I have absolutely no idea what you two are rambling about, but justification is still not synonymous with explanation.

No one is saying it is.
I'm saying they can be functionally equivalent.

If someone points the cause of what they see as a problem that needs to be fixed, regardless of whether they are wrong, correct or somewhere in between, they are obviously not claiming that cause is justified.

Yeah sure. But in terms of how the ideas function as ruling class narratives, they can have functional equivalence. Both are using race to explain societal structures instead of something like class, and both can be promoted for the same reason.

Many black socialists and communists were put off by the racist comments they received when they took trips to the Soviet Union, particularly because they believed it to be a place where racism didn't exist because they believed the Soviets transcended racism in a brotherhood of workers.

As a tactical strategy believing the the unreality of racism has already failed. A class based political union has already been tried. That was the New Deal that was supposed to tackle problems without regard to race. When African Americans demanded to be part of the deal conservative were able to break the politically dominate New Deal coalition up by making racist appeals. I don't know how you could explain the demise of the New Deal without mentioning that race was used to fracture it.

That's all fine but I certainly never said that racism doesn't exist.
As far as the New Deal specifically goes, Adolph Reed has a nice piece on that here: The New Deal Wasn’t Intrinsically Racist
And I don't think it was demands that blacks be let into the New Deal that tore up the New Deal coalition, but rather the breakup of the left during the Vietnam war combined with the civil rights movement/Southern strategy.
But I also don't think this fact means that class-first approaches are invalid as you seem to suggest.

Present day liberals are hardly the first people to put race as a primary determinant of one's station in America. And describing the existence of social structures put into place by other people is not per se justification of those structures. Indeed, liberals are describing these structures in service of tearing them down.

I didn't say black demands broke up the coalition, I said conservative racial appeals broke up the coalition. If class based identity was the only reality then racial appeals would have had no purchase right? Working class whites would have recognized that African Americans were fellow workers and united with them. That's not what happened.

I don't think their invalid. I think they're more efficacious than an explicitly race based political approach, but that's not the same as saying racism shouldn't be mentioned at all. That was tried and failed so we're stuck in the second best option. That's not to say anti racist appeals can be coopted by elites for any progressive means (breaking up the banks won't end racism), or that those in the movement don't become their own elites jealously guarding their own power.

The same has happened with the class based strategy as well. As unions stopped being expansionary organizations they've become more about guarding the benefits of their members rather than working to improve the lot of all workers ,allowing more moderate candidate to leverage union votes against more economically progressive canidates in exchange for access. Think Nevada's union attempts against Bernie because his universal health care would have taken away their Cadillac health care plan.

Part of the problem here is social identity theory. On average, people will always prefer people more similar to them than less similar. This includes woke college students, who despite their protestations always get caught out when when run experiments on this in class. And in a more obvious example, when they walk into a lecture theatres, they almost always sit with their ethnic group.

Social identify theory dictates that where white people are in the majority, they will end up with privileges. These privileges are obvious things like having a slightly better chance of getting a job. However, there privileges include getting to dictate what is or is not okay, like being gay and freedom of speech. There are certainly issues to be resolved in modern society; however, there is no guarantee that in tearing things down it will make things better. I think it's substantially more likely to make things worse. Even in a reformed society, white people will de facto retain the privileges they already have. And if things really go pear shaped, bad actors will have every opportunity to extend them.

... or that "anti racist appeals" even work:

https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/art...hite_privilege
https://psyarxiv.com/dv8tu/
The thing is we already know what works best to eliminate or at least reduce racism: social integration/inter-marriage. That that didn't happen with blacks at anywhere near the same degree as other ethnicities was undoubtedly driven by overt racism and social stigma initially. But I'd say the main driver behind a lack of racial integration now is economic. Pareto wouldn't be pleased.

There's a small difference in wording here that I think makes a big difference. Earlier, you said that "I still am trying to figure out if there's an actual functional different". Yes, I believe that in many (most?) situations there is a functional difference. I suppose that as "ruling class narrative", they could be used in a way that leads to functional equivalence, but that doesn't mean that there isn't usually a functional difference.

On the only actual widespread voter fraud in recent years in the United States, perpetrated by Republicans who tried to justify it on the grounds of imaginary Dem fraud, because their white privilege manifests their delusion about black voters cheating into reality:



...

Makes me wonder if some of these people understand that had history accidentally worked out differently they'd be saying the same thing about African Americans or Native Americans they're saying about whites. I mean I get why they're not saying that but the way some of them talk I really wonder if they get it.

CRTers are operating from their own delusions and just want to replace the current cultural hegemony with their own. It’s not like they want or even claim to want to seek any kind of objective truth.

Not that the white privilege discourse doesn’t have any merit at all. It exists and it needs to be talked about. But be very wary of anyone that tries to tell you the other guys are the LIARS and they are the TRUTHTELLERS.

I don't think they're delusional. If blacks believe they'll never get a fair shake in a liberal society, then what CRT is doing makes sense.

For me, it's hard to see complaints about CRT as anything other than a rhetorical strategy and a concession that one's actual views are so unpopular and undefendable that it's better to talk about the conversation about the issues rather than the issues themselves. And when the major right wing legislative effort is based on people feeling like elections are rigged because they keep losing, how do you continue without pointing out the fact that it's all lies?

Tom Vilsack: Why debt relief for Black and minority farmers is major civil rights victory

For Black and minority farmers, the American Rescue Plan could represent one of the most significant pieces of civil rights legislation in decades.

...For Black and minority farmers, the American Rescue Plan could represent one of the most significant pieces of civil rights legislation in decades. That’s because deep within the law is a provision that responds to decades of systemic discrimination perpetrated against farmers and ranchers of color by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The law directs USDA to pay off the farm loans of nearly 16,000 minority farmers and begin to address longstanding racial equity challenges that have plagued farmers of color for generations...

For much of the history of the USDA, Black, Hispanic, Native American, Asian American and other minority farmers have faced discrimination — sometimes overt and sometimes through deeply embedded rules and policies — that have prevented them from achieving as much as their counterparts who do not face these documented acts of discrimination.

For example, in 2020, USDA distributed tens of billions of dollars to farmers due to COVID-related market losses. But those payments went primarily to white producers while socially disadvantaged producers — a legal term for Black, Hispanic, Native American, Asian American and farmers of color — received just 1% of the aid.

The reason the payments went so overwhelmingly to white producers is because the system is stacked against farmers of color. Most farm programs are based on size of an operation and its history of output.

White farmers have advantages, including more land and larger farms which have produced more crops and livestock over a longer, documented period of time. And because those farms are larger, better capitalized, and producing most of the crops and livestock, they get most of the USDA payments when payments are distributed. As a result, socially disadvantaged farmers continue to fall further and further behind.

Owning land is a major advantage. Land owned by Black farmers all but disappeared in the 20th century due to federal dispossession and systemic discrimination against Black farmers. From the late 1800s until the turn of the 21st century, Black families lost nearly 98% of their land, and the number of Black farmers fell from more than 1 million to fewer than 50,000 today.

In 1990, Congress sought to address discrimination by creating programs for “socially disadvantaged producers” — a term identifying people whose members have been subjected to racial or ethnic prejudice because of their identity.

In the 1990s, USDA also began settling civil rights cases to compensate minority farmers for specific acts of discrimination by the department against them. Yet, the settlements and programs did not change the system. The cumulative impacts of discrimination had taken hold, evidenced by the 1% example.

The American Rescue Plan sought to address cumulative discrimination by giving USDA new tools and resources. The law provides an estimated $5 billion to deliver historic debt relief to socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers who hold a qualifying farm loan.

The Rescue Plan provides also provides additional money and direction to USDA to begin a long-term effort to advance equity and remove systemic discrimination from its programs; part of this long-term effort will be led by an independent equity commission.

The loan payments will clear the debt in full as well as offer additional resources to pay tax liabilities and other fees associated with clearing a debt. Any socially disadvantaged borrower with a qualifying USDA loan is eligible for the debt relief and any assistance provided to the borrower by USDA is free of charge...

Staggering numbers willfully ignored by people who certainly have a legitimate concern and valid criticism in terms of how the equality/equity debate has capitalism and its merits hanging in the balance, or at least is a slippery slope worth being vigilant of...

But, again, what is the right thing to do? Are we interested in morality? Are we capable of considering that the moral approach in something like, say, universal healthcare, might also be the optimal economic approach? Or at least not nearly as economically depraved as the right wing has given Herculean effort to lead us to believe? Even center left Dems?

At some point, people are going to have to simply admit that the idea that meritocracy is paramount is only great in theory

In practice, it led to the staggering numbers shown in Cuepee's post. It has led to riots over Floyd's murder, among the laundry list of dead by brutality. It has led to poor enclaves in the city, in part from white flight. Those are all outcomes of capitalism that get ignored or explained (sometimes whitesplained) rather than simply admitting that in reality, capitalism has done great things for black people too, but it's also got some serious flaws and we can't keep ignoring Achilles heels the US has forever...

I get that CRT's abusurdities will forever be pointed out in threads like this and also defended in spots where perhaps maybe they shouldn't? But at some point it would be nice for people to acknowledge reality is somewhere in the middle. CRT is an attempt to address practice not theory.I get that it is theory in itself. It sounds weird logically, but what I mean is it is addressing something not currently addressed and largely has been ignored or argued against, often dismissively, by people in power who are not interested in even remotely altering the status quo. There is a large disconnect by the well off who can't understand and possibly never will understand the plight of a life long struggle for stability, often short circuited by terrible conditions, terrible upbringing, and a matter of fact herding to the end of one's wit...

There is a reason I said that mental health services free of charge would have monumental impact on the poorest of the poor and the disenfranchised, disenchanted, POCs and other vulnerable groups who are now directly attacked via social media and violently attacked in person, god forbid they ask to be treated like the exact person they are rather than whatever prior contemporary society demanded them to be against their will...

I don't know if the equity concept is optimal. I certainly don't think it should be dismissed just because it doesn't contribute to lassez faireness in the economic market of the human condition. But it should be obvious by now something should be done and nothing is simply not an answer. Doing nothing led us to the very problems we are discussing

So as I put forth as a question before, I ask, again, what is the right thing to do? If not CRT, then what? The status quo simply cannot be accepted, and won't, lest you be OK with riots, inflation, and bankruptcies/evictions/homelessness/mass shootings, indicative of a society with a truly ill mind in denial of its own ugliness just because your **** is taken care of. I know there is a large math equation, certainly not quantifiable by my mind (but partially understood), but greed is incalculable, especially when the death of others is simply out of sight, out of mind...Social media is telling you right to your face the damage we do to ourselves. Be it foreign affairs we meddle in or domestic affairs where we argue about basically what boils down to money and having it for comfort, these threads always lead me to believe capitalism does good things and by design bad things we still simply do not do enough to address. Even worse, people are screaming to do less...

I will admit that when people say leftism is a mental disorder, I get it. Too much empathy is actually a thing. Too much taxation and ignorance can ruin industry and its productivity (online poker in the US, marijuana markets, the Philly Sugar Tax is one of the dumbest laws passed of recent memory), But not having empathy at all is just as bad if not worse. The greatest threat to democracy is the lie, second greatest threat might be greed/inability to empathize. I would like to entertain valid criticisms. I certainly get that it can also be immoral to take from the productive (taxes is theft mantra), but not if that's based on a lie (first threat to democracy), in this case the lie being every effort to downplay the true depth and breadth of the plight of the masses...I have concerns about left wing media omitting the truth from time to time, but disingenuous/bad faith politics from the right is the bigger problem right now. Trump put that into Super Saiyan mode, coupled with the vessel of narcissism social media has incubated over the past decade plus

What to do?

But an increased minimum wage was a key part of the New Deal. Does that not make it racist?

.

Global wealth/income redistribution.

Figure out why virtually all Americans (including the most empathetic) will reject that and then we'll know what to do or probably more apt what we have to work with. And the same holds for democracy itself: across the political spectrum Americans would reject a global democracy as well.

Reading your post is a great start. VERY well said, all of it.

It's logical in a base first level thinking "If I can control it and wish it away it will go away" sort of way. It's not a robust philosophy.

For some insincere actors it is a rhetorical strategy, sure. But CRT is making inroads into education, the media, and the general discourse. Is it not good to look at what it is and decide if it is something worthy of the place it's advocates believe it should have in society? I ignore most bad actors or if I get a whiff of grifter so maybe I'm ignoring much of the noise but there is quite a bit of critique of CRT that is sincere.

I think all free thinking people should point out lies when they are lies. And if Republicans are lying about rigged elections(I don't know enough about it to have an opinion but I suspect you are right that they are lying) then we should call that out. But, and this is going outside CRT to look at the Left in general, there is plenty of delusion to go around. Think Russiagate, Nazi Jeopardy guests, environmental alarmism, criticizing Trump(rightly) for human rights abuses at the border then ignoring them when Obama and Biden do it, etc.

You seem like you are a math guy? Do you know what CRT believes? Do you know they scorn reason, debate, and free thought? Do you know that 2 + 2 = 4 is considered colonizer thought?

Even here it's still delusional. Remember that it's about equity not equality-- which is redistributing skin colors in a way that benefits mostly the top 10% of minorities. For those people it can be logical sure.