech, by most, is considered a fundamental psychological commodity.

Further, political correctness is charged with giving carte blanche to the use of emotionally charged accusations (e.g., racist, sexist, homophobic) toward views that dissent from a supposed superior moralistic perspective (Gordon, 2011). Political correctness ultimately complicates engagement between people who differ; rendering interactions and discourse shallow or uncomfortable (Sinitin, 2021). In this way, the politically correct narrative can be detrimental to the DEI agenda. However, the question is whether a middle ground can be reached, since a right to free speech should not equate to a right to affront, and honest transparent conversations are key to a spirit of understanding and empathy between people.

Curiously, humans naturally push back against forced ideas and rules for two primary reasons. The first being emotional reactance; stemming from an instinct to assert our individual beliefs and a right to make independent choices both potentially jeopardised by political correctness. The second being information contamination; insofar as the emergent politically correct ideology serves to undermine the informational value of formerly held views (Conway et al., 2017; Crawford et al., 2002). Each reason coincides with an innate desire to be right.

Still, pushback against political correctness can be understated and discreet. One result of discrimination becoming socially unacceptable is its transformation into more subtle forms of iniquitous expression that are more socially acceptable, and thus, politically correct (Barreto & Ellemers, 2005). Invariably, there are conditions under which one may refrain from making overtly discriminatory articulations, but political correctness is peculiar in that these acts of personal restraint do not necessarily reflect an assimilation of equitable beliefs, nor an internalisation of egalitarian values. Thus, the risk of a juxtaposition between thought and speech. A further limitation of political correctness is its failure to replace repressive terminology overtime, which suggests it is not permeating into peoples true value set, and so a pushback manifests in more subtle ways (Lichev & Hristoskova, 2017). In an ideal world, the pressure of political correctness would not only abate overt expressions of prejudice, but it would also develop into internalised attitudes and behaviours that echo its ultimate intent. Moreover, if operationalised effectively, political correctness would organically advance DEI initiatives.

As researchers have found, there is a substantial discrepancy between our internal and external displays of prejudice (Greenwald et al., 1998). Within the same individuals, overt prejudicial attitudes have been detected to a lesser extent than covert attitudes exposed through implicit test evaluations. This discrepancy has been found to be due to political correctness (Levin, 2003), such that individuals are less likely to overtly display prejudicial attitudes due to the pressures of complying with politically correctness. Yet, there was some inter-individual variability, since this finding was crucially dependent on how the individual viewed political correctness. When viewed in a negative light, there was a smaller discrepancy between internal and external prejudices as opposed to when political correctness was viewed in an affirmative way. Among those who viewed political correctness as a negative pressure, they were more likely to rebel against such pressures and thus less likely to act in an egalitarian way.

Additionally, it has been found that inter-individual variability in motivations may determine how one feels about political correctness (Plant & Devine, 2001). Individuals who have low internal, but high external motivation to respond without prejudice are more likely to feel angered and threatened by politically correct pressure. For these people, they may be sensitive to other imposed pressures, but as they do not have internal motivation to be unprejudiced, this dichotomous motivation can make them averse to politically correct pressures. This in turn may result in behavioural backlash an outright refusal to be politically correct.

Taken together, these findings show that inter-individual motivations to respond in an unprejudiced manner can form our views on political correctness, which can then impact our external displays of prejudice towards others. It seems that political correctness can be effective in moderating external displays of prejudice, but motivation must be taken into consideration, as backfiring effects can occur when individuals are especially averse to politically correct pressures.

There are certainly benefits to reducing external expressions of prejudice in the workforce, as political correctness would encourage among most individuals. It may lessen overt forms of bullying and workplace harassment. However, without internalisation of nonprejudiced values, it may come with the side effect of promoting more passive aggressive forms of discrimination, such as incivility and microaggressions. Such actions have been described as modern discrimination in organisations (Cortina, 2008), as they manifest as subtle prejudicial actions that can be hard to detect and, thus, hard to address. Although subtle, they can still have substantial detrimental effects on individuals in the workplace (Nadal et al., 2014), and can also make true inclusion difficult to achieve. It is likely no coincidence that such covert forms of discrimination have become a modern-day phenomenon that coincides with a rise in politically correct ideologies. As a result, political correctness may be responsible for the shift from overt to covert workplace discrimination. This represents a lack of real progress for workplace inclusion and may be inhibiting lasting impact arising from DEI initiatives.

Given its contentious and often provocative nature, the challenge then becomes how to progress from political correctness as compliance to a true internalisation of egalitarian values. Without this transference, the effectiveness, and indeed permanence, of politically correct ideologies is untenable, and DEI becomes futile.

One must first seek to change the narrative. Political correctness has been tied to differences in beliefs and in some instances a complete polarisation of views (Gordon, 2011). A refocus on similarities and seeking common ground can often help people appreciate differences. The ultimate intention behind politically correctness is to alter discriminatory perspectives (Sinitin, 2021), but how can one impose change, when not being open to change [by example] themselves. Compromise of attitude is key. Given that forceful mandates to observe politically correct views are often met with resistance (Conway et al., 2017), it would likely be more effective to depart from force and coercion to a more amenable approach of persuasion for a depth of influence. Certainly, persuasion through the proposition of a compelling line of reasoning, is a subtler and less antagonistic method of communicating a supposed moralistic point of view.

Maintaining an awareness of thought, with regard to why you hold the views you do and being self-reflective enough to recognise possible limitations to your own belief system is central to holding a rational conversation about DEI. For that reason, promoting introspection could prove more effective than imposing conformity. Equally, attempting to understand why someone may hold the view that they do is crucial to developing empathy and engaging in reasonable, logical communication. There should be an appreciation for differences that, more often than not, derived from our environmental milieu, inclusive of upbringing, culture, and life exposures. These dictate the experiences, and thus, beliefs, principles, and convictions that we each hold. In order for such a process to be effective, one cannot assume to hold the moral high ground; insofar as maintaining a belief that any divergence from our own perspective is erroneous and redundant. In this way, both parties enter into discourse receptively, with a view to understanding the other and respecting any differences.

Finally, taking the emotion out of it. Open, honest, yet composed discussions are paramount to changing minds and instilling values. Instead of engaging in political diatribe, we should seek to understand differences in views and values engage in perspective-taking, even if those perspectives are diametrically opposed to our own. Only then can we open the minds of others to assume our views. Instead of a combat brewing because of different views held [with accusations and insults in tow], this level of sensible and pragmatic discourse could result in a healthy respect for the alternative view, or even a change of view.

Ultimately, political correctness would likely be more effective in advancing DEI initiatives if reframed as a respect for others, irrespective of their views; endeavouring to eliminate the us against them dogma, with a view to treating everyone with respect, in order to coexist and collaborate. As in all DEI initiatives, its effectiveness is rooted in a genuine willingness to listen and change on both sides of the aisle. This takes a particular level of maturity and rationality, dosed with humility.

Notes:

Originally posted here:

Is political correctness holding back progress on diversity, equity, and inclusion? - USAPP American Politics and Policy (blog)

Nicole Kidman is one of the most sought after television actresses of the moment, delivering chilling performances as the leads in Nine Perfect Strangers, The Undoing, and Big Little Lies over the last several years. Naturally the rumor mill quickly took into effect to tear down a strong and successful woman, churning out stories that the 54-year-old actress recently stormed off the set of her new Amazon show Expats. However, the production studio swiftly shut down these rumors, denying the claims and setting the record straight.

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This past weekend, Hong Kong based publication HK10 raised the allegations that Kidman angrily left the set of the new Amazon Productions show Expats after a disagreement with the director, Lulu Wang. These rumors were quickly ruled unfounded, however, as Amazon shared with Variety that there was no drama to be had.

Nicole wrapped as scheduled, she did not leave early. She always had other projects she was committed to. The production is not stalled or on hiatus, it was always going to continue shooting without her, an Amazon spokesperson revealed to the publication via email.

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This was not the first controversy that rose from set, and earlier this week it was revealed that Hong Kong, where Expats is filming, waived their quarantine mandates for Kidman upon her arrival to the country. The reasoning for waiving Kidmans quarantine was justified for the actress 'to carry out designated professional work, according to Hong Kong's Commerce and Economic Development Bureau via HK10. However, this was not well received by the general public although Kidman is vaccinated as stipulated in the agreement.

Kidman will serve as an executive producer on the show, which has also sparked concern over the political correctness of the premise, which was derived from Janice Y. K. Lee novel The Expatriates, and follows the story of privileged white expatriate women living in Hong Kong. Questions have been raised as to whether or not the show is tone deaf considering the current climate of Hong Kong at the moment, with Amazon catching significant flack. However, filming for the show continues, and is set to premiere on Amazon video with a date yet to be announced.

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So Awkward! Your Jaw Will Drop When You Hear The Rumors About Nicole Kidman On Her Latest TV Set - SheFinds

Kevin Hart, Megyn Kelly, Joe Rogan, Kanye West and other celebrities have all faced cancel culture a merciless, social media backlash targeting their comments and beliefs, which seeks to remove them from society.

But this social firing squad isnt just for the elite. In fact, most cancel culture victims are young, voiceless, financially vulnerable or dont have a major platform on which to defend themselves.

Last year, I became one of those victims.

In the summer of 2020, when defunding the police became a popular refrain and white supremacy was considered the greatest threat to the West, I wrote an essay sharing my experiences with racism growing up as a young Sikh boy in a majority-white area in British Columbia, Canada. However, I also argued that making broad racial generalizations and stripping minorities of human agency and self-determination does not lead to racial progress it does the precise opposite.

Soon after my piece, called The Fallacy of White Privilege, appeared in this newspaper in November 2020, it went viral, leading to an interview with The Hills Saagar Enjeti on his show Rising and later an appearance on The Adam Carolla Show.

I was surprised and happy about reaching such a huge audience until I realized I had violated the current culture of political correctness.

On social media, I lost friends, former classmates, colleagues, sports teammates and social connections. I noticed as my private, relatively tight-knit Instagram following declined from 500 to 350 followers. One of my best friends since seventh grade blocked me on Instagram for views he considered critical of the Black Lives Matter movement. I have not spoken to him since, despite seeing him at a recent social gathering where he ignored me.

This may sound juvenile and trivial, but when social media has increasingly replaced real social interactions during the pandemic, the ostracism took a heavy toll. At 19, I felt like I was born in the wrong generation.

Even so, I felt compelled to keep speaking out, taking a contrarian position on many social issues, leading to more widespread attention.

The handful of young moderates in my social circle who support my work messaged me in private, saying they respected my views but were unable to publicly support or share them on social media.

One friend said, I loved your appearance on The Ben Shapiro Show, man, but dont tell anyone I said that. Ill be crucified.

In August 2020, Paul Henderson, the editor of my local newspaper The Chilliwack Progress (who happens to be white), started taking to social media to accuse me of downplaying racism in our society and spreading misinformation. Worse, in January 2021, he went on to describe my views as alt-right (frequently used to describe white nationalism).

I have also faced backlash at my college, University of Fraser Valley. Last August, concerned with social justice activism pervading academia, I tweeted at Sharanjit Sandhra, aSouth Asian studies/sociologyprofessor at my college, to ask if my perspective would be welcome inher new thinktank for young thinkers to examine racism in our society. Expecting her to welcome my ideas, I was shocked to see her blunt reply, not interested.

Later in 2020, Carin Bondar, another professor at my university (who was recently elected to the local school board) criticized an essay I wrote about Joe Rogan, praising him for his heterodox views. Why? Because, as she tweeted, he is a #whiteman.

Incidents like these have forced me to avoid courses on racial inequality and gender relations at my school, two of my favorite subjects.

My views also affected my job, working remotely as a content creator. In July 2020, when I tweeted a study by black Harvard Economist Roland Fryer, which found no systemic racial bias in police shootings, my boss e-mailed me and told me to remove my affiliation with the company from my Twitter bio because it might make the company look anti-black and pro-police.

He found me correlating policing with saving black lives (his words) to be offensive, but assured me my job wouldnt be compromised and I could continue to work. Though unsettled, I removed my work with the company from my Twitter bio.

A month later, I published my essay on white privilege. Though I expected more remote tasks from my employer, I mysteriously received nothing for weeks, something that had never happened before. Finally, my boss sent me a brief text, telling me to remove my affiliation with his company from my LinkedIn profile as I am no longer an employee.

As a result, I lost out on a $1,000 paycheck that summer, which I received every couple of months a modest but much-needed amount that I was putting towards my college tuition.

You may wonder why I am now sharing these stories a year later.

The answer is simple: I no longer fear the backlash from my contemporaries, media figures or professors.

In many ways, the outrage over my dissent has reached its peak. Any new assault on my character by my local newspaper editor or anyone else will have little influence or impact on my mental state or work.

Perhaps most importantly, I have established my independent voice and can (modestly) financially support myself with my writings for now.

But, one thing is clear: the reputational costs for dissenting from the correct views are high. According to a 2020 Heterodox Academy survey, 62 percent of sampled college students believe the climate on their campus prevents them from sharing their views on social and political issues, mostly because they fear backlash from professors and other students.

Meanwhile, only 8 percent of Generation Z supports cancel culture, according to a recent Morning Consult survey.

While rich, powerful celebrities are comparatively bullet-proof from cancel culture, its no wonder why many ordinary people remain silent or cynically supportive of the social justice cause du jour. The odds are stacked against them from the university system, the media, the labor market and broader culture and compliance is the only financially and socially sustainable option.

Rav Arora is a 20-year-old writer, who specializes in topics of race, music, literature and culture. His writing has also been featured in The Globe and Mail and City Journal. https://twitter.com/Ravarora1

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What it's really like to be canceled and how I overcame it - New York Post

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have been presented with a clear dichotomy of policy choices. The government could institute restrictions that sacrifice the economy for the benefit of public health, or take a laissez faire attitude towards the pandemic that does the reverse. This dichotomy has defined the public understanding of pandemic policy and possibly politicized the pandemic more than anything else.

To conservatives in favor of a laissez faire approach, even basic public safety measures became associated with over-cautiousness, economic ruin and political correctness. Those that supported restrictions bought into the same framework: they called conservatives greedy and heartless for caring more about the economy than human lives.

These assumptions still go unchallenged. But after a year and a half of this pandemic, it is becoming clear that reality was not as simple and clear-cut. It turns out that very restrictive approaches to the pandemic might have been the best long-term economic choice, not one that sacrificed the economy.

This may sound strange, but that is because our understanding of what caused the coronavirus recession is flawed. The slowdown in economic activity was not because government officials hit some kind of economic off-switch. It was because millions of people were terrified of getting a life-threatening disease.

These people existed before the shelter-in-place orders. They existed after these orders were rescinded, and in the areas where restrictions were simply never enforced. But they were rarely acknowledged by a media that focused on only the most extreme anti-maskers and anti-vaxxers over everyone else.

However, this was not the case everywhere. Other countries around the world recognized that having a large portion of their population fearful of going out would be a major long-term economic problem, so they attempted the only real solution: getting transmission as low as possible. This goal led countries to institute measures unimaginable by American standards, with nations like Australia and New Zealand shutting down entire cities after only a few infections.

These measures were undeniably effective at stopping the spread. New Zealand has never had over 100 confirmed cases in a single day. Australia never had more than 1000 cases a day until this summer. But more importantly, neither country faced economic devastation as a result of these monumental efforts.

Completely contrary to expectations, they got the best of both worlds, achieving miniscule spread while also seeing a rapid economic recovery. Because of their serious approaches to stopping the spread, both Australia and New Zealand came out of the pandemic with massive economic surges that brought them at and above their pre-COVID GDP levels.

China is another example of this. After instituting some of the worlds most draconian and controversial lockdown rules at the start of the pandemic, they stopped the spread to such an extent that they never even had a recession in the first place, being the only major economy to have a positive GDP in 2020.

By lowering case counts so much, these countries were able to fully reopen their economies early rather than having to wait for vaccines to become widely available. And when they reopened, they reopened: even the most fearful and reluctant felt confident returning to everyday life.

This has never been the case in America, where we have seen tens of thousands of daily cases even at the absolute best moments of containment. Those most vulnerable, or even just fearful, have never had an environment where they felt comfortable returning to everyday life. Even those who feel comfortable going out when cases are low are forced back inside when yet another surge occurs the next month.

As a result, we have reaped an inconsistent, incomplete economic recovery, with growth completely dependent on the state of a rapidly mutating disease. This is already evident in the recently released August jobs report, which showed an unexpected dropoff in job gains from previous following the surge of the Delta variant.

It is hard to miss the irony here. Our laissez faire approach, intended on saving the system from COVID-induced destruction, may have ended up crippling it for years to come by making the disease a permanent issue. It is even harder not to feel frustrated with the choices made at the beginning of the pandemic, when all of these issues could have been nipped in the bud.

Unfortunately, the genie cannot be put back into the bottle. Until America reaches herd immunity through vaccinations, both the economy and the state of public health will be at the mercy of COVID, as it has for the last year and a half. All we can do now is hope that we reach that point sooner rather than later and commit to never again choosing this path during the next crisis.

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OPINION: Trying to save 2020's economy ruined 2021's - Red and Black

And the next change was when hedge funds came in. Now you are talking about the people who came in and give you the formula as they were in the movie. If you have these factors, this amount of action, we can earn 17 percent on our investment. Thats what I was told. Ive always heard things like this, so I didnt really care so much. To direct a movie, you need to have an alpha personality in the first place. Your instinct is Give me that chair, give me that whip. I will go there and make those lions behave. Well, sometimes the lion wins. Especially if the lion is not particularly interested in the concept of circus.

Martin ScorseseYour frequent collaborator, has recently been in the news saying that Marvel movies are not movies, but upset many people in the process. Do you have the same opinion?

No, they are cinemas. The YouTube cat video is also a movie. Its a little surprising that teenage comics, which we considered adolescent entertainment, have become an economically dominant genre. Each generation is informed by literature, theater, live television and film schools. Now we have a generation that is informed by video games and manga. It wasnt the filmmakers that changed, but the audience. And when the audience doesnt want a serious movie, its very difficult to make it. When they do, when they ask you, What should I think about womens freedom, gay rights, racial conditions, financial inequality? And the audience asks about these issues. Interested in, and you can make those movies. And we have. Especially in the 50s, 60s and 70s, I write about social issues once or twice a week. And they were financially successful because the audience wanted them. After that, something changed in the culture and the center dropped out. Those films are still made, but they are no longer the center of conversation.

What do you think has changed?

Well, that happened all over. Theres no Walter Cronkite, no Johnny Carson, no Hollywood studio movie. The center of gravity is gone. What happens then is that people retreat to the surrounding area. In other words, there is a world of Comic books, or a world of X or Y, Z, and it is very difficult to reassemble these people. It has been culturally lost. Will never come back.

I know you are now In Facebook prisonBut if not, why is it your favorite platform and how do you choose what to share there?

Well, I started as a film critic. And many of my friends on Facebook are critics, filmmakers, or cultural consumers. Therefore, Facebook is a great way to communicate. You see something interesting, you tell them about it.If I were on Facebook I would have mentioned something Swan rhymeThis is a completely strange movie starring Udo Kier. Its about the aging queen, the best beautician in the town of Sandusky, Ohio, trying to escape from his nursing home and discover his old world. Who knew that Sandusky, Ohio had gone to zero because of the homosexuality of American men? But thats where the filmmaker came from.

Well, thats what I would have posted on Facebook. But I couldnt.Because, of course, the focus [Features] I understand the world of this clickbait we live in. I wont talk about it because Focus asked me not to do that, but lets say the actress said something creepy. What happens is that clicks occur, and clicks and other clicks occur. Its fictitious and I made it up, but when I say Paul Schrader talked about Michelle Obamas big ass, click-click-click-click-click. And their employers are happy. yours The employer is happy because they will get a lot of clicks. Therefore, in that environment, it is not possible to predict who will implement the concept. So Focus said, Everyone is looking for a click, so its better to keep your mouth closed. Its the same in everything, including political correctness. We all know what reality is. We all know the language used in childhood, but it is still used today to define words that can no longer be used, whether sexually or geographically. But if you say I know those words, its almost as bad as using those words.

Source link Paul Schrader knows the perfect Clickbait headline for this interview

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Paul Schrader knows the perfect Clickbait headline for this interview - Texasnewstoday.com

By Rick Plasterer, CP Op-Ed Contributor | Wednesday, September 08, 2021Rick Plasterer is a staff writer for IRD concerned particularly with domestic religious liberty.

The decades long persecution of Christians in Nigeria continues unabated, and if anything appears to be worsening and just as one-sided as ever. It has been recounted in numerous articlesposted by IRD in recent years. Perhaps most disturbing, the government of Nigeria, led by President Muhammed Buhari, has centralized control of the nations police, and seems to have a policy of allowing Christians to be murdered by militants of the Muslim Fulani ethnic group with impunity.

Killings, which areongoing, commonly occur in Nigerias Middle Belt, between the Muslim north and the Christian south of the country. Significantly, an Anglican bishop in one of the affected areas, the Rt. Rev. Jacob Kwashi of Zonkwa Diocese,remarkedlast month at a mass funeral that:

We have never seen an evil government in this country like the one of today The government is fully in support of the bloodshed in Nigeria. We are being killed just because we are not Muslim:

This theme was echoed inpresentationby Robert Reilly, Director of the Westminster Institute on August 28. Reilly interviewed Robert Destro, former Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor in the Trump Administration, and currently Professor of Law at the Catholic University of America, and Mark Jacob, a Nigerian barrister, and former Attorney General of Kaduna State in Nigeria, concerning the Nigerian governments effective support of the slaughter. Although the terrorist group Boko Haram is the best known perpetrator of violence in Nigeria, Reillys interview focused primarily on violence committed by Fulani militants.

Reilly noted that the Trump Administration declared Nigeria a Country of Particular Concern (CPC) in late 2020, which indicates that it has engaged in or tolerated ongoing and egregious violations of religious freedom, and that the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom has warned of a potential Christian genocide in Nigeria.

Jacob provided a broad background to what is going on in Nigeria, talking about factual events that I have primary knowledge of. Im not talking from second guess or hearsay. He said that he has been part of several mass burials, and has encouraged victims.

Jacob observed that the atrocities to which he refers were selected killings of Christians, particularly in the Middle Belt region of Nigeria. While it is being claimed that climate change is the ultimate cause of the conflict, in fact, the killings that have happened from 2014 on are a genocide perpetrated by a sophisticated armed militia. He said the Fulani militants are well organized, they are well trained, they are well armed. These armed groups move from village to village, from town to town, from community to community. It has also been claimed that the attacks were not religious. But Jacob said that all the attacks are religious. Attackers come into a community shouting the Islamic slogan Allahu Akbar! Churches are destroyed. Mosques are spared, indeed, left untouched. Muslim inhabitants are not attacked, only Christians. He said that since 2015, the Nigerian government has taken sides with the attackers. To claim that the attacks are not religious is simply a falsehood, he said.

Reilly asked who is arming the Fulani. Jacob said that the Nigerian government claims that the arms are coming from Libya. However, Jacob said that the Islamic world is organized on this matter. Several Islamic countries are believed to be funding and supporting these attacks because the entire program is described as a jihad. He said that it is described as an attempt to Islamize the territories. The attackers use the Islamic language and slogans.

Jacob said the current jihad began around 2010 in Plateau State, and got worse by 2015. From there, it has spread to other states in Nigeria. Attacks are on predominately Christian communities, which are attacked at night time. Villages are surrounded, people driven from their homes, and then hunted down. Houses are looted, and separate contingents of the Fulani set houses on fire. These attacks are ongoing. Thousands of internally displaced persons are inrefugee camps, with the government doing little or nothing to help them. Education has been permanently disrupted.

Another abuse has been to kidnap children. In one case, aboutone hundred childrenfrom a Baptist childrens home were held captive. He said that commonly following a kidnapping, the parents are left alone, to negotiate with the kidnappers. At least in some cases, the locations of kidnapped children are known. Jacob said that against the Fulani, Christian Nigerians are totally helpless, you survive only by Gods will.

Jacob observed that the Nigerian armed forces are skewed to the Muslims. Since 2015, when Buhari became President, the government has ensured that the heads of all agencies are Muslims. All appeals to have a mixed military leadership have been ignored. To all appearances, the Nigerian government and armed forces are complicit in the mass murder that is happening. Even if a state government would like to attack terrorists, they would have to act through the federal government to apply coercive force, since both army and police are centralized under the federal government. Military action against terrorists is approved if Muslims are attacked, but not if Christians are attacked, he said.

Reilly asked about a situation a number of years ago when federal troops moved against the terrorist organization Boko Haram. In this situation, a number of school girls were attacked. But Jacob said that the Nigerian president at the time was Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian. However, the President of Nigeria since 2015 has been Mohammed Buhari, who himself was appointed by Boko Haram to lead in any negotiations with the Nigerian government before 2015.

Jacob sees a real problem with known members of Boko Haram being integrated into the Nigerian army on the claim that they have repented. This, he said, is clear injustice, not to punish terrorists. He believes it accounts of the lackadaisical approach of the Nigerian military to terrorism. Jacob said that the terrorists have an ideological conviction to kill people in the name of religion. And then you are just brought back and given the uniform with the Nigerian army.

Reilly asked if the Nigerian military itself had ever been implicated in these attacks on Christians. Jacob essentially said that the militarys inaction is evidence of complicity. He cited a recent case of an attack which was just fifteen minutes from the barracks of the Nigerian army. Over 70 people were killed, and many homes destroyed, but no action from the army. Another attack on Christmas Eve 2016 continued from mid-night to dawn, and lasted until everyone was either killed or had fled, and their houses destroyed, while the army and police were only 15 kilometers away. This sort of thing has been seen over and over.

Jacob said that when an incident occurs, victims or their advocates are told that the military does not have approval to act against terrorists, and may be told that the attack is simply a mere internal strife over land or a herder/farmer crisis. This, he said, is a total falsehood. There were tribal clashes in the 1970s, but these were resolved without bloodshed. Jacob added that the Fulani attackers today will cut down crops after destroying a village. It is not a situation where a herdsman happens to stray onto a farm, but an attack by well-armed troops on farms, killing the inhabitants, and destroying the farm.

Reilly asked if these attacks have been successful in depopulating parts of Nigeria. Jacob responded absolutely. The indigenous population is gone in many areas, and the land occupied by the Fulani. Court orders to restore land cannot be enforced, because of government complicity in the attacks.

Jacob said that governors of states in southern Nigeria came together to prevent Fulani expansion into their areas. This action was condemned, both by the Fulani and the Nigerian government, clearly showing the Nigerian governments complicity in the murder of Nigerians and confiscation of land. The governments official policy is to declare privately owned land open for settlement, resulting in the current assault on Christians in Nigeria, which is ongoing. The Nigerian government has also designated thousands of kilometers of land in Nigeria for grazing (Fulani) expansion, ignoring property rights.

Jacob said that the Nigerian government was very upset and angry about the designation of Nigeria as a country of particular concern. But he said that no one who has entered Nigeria in the last two years will fail to see, will fail to touch the turmoil that is happening there. No single day passes without a report of twenty, to thirty, to one hundred people being killed the government is refusing to address criminality the people bearing arms are getting bolder every day.

Reilly remarked that one would expect widespread revulsion in Nigeria against what is happening. He asked why the Christians in the south of Nigeria cant do something to help people in north and central Nigeria. Jacob said that they can do very little. The problem is that the southern governors, who have opposed President Buharis policy of opening farmlands to Fulani grazing, are in the same political party as the president, and political correctness has prevented them from effectively opposing his policies.

The violence in Nigerias middle belt has now spread to the southeast and the southwest of Nigeria, he said. Although the southern governors have formally come together to state their opposition to his policies, which Jacob said is a bold step, nevertheless, their opposition has so far been ineffective. Security is highly centralized in Nigeria, and most politicians like to play safe, rather than opposing the President.

Reilly asked what is the potential within Nigeria for a peaceful, democratic change. Jacob said that the potential is very slim, because there is no arm of government that has not been infiltrated with, by the current political style we have, where the President and his men have their hands in everything. While there is an electoral commission, no one believes that there will be a fair election. Rigged elections have been approved in the past, and ballot boxes were taken away by soldiers.

Reilly asked about the integrity of the court system. Jacob said that the courts are intimidated. The current government raided the homes of Supreme Court justices, on the pretense of investigating corruption. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court was removed, and replaced by someone else. Reilly asked how Jacob operates as a barrister in Nigeria in view of this corruption. Jacob said that he is not a proud lawyer because of this corruption. Judges are unwilling to render true justice according to the law, because of intimidation. Thus, the Buhari government could obtain an order designating the Independent Peoples Movement of Biafra a terrorist organization, while those groups actually committing mass murders go free.

Jacob said that the rights of Christians and other religions have been trampled upon with impunity. So much so, that the lives of Christians do not matter. Any attack on Muslims, however, results in immediate government action. He said that the Nigerian government specializes in the manipulation of information. The government even attempted a hate speech bill that would effectively prohibit criticism of the government.

Reilly asked Jacob if the interview he had given puts him personally in danger. Jacob said absolutely, but I dont care. He said that there is a common saying now in Nigeria that if you speak, you die. If you dont speak, you die.

Jacob presented a much more dire picture of Nigeria than Americans commonly hold. Comments of Robert Destro, who dealt with Nigeria as an Assistant Secretary of State, along with concluding observations, will be given in a subsequent article.

Originally published at Juicy Ecumenism.

Rick Plasterer is a staff writer for IRD concerned particularly with domestic religious liberty. He attended Eastern Mennonite College (now University) receiving a B.A. degree in history and sociology, and an M.S. in library science from Drexel University.

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Persecution of Christians in Nigeria continues to need attention and action pt 1 - The Christian Post

The controversial comics show was pulled from Sheffield City Halls programme of upcoming events because of concerns raised over the nature of some of his material, which is often vulgar and can be offensive.

Concerns were raised by some objectors, and the event was axed by Sheffield City Trust, which runs Sheffield City Hall on behalf of the council.

Announcing the decision, SCTs Chief Executive, Andrew Snelling, said: We dont believe this show reflects Sheffield City Trust values, particularly our ambition that our leisure, culture and entertainment venues are inclusive for all in Sheffield.

We understand that some people will be disappointed with our decision but we must uphold the standards and values that we promote and expect across our venues.

At the time, Councillor Terry Fox, leader of Sheffield City Council, added: The council wholeheartedly supports Sheffield City Trusts decision to remove the booking for Roy Chubby Browns January show. Sheffield is a City of Sanctuary, with diverse communities and the content of this show is unlikely to reflect Sheffields inclusive values.

But the decision to drop the show has led to a protest being planned outside the City Hall on Friday and over 31,600 people have signed a petition calling for the gig to be reinstated.

Councillor Shaffaq Mohammed, Lib Dem leader of the opposition at Sheffield Council, described the decision as the start of a very slippery slope.

He said the decision smacks of the nanny state and feels like living in a soviet era.

The councillor plans to quiz the council about the decision at a meeting this afternoon.

He is looking for an answer from council leader Terry Fox as to whether councillors were consulted in the decision-making process.

Councillor Fox has already said that despite mounting objections, the council will continue to support Sheffield City Trust's position.

Roy Chubby Brown, whose real name is Royston Vasey, has blamed 'snowflakes and political correctness' for his act being dropped from a venue where he has performed for more than 30 years.

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Council to face questions on axing of Roy 'Chubby' Brown show in Sheffield - The Star

In our uncertain age, which can so often feel so dark and disturbing, Steven Pinker has distinguished himself as a voice of positivity. This has been a boon for him, as his books, like The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined (2011) and Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress (2018), have been best sellers and elevated the Harvard cognitive psychologist, who is 66, beyond academia and into the realm of the public intellectual. Theyve also generated no small amount of disagreement, with Pinkers critics arguing, to cite two common examples, that his view of the world is overly sympathetic to the excesses of capitalism and too callous about the profound hardships still faced by so many. His latest book, Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters, takes on another provocatively large subject and will be published on Sept. 28. Many philosophers that I know, says Pinker, think that the world would be better if more people knew a bit of logic.

Your new book is driven by the idea that it would be good if more people thought more rationally. But people dont think theyre irrational. So what mechanisms would induce more people to test their own thinking and beliefs for rationality? Ideally thered be a change in our norms of conversation. Relying on an anecdote, arguing ad hominem these should be mortifying. Of course no one can engineer social norms explicitly. But we know that norms can change, and if there are seeds that try to encourage the process, then there is some chance that it could go viral. On the other hand, a conclusion that I came to in the book is that the most powerful means of getting people to be more rational is not to concentrate on the people. Because people are pretty rational when it comes to their own lives. They get the kids clothed and fed and off to school on time, and they keep their jobs and pay their bills. But people hold beliefs not because they are provably true or false but because theyre uplifting, theyre empowering, theyre good stories. The key, though, is what kind of species are we? How rational is Homo sapiens? The answer cant be that were just irrational in our bones, otherwise we could never have established the benchmarks of rationality against which we could say some people some of the time are irrational. I think the answer is, especially for publicly consequential beliefs: We achieve rationality by implementing rules for the community that make us collectively more rational than any of us are individually. People make up for one anothers biases by being able to criticize them. People air their disagreements, and the person with the strongest position prevails. People subject their beliefs to empirical tests.

Steven Pinker in 1976, when he was an undergraduate at McGill University. From Steven Pinker

Are there aspects of your own life in which youre knowingly irrational? The answer is almost certainly yes. I probably do things that morally I cant justify, like eating meat. I probably take risks that if I were to do the expected-utility calculation could not be justified, like bicycling. If I were to multiply the probability of my being killed by the value placed on my life, it would certainly be less than the same sum for getting my exercise by hiking or swimming. But nonetheless I enjoy bicycling. I try to mitigate the risks and to adjust my behavior to make it more ethically defensible. I have reason to believe at a meta-self-conscious level that whatever adjustments I do make are probably less than what would be optimal.

Do you see any irrational beliefs as useful? Yeah. For example, every time the media blames a fire or a storm on climate change, its a dubious argument in the sense that those are events that belong to weather, not climate. You can never attribute a particular event to a trend. Its also the case, given that there is an availability bias in human cognition, that people tend to be more influenced by images and narratives and anecdotes than trends. If a particular anecdote or event can in the public mind be equated with a trend, and the impression that people get from the flamboyant image gets them to appreciate what in reality is a trend, then I have no problem with using it that way.

What about love? Theres nothing irrational about love. Ultimately our values are neither rational nor irrational. Theyre our values; theyre our goals. David Hume made that point: Theres no rational argument why I should rather be happy than sad or healthy rather than sick. But we have to acknowledge basic human needs. Its a misconception to think that if you are joyful, if you are awe-struck, there is something irrational about it, and if youre rational youve got to be a robot. If youll pardon the expression, thats irrational.

Pinker at M.I.T. in 1991. Puppets figured into his study of language development in children. From Steven Pinker

I dont think Im alone in feeling that rising authoritarianism, the pandemic and the climate crisis, among other things, are signs that were going to hell in a handbasket. Is that irrational of me? Its not irrational to identify genuine threats to our well-being. It is irrational to interpret a number of crises occurring at the same time as signs that were doomed. Its a statistical phenomenon that when events are randomly sprinkled in time they cluster. That sounds paradoxical, but unless you have a nonrandom process that spaced them apart Were going to have a crisis every six months but were never going to have two crises in a month events cluster. Thats what random events will always do.

You mentioned changing social norms. How can we know if the fights happening in academia over free speech which youve experienced firsthand are just the labor pains of new norms? And how do we then judge if those norms are ultimately positive or negative? These fights clearly reflect a new regime of norms. The way we evaluate whether they are truth-promoting or not is twofold. One is by analyzing what they reward, what they punish. Are they specifically designed to reward more accurate beliefs and to marginalize less accurate ones, as, for example, the norms of science ought to do? There are norms in my own field, such as preregistering studies, that did not exist 10 or 12 years ago and that can be justified because we know that the old norms led to error and the new norms reduce errors. Moreover, this isnt just etiquette. You can explain why that norm change is necessary in order to achieve our goal of the truth, whereas other norm changes descend on people like a kind of etiquette and are not scrutinized for their effects on achieving the goal of alignment toward truth. The second part of the answer is, does a community that has those norms tend to say true things or false things? You can contrast the set of norms around Wikipedia on the one hand and Twitter on the other, to take two digital platforms that differ a lot in their commitment to the rules that are implemented in order to steer users toward the truth. Does Wikipedia have a good track record? Its not bad. Its comparable to Britannica. If someone were to do that for Twitter, I think its obvious what the answer would be.

You said we have to look at whether or not new norms are designed to reward more accurate beliefs or marginalize less accurate ones. How does that apply to subjective issues like, for example, ones to do with identity? I guess as with all moral arguments, theres not an objectively correct answer, but there can be matters of consistency with values that everyone holds. If everyone agrees that fairness is a value, that education and health and happiness and long life are values, then you could prosecute moral arguments by saying that a particular position is inconsistent with other values that the arguer may hold. I used this example in Rationality: The English feminist Mary Astell appropriated words from John Locke about how people should not be subjected to the arbitrary will of other people. She said if thats a good argument against autocracy and against slavery, why doesnt everyone hold it with regard to women? Similarly, in the 1960s and 70s, the arguments that people had accepted on racial equality were then extended to gender equality and then to sexual orientation. So in the case of free speech, for example, if you believe that the arguments against slavery in their time and against Jim Crow laws more recently could only have been expressed when people had the freedom to voice unpopular opinions, then you cant now say that free speech is inherently dangerous.

Pinker at a lecture in 1997. Brooks Kraft/Sygma, via Getty Images

I think its fair to say that the scope of acceptable academic perspectives and subject-matter study areas has widened immeasurably over time. People can study a multitude of things today that would in the past never have been admitted into academia. But the popular conception is that academic discourse is narrowing. How real is that concern? Is the evidence for it just anecdotal? Its a pointed question to me because one of my shticks is dont let your head be turned by flagrant examples, look at the overall trends. The answer is yes, it has gotten worse, as best we can tell. If you look at the number of cases that the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education has to deal with every year of flagrant violations of students or professors right to express their opinions; if you look at attitudes among students, do you think its justifiable to fire a professor who has offensive beliefs? There has been a worsening in the last five years. So it isnt just anecdotes. Although some of the anecdotes are hair-raising. Such as, to take a recent example, the law professor who was investigated for raising the possibility that Covid-19 resulted from a lab accident, which until very recently was considered racist beyond the pale. I hope its not true. But I have to admit that it might be true. We cant call somebody a racist for raising the question. Another thing that we know, no doubt as a consequence of some of these trends, is that confidence in academia is sinking. It is an unfortunate trend because it means that in cases where academics ought to have credibility, where the research is not infected by political correctness, such as climate change, theres a sapping of confidence in the scientific consensus. Given that virtually every climate scientist believes that human activity is warming the planet, how could anyone deny it? The answer is, people dont necessarily believe what scientists say because they correctly sense that within academia a person can get punished for unorthodox beliefs.

Isnt it more likely that skepticism about climate change has to do with bad-faith efforts by corporations or politicians than declining confidence in academics? I think its both. The fact that there are grounds for worrying about groupthink in academia means that those admittedly vested interests can gain too much traction. That is, vested interests can gain credibility if they can point, as they now can, to suppression of debate within academia.

What links do you see between rationality and morality? Hume was probably the first of a series of philosophers to point out that they are not the same. That is, you cant, as the clich goes, get an ought from an is. That is technically narrowly true, but it doesnt go very far. Because as soon as you make the nonrational commitment that well-being is good, health is better than sickness, life is better than death and we care about how others treat us that our fates depend on other peoples behavior once you grant those, a lot follows rationally. Such as that I cant justify treating you in a way that is different from the way I expect you to treat me. Just because there is no logical difference between me and you. So a kind of golden rule, categorical imperative, can be derived rationally from the nonrational positions that I care about my well-being, and that my well-being depends on what you do, and that you can understand me. Now, there can be disagreements. If you believe in an afterlife, for example, you might devalue life on Earth compared with salvation. But to the extent that people do care about life on Earth, certain things do rationally follow.

One of the recurring criticisms of your ideas on progress is that our having an awareness of how much better the situation is for the impoverished today compared with the impoverished of the past doesnt actually make anybodys life better and, in fact, minimizes contemporary suffering. Is there a moral gap there? I think thats a fallacy. It can be true both that there are fewer poor people, fewer oppressed people, fewer victims of violence and that there are still poor people, oppressed people and victims of violence. We want to reduce that suffering as much as possible. The fact that there has been progress helps us identify what drives down poverty and violence and illness. But theres also a moral component, and that is: What actually dislodges us from fatalism? What gives us the gumption to try to reduce war further? Maybe you can eliminate it, or poverty? The United Nations and the World Bank and development experts say: Lets see, weve reduced poverty from 90 percent of humanity to 9 percent. Can we push it to zero? That might seem utopian, but if we got it from 90 to 9, lets try to get it to 6 and then 5 and then 4 and then 3. It gives us the rational reason to believe that it is not utopian, and the knowledge of what we should and what we shouldnt be doing.

Pinker giving a lecture at the British Library in 2011. Nick Cunard/Writer Pictures, via Associated Press

If we agree that well-being is better than its opposite, where does economic equality fit in? Is that a core aspect of well-being? I would say it is not the core aspect, although fairness is. The core aspect is flourishing, having the resources necessary to have a stimulating, healthy life. The fact that Warren Buffett exists by itself doesnt make me any worse off. We should distinguish the mere fact that some people earn more than others from the possibility that they did so by illicit means. Of course, unfairness is morally wrong. But inequality per se?People could disagree. In Enlightenment Now, I cite the old joke from the Soviet Union: The two dirt-poor peasants Igor and Boris are just barely scratching a living out of their tiny plots of land. The only difference being that Boris has a goat and Igor doesnt. Then a fairy appears to Igor one day and says, Ill grant you any wish. And he says, I wish that Boriss goat should die. If you can see the humor in that, then you could perhaps appreciate an argument that equality that simply makes some people worse off and doesnt make anyone better off is a dubious moral good. The more defensible moral good would be raising the bottom rather than reducing the difference between the bottom and the top.

Is it possible that the rising-tide-lifts-all-boats economic argument provides the wealthy with an undue moral cover for the self-interested inequality that their wealth grants them? Oh, absolutely. It is a danger that all democracies have to safeguard against: With wealth comes influence and power, and theres the constant vulnerability that the wealthy will game the rules to favor themselves. Another is related: Given that we have a tax system, its elementary fairness that the rich should pay a greater share, that taxes should be progressive. For the obvious reason that an extra dollar means a lot more to a poor person than a rich person. So it hugely increases aggregate welfare if the rich pay a greater share than the poor. For all the debates in the United States as to whether governments should reduce poverty, should support education, support health, the debate is kind of over. We already do. All affluent societies do. Its easy to be seduced by a kind of radical libertarian argument that the role of government should only be to help enforce contracts and maintain safety and law and order. However appealing that might be in theory, in practice it doesnt exist anywhere. Theres no such thing as a libertarian paradise of an affluent democracy with no extensive social safety net.

Just going back to shifting norms in academia: Does the current atmosphere have any bearing on what youre willing to say in public? It is something that I think about. I manage my controversy portfolio carefully. Partly because, as my late colleague Bob Nozick would say, you dont have to have an opinion on everything.

Says the guy whos written multiple books trying to explain human nature. [Laughs.] Yeah, right. I dont shy away from defending the positions that I think can and ought to be defended while not squandering my credibility by being outrageous for the sake of it. I do defend the abstract principle that people should be able to express opinions that they can defend. In making that argument, it isnt like the classic case of the A.C.L.U.s defending the right of the Nazis to march in Skokie, namely that we should allow crazy and offensive and bizarre beliefs to be expressed because thats what free speech is all about. Which, I actually do believe that. But when people are canceled or punished for expressing beliefs that might very well be true or are not outrageous, are not wild, that they can defend thats the greater danger.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity from two conversations.

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Steven Pinker Thinks Your Sense of Imminent Doom Is Wrong - The New York Times

There have been plenty of supply chain issues over the past year and a half. Concocting strange topics to fight about has not been a struggle. It is, however, becoming more difficult by the day to retain the attention of audiences needed for clicks, ratings, and winning elections. There have been overarching themes: anger over lock-downs and mask mandates; vaccine conspiracy theories; whether or not the person who lost the last presidential election indeed lost. But, underneath those meta-panics lies a constant stream of shorter flash-panics that often cause utter confusion.

The latest of these faux-crises brought a small gathering of Anchorage residents to the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Memorial on the Park Strip late last month. The emcee of the rally, entitled Truth in Education, was Roz'lyn Wyche, an Anchorage educator and the vice-president and co-founder of the Anchorage Coalition of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color Educators (ACBE), a group committed to [championing] equity in education for communities of color in order to achieve equality.

Wyche knew what she was at the rally to object to, but wasn't sure what circumstances had led her to have to object to it in the first place.

Just like everybody else, I didn't even know there was a thing called 'Critical Race Theory,' Wyche told the small crowd. She had helped organize a rally to promote truth and equity in education, including more perspectives from people of color. Conservative media was trying to make it something distinctly different.

If the reader is unfamiliar with the term Critical Race Theory (CRT), that's because its novelty is what made it so appealing to right wing paranoia manufacturers during the aforementioned pandemic, replete with free time and internet access (for those who can afford it).

That's the position in which Seattle-based filmmaker turned conservative activist, Christopher Rufo, found himself earlier this year. Rufo told The New Yorker's Benjamin Wallace-Wells that he was radicalized after coming across Critical Race Theory texts, in which he found radical roots... [and] often explicitly Marxist themes.

COVID lock-downs afforded Rufo and his followers ample time to find more CRT content objectionable and inevitably decide that it was not a legal philosophical discussion, but anti-American curricula invading public K-12 schools and indoctrinating students. Soon, the internet brush fire was sweeping through the conservative ecosphere, percolating to cable news, before landing in local school board and city council meetings including in Alaska, where conservative blogs took Rufo's mental gymnastics and did what they generally do with those sorts of things.

Educators are being asked to pledge to teach what they deem is necessary regardless of any laws to the contrary, one such local blog opined, sans evidence, in advance of the August 28 rally. The blog called out Wyche by name (the comments section did much worse), in a post titled Activist Anchorage Educators to Rally in Support of Teaching Critical Race Theory.

NEA-Alaska president Tom Klaameyer

Back on the Park Strip, NEA-Alaska president Tom Klaameyer repudiated the claim: No school district in Alaska is teaching Critical Race Theory. NEA-Alaska is opposed to teaching Critical Race Theory in K-12 public schools. Klaameyer said he was frustrated having to even talk on the subject. CRT wasn't even on my radar.... I don't know anyone that even believes it ought to be taught in K-12 schools.

CRT is a world removed from the bogeyman it's being sold as, but it's definitely a real, legal scholarship. In the words of leading scholar Kimberl Crenshaw, CRT was formed to [challenge] the ways in which race and racial power are constructed and represented in American legal culture and, more generally, in American society as a whole. And while Crenshaw self-describes CRT as a race-conscious intervention on the left, developed mostly by liberal academics hailing from Ivy League schools, it is more a critique of liberal legal philosophy ranging from Brown v. Board through to today (the initial writings on the topic first appeared in the 1970s and '80s).

That CRT was so obscure (until it was appropriated and redefined) made it the perfect fodder for fear-peddlers in search of rage-bait. They needed something new, because the other trends (Dr. Seuss, Potato Head, the Muppets) were succumbing to flagging ratings. Rufo explained in his interview with The New Yorker that terms like wokeness, cancel culture, and political correctness had come to be viewed as too broad, too terminal, too easily brushed aside. Critical race theory is the perfect villain[.] CRT was employed because its obscurity could be framed as something, as Rufo put it, hostile, academic, divisive, race-obsessed, poisonous, elitist, anti-American. A catch-all with a fresh canvas.

Rufo didn't strike gold, but he found a lot of buyers content with his pyrite. In the short time since CRT's re-branding, fourteen states have passed racial and gender equity prohibitions into law, with at least ten more states entertaining proposals including a bill prefiled by Rep. Tom McKay (R-Anchorage) in the Alaska State House.

Lost in the manic proxy war are the students striving access to an honest account of American history. The cacophony decrying CRT as an anti-American reformation of education where white people are cast as an evil monolith belies the fact that students have been deprived of an honest depiction of the uglier parts of American history; slavery, the genocide of First Nation peoples, the Fugitive Slave Act, Jim Crow, the Civil War and Reconstruction, the Civil Rights Movement and its backlash(es), to name a few. Honestly, how many readers knew about the Tulsa Massacre before HBO's The Watchmen hit?

As more and more people realize that the truth isn't being told in education, they want to make way for a change, Krissia Tuzroyluk, an Iupiaq high school senior from Point Hope, said. It should be a right for students to learn the truth. Yet, this is threatened by policy and lawmakers. And some are trying to keep teachers from teaching diverse topics and anti-racist topics. And it's what we see here in Alaska, too. The classroom should be a safe space where students learn the truth.

We have the ability to hold [this] nation accountable as we hold ourselves accountable with that eternal call for improvement, George Martinez, former Anchorage mayoral candidate and Director of Leadership and Youth Programs at the Alaska Humanities Forum, added. Asking those difficult questions, confronting the ugly historical facts, but moving forward embraced in perpetual hope that, on the other side of the pain, can come reconciliation, healing, and transformation.

There is no reconciliation without understanding history including the difficult parts and confronting it. That is what the Truth in Education rally, and the movement for a more fair, just, and diverse depiction of history as taught in schools is fundamentally about.

Our schools should be safe havens of exploration, free-thinking, creativity, and growth. And we don't avoid controversial topics just because they're controversial, Klaameyer said. We have an obligation to teach our students the unvarnished truth about the world around them so that they can understand it and successfully find their place within it.

Read more here:

Critical Race Theory: The Right's New Manic Proxy War and the Anchorage Group Fighting Back - Anchorage Press

Jamiel Law for BuzzFeed News

In celebration of the impending release of her first single, "Drivers License," in January, Olivia Rodrigo held an Instagram Live party. Her excitement was palpable as she realized her song had already become available to people on Spotify; from there, she spoke about myriad topics, including her new music video and even dirty makeup brushes. But for some viewers, it wasnt what she was saying that attracted their attention so much as how she was saying it.

I be trending! she announced in shock at one point. Im emotional AF, she said later.

When clips from the livestream resurfaced in July, people on social media criticized Rodrigo, saying that she was appropriating language used primarily by Black people and attempting to talk in a blaccent.

And shes far from the only person to be accused of Black cultural appropriation recently. Singer-songwriter Camila Cabello, who has received backlash for racist Tumblr posts she reblogged as a teenager and for using the n-word, published and deleted a tweet in late July that was widely mocked for its nonsensical grammar. These incidents echo a long-standing trend that is probably best exemplified by Bhad Bhabie, who first went viral after appearing on a 2016 episode of Dr. Phil that featured her speaking in an often incomprehensible accent of her own. When Dr. Phil himself asked Bhad Bhabie, who was 13 at the time and whose real name is Danielle Bregoli, whether she was even speaking English, she proudly proclaimed that her accent came from the streets while wearing long press-on coffin nails and gold bamboo hoop earrings.

By making the effort to uncover somethings origins, we make a strong statement: Black culture is not deserving of mockery or appropriation it demands respect.

It was a couple of minutes later in the segment, when Bhad Bhabie expressed disdain for the members of the audience who were laughing at her, that she let loose the catchphrase Cash me ousside, howbow dah?! Within six months of the episode airing, a clip featuring Bhad Bhabies taunt blew up on social media. In 2017, she debuted as a rapper with the single These Heaux and signed a deal with Atlantic Records under her stage name.

The specific way Bhad Bhabies words were transliterated on the internet was meant to simultaneously replicate and mock her undoubtedly fake/performative accent. (She claims she grew up in the hood, although her mother does not share the same mannerisms.) But non-Black people are constantly using either real or imagined proximity to Black Americans and their cultures in an attempt to seem cool, sexy, and threatening in equal measure and in the case of Bhad Bhabie and other stars like Awkwafina, theyre profiting off it without having to deal with the legacies of racist segregation, redlining, overpolicing, and disinvestment in the same ways Black people do.

Its the vibrancy and authenticity of Black culture that attracts appropriators, who, ironically, dilute those very same qualities. Black communities around the country are far from monolithic, but the stereotypes that fuel cultural appropriation assume otherwise. For example, while Black Americans have been affected by poverty in a variety of ways, the cultural mainstays of many urban, working-poor Black people (those from the streets, as Bhad Bhabie put it) are considered the model for understanding Black American communities as a whole. Those mainstays include the long acrylic nails and bamboo earrings Bhad Bhabie wore in her Dr. Phil appearance and the blaccent that she, Cabello, and Rodrigo have attempted. These privileged young women reach for caricatures of low-wage Black workers when they desire edgy yet superficial makeovers.

When it comes to language appropriation, specifically, you dont have to look for very long on social media to find examples of African American Vernacular English, or AAVE, being used in out-of-touch or even downright inaccurate contexts because someone outside Black American communities decided to run with it (as Cabello proves). Also known historically as Ebonics, AAVE is the unique dialect often spoken by the descendants of Africans who were enslaved in the US. Black immigrants often assimilate and use it too, bringing new linguistic traits with them. AAVE consists of both singular phrases and unique grammatical structures that make it comparable to the language spoken by the Gullah Geechee in the Carolinas, Florida, and Georgia, the Creole from Haiti, and the patois spoken in countries such as Barbados and Jamaica (and unfortunately appropriated by Chet Hanks). AAVE is a living language that has evolved over centuries, but the ubiquity of the internet has made many aspects of the dialect more accessible and encouraged others to adopt it for their own use. And it has proven to be extremely popular.

But when media outlets including BuzzFeed and individuals who discuss memes and popular culture reproduce instances of Black American cultural appropriation, they lend them more credibility. On fleek, AF (as fuck), savage, shade, sip/spill the tea, and woke are all examples of AAVE that have crept into wider public vernacular upon being championed by non-Black people. The BuzzFeed Style Guide includes entries for many of these slang terms including cash me ousside, howbow dah because it still appears in quotes and critical contexts and there exists a question of whether we should note their AAVE origins when they come up in a story. Doing so would help put concepts in their proper context and make it more difficult for culture vultures to appropriate with impunity.

From left: Melissa Villaseor, host Elon Musk, Ego Nwodim, Heidi Gardner, Mikey Day, Kate McKinnon, and Bowen Yang take a selfie during the "Gen Z Hospital" sketch on Saturday Night Live on May 8, 2021.

Heres a common scenario that plays out on social media: Non-Black people think theyve found a new phrase, custom, or fashion trend, only for Black people to point out that it is actually a deep-rooted cultural practice. For example, AAVE terms are played for laughs as being the work of ridiculous and nonsensical kids in SNLs Gen Z Hospital sketch, which aired this spring. Black Twitter users were quick to make their annoyance with the sketch known. (Michael Che, the Black writer of the sketch, said he was baffled by the controversy because he had never heard of AAVE; critics on social media said this was disingenuous, as he surely had heard of and used Ebonics.) Similarly, AAVE terms and grammatical structures have also been falsely attributed to millennials, college students, fandoms, and the Very Online, with no consideration given to the race of people using them.

References like these lead to a cycle of the public at large erasing Black people from their own culture and getting shamed for it. Sometimes, these callouts lead to a lasting awareness that prevents someone from making a similar mistake in the future, but that doesnt change the fact that denouncing a popular influencer, media outlet, or viral tweet still takes a huge toll on Black peoples mental health.

While there are people of all races who believe that criticizing cultural appropriation is pointless, maybe even harmful, it is important to differentiate between cultural appropriation and cultural exchange. Non-Black people who grow up in communities alongside Black people often use AAVE in their daily lives without much pushback. Its when AAVE is used exploitatively i.e., without active collaboration with Black people that it becomes a problem. In an ideal world, non-Black people would engage meaningfully with Black communities on a consistent basis, allowing them to recognize language that was invented by Black people before taking credit for or incorrectly using terminology (and other products of Black culture). If, for whatever reason, that isnt possible, then poring over cultural analysis by Black journalists and other writers, such as this recent Wired piece on the history of Black Twitter by Jason Parham, is the natural next step before one decides whether to incorporate Black language into their personal lexicon.

The terms cancel and woke, for example, having been stripped of their original, more nuanced meanings among Black people, have illuminated how the internet and social media can both oppress and empower marginalized groups.

I think of Peaches Monroee, who created on fleek with that viral Vine, April Reign, a diversity and inclusion advocate who created the #OscarsSoWhite hashtag, told Wired. Theres so many examples of how Black Twitter has been undermonetized for years, and yet others have been able to make entire careers off of our brilliance.

And Black American culture is an important aspect of news coverage beyond just the internet memes. Black American music, language, and ideas underpin many of the USs oldest institutions and provide a vital frame of reference for both the past and present. The terms cancel and woke, for example, having been stripped of their original, more nuanced meanings among Black people, have illuminated how the internet and social media can both oppress and empower marginalized groups. But the only way that this insight can receive proper consideration is by ensuring that Black Americans and their influence are not erased.

When we divorce language from its context, we risk further oppressing not only Black people but also the communities they intersect with, including other people of color, LGBTQ people, and people with disabilities. By making the effort to uncover somethings origins, we make a strong statement: Black culture is not deserving of mockery or appropriation it demands respect.

And we show respect to Black culture when we choose to spend time searching social media or the wider internet before drawing conclusions about cultural content we are unfamiliar with. This kind of preliminary research would uncover, for example, the clear association between woke and Black people, forcing conservatives and other dishonest actors to at least say the quiet part out loud that an attack on liberal wokeness is really just a way to avoid being held accountable for oppression la political correctness before it. In the same vein, Bhad Bhabies own admission that her accent came from the streets makes it clear how much AAVE has influenced her; likewise, it helps socially conscious people think twice about mocking her speech if their punchline is still ultimately Black people dont know how to speak English.

Mocking her and other appropriators for getting the totally valid dialect wrong, though, should be fair game. AAVE has rules like any other dialect or language, as linguists John Rickford and Russell Rickford argue in their 2001 article for Language Review, The Ubiquity of Ebonics:

Consider grammar. In the movie [The Original Kings of Comedy], the Kings mark tense and aspect when and how events occur with the tools of black talk. They place invariant be before verbs for frequent or habitual actions (they songs be havin a cause), and use done for completed actions (you done missed it), and be done for future perfect or hypothetical events (lightning be done struck my house). And they frequently delete is and are where Standard English requires it (Tiger ___ my cousin we __ confrontational).

Moreover, suggesting, as some do, that [Black people] abandon [Ebonics] and cleave only to Standard English is like proposing that we play only the white keys of a piano, they conclude. The fact is that for many of our most beautiful melodies, we need both the white keys and the black.

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So Much Modern Slang Is AAVE. Heres How Language Appropriation Erases The Influence Of Black Culture. - BuzzFeed News