You are too kind and self-questioning, Professor Krueger. It goes to your credit as a person and as a scholar. That you even entertain this question, "Do I, as a white man, have anything to say?" is testimony to your willingness to engage even the forces of obscurantism. Those who, without valid arguments or not willing to make the effort to find any, use an extracurricular trump card. It was done, you know, broadly and efficiently in other times and places. Scientists who questioned the Ptolemaic cosmography were accused of heresy, and silenced. The "he's a Jew" trump card was very popular in Nazi Germany. The ideologues have their goals, but the opportunist mass is quick to follow where some advantage for them may manifest through playing such cards. Academia was never above it.
And the problem with prejudice, is that we stand on a divide. There is a push, in today's culture, to completely dismiss the concept of common humanity and present the world as a battlefield of groups categorised by strict and shallow identities which (despite all the talk on intersectionality) are believed antithetical and forbidden to ever mingle and truly communicate. This push is a bid for power (because, much though Derrida was a bloated fraud, the entirety of his epistemological tools can perfectly be used against his present forgetful heirs), and not even by the supposedly disadvantaged groups, but by the increasing number of convenience activists who speak in their name and have the grit and tools to sway the credulous and well intentioned to follow their lead.
In the case of academia, to suppress rivals and competition and advance one's scholarly and institutional standing. In the case of politics, to push through rules that will allow more and more hooks to silence opposition. In the case of business, to pour money into a nearly infinite number of mainly ineffective training programmes aimed at enriching the programme's personnel and at instilling a creed that will in turn continue to feed the need for such training.
The entire ideological system works on grievances on one hand (which will attract almost everybody at one stage, because it is hard to find someone who has never been victimised in some respect), and a promise of salvation through dogmas on the other (another attractive thing, as it excuses people from having to think and question in unexpected ways). It is for all intents and purposes a proselytising lay religion. Like all such religions, it aims to become universally accepted and to annihilate opposition.
And another thought. The entire race thing, posed in the way it is posed in the US -- and bleeding, unfortunately, over all the English speaking countries, because of the reality of cultural hegemony -- is a peculiarly American curse. I do not know how much it stands out from within, but to an external eye it is blatant... this race concept based on skin colour comes directly from the racist past of the United States, it is a crude slaver mentality category that does not contemplate ethnicity or culture but a broad, vague phenotype by which to divide human beings into groups, always superior vs inferior.
The Europeans with pale skin are not the same "race". For over two millennia we talked of race to mean peoples with common background, culture, usages, and vague similar looks, all these together. One reads the texts up to the 18th century: the French are called a race, and so the English, and the Welsh, the Scots, the Germans, the Dutch and the Flemish. The same all over the continent: a thousand races, whose looks are the least distinguishing trait.
And Africans are not the same race either. Go tell that to Hutu and Tutsi and see where you end. One of my mates at Oxford was the son of a Zulu prince; he used to laugh when we spoke of racism (granted, it was the 70s), saying that he would take a white devil any time over a lowly Xhosa, and blamed the apartheid for having given power to a race, the Xhosa, whom his people considered inferior.
Populations all over the world entertain prejudices, and racial prejudices, according to their history and tradition. To overcome these, the tools of modern anti-western-anti-racism are not going to work. But they make for a lot of righteous claims that only remove the chance for discussion and the hope to find solutions, which can never be easy or one-sided.
The entire discourse today hinges on a concept of race that is the one developed during the 19th century and perfected by the theorists of Nazism. I am amazed that this does not get brought up more often. Perhaps it is another of our beloved taboos.
That someone's ideas, thoughts, books or art should be first judged by that person's sex and ethnicity is the height of barbarism and explictly anti-thought and anti-human.
The reason the Race & Gender Red Guard will never not cling to this argument is twofold: 1) being marked as a member of a Protected Victim class is too valuable of a credential to relinquish, why would you willingly give up a weapon that allows you to win every argument and send your opponents cowering in fear? (not to mention its use in employment etc); and 2) the liberal class who governs academia funded, built and wielded the great superweapon of our time, the Bigotry Accusation, imagining that it would only be turned on conservatives and other political opponents.
But the Bigotry Accusation has escaped the lab and is probably one of the strongest forces in modern America, the modern heresy/blasphemy charge, the ultimate trump card, the way to muzzle all dissent (esp among liberal academics).
Fundamentalist "antiracism" is now the official belief system of every educational and cultural institution in the Anglosphere and unless you pledge fealty to it, you can expect to be marked as an enemy of the state. The ideological takeover aka Long March is complete and once again our colleges are run by a priesthood of theocrats.
Can I make the assumption that you have read Hannah Arendts work?
I am not smart enough to understand all of the Jewish implications of her books but I got a little bit of insight into the complexities of the stigmatism then compared to now.
It seems ' don't say the word Jewish or I will not listen to you' now applies in the opposite the discussion about white males.
The connection may seem weak but to me this is all about generalisations and scapegoating.
There is no doubt of the fact that there is a connection between banking and Jewish people. This is due to a number of factors pointed out in Hannah Arendts work.
There are other factors such as Jewish higher IQ and their insular communies that are excellent wealth accumulators that lack the western corruption scaling elements.
So what group is now scapegoated for the corruption in banking ( debt slavery) and historical slavery ? Along with everything else? -Corrupt white men ( how many articles I have read about white psychpaths as CEOs) and their offspring are guilty by proxy.
The PC brainwashing of University academics and mainstream media etc. Requres them to bias selection of pieces of already ' adjusted' history has enabled a superb bit of scapegoating!
Interesting how politicians are getting away with calling holocaust survivors offspring Nazis and walking out of parliament without apologising or even getting a slap on the wrist. Where as no one else can talk about anything Jewish, especially in banking?
99.9% lies everywhere. But all will be well- nature abhors a vacuum and isn't fond of imbalance.
Prof Krueger was not just edited out but targeted for elimination started years ago, and culminated in what can only be described as a putsch..
You are too kind and self-questioning, Professor Krueger. It goes to your credit as a person and as a scholar. That you even entertain this question, "Do I, as a white man, have anything to say?" is testimony to your willingness to engage even the forces of obscurantism. Those who, without valid arguments or not willing to make the effort to find any, use an extracurricular trump card. It was done, you know, broadly and efficiently in other times and places. Scientists who questioned the Ptolemaic cosmography were accused of heresy, and silenced. The "he's a Jew" trump card was very popular in Nazi Germany. The ideologues have their goals, but the opportunist mass is quick to follow where some advantage for them may manifest through playing such cards. Academia was never above it.
And the problem with prejudice, is that we stand on a divide. There is a push, in today's culture, to completely dismiss the concept of common humanity and present the world as a battlefield of groups categorised by strict and shallow identities which (despite all the talk on intersectionality) are believed antithetical and forbidden to ever mingle and truly communicate. This push is a bid for power (because, much though Derrida was a bloated fraud, the entirety of his epistemological tools can perfectly be used against his present forgetful heirs), and not even by the supposedly disadvantaged groups, but by the increasing number of convenience activists who speak in their name and have the grit and tools to sway the credulous and well intentioned to follow their lead.
In the case of academia, to suppress rivals and competition and advance one's scholarly and institutional standing. In the case of politics, to push through rules that will allow more and more hooks to silence opposition. In the case of business, to pour money into a nearly infinite number of mainly ineffective training programmes aimed at enriching the programme's personnel and at instilling a creed that will in turn continue to feed the need for such training.
The entire ideological system works on grievances on one hand (which will attract almost everybody at one stage, because it is hard to find someone who has never been victimised in some respect), and a promise of salvation through dogmas on the other (another attractive thing, as it excuses people from having to think and question in unexpected ways). It is for all intents and purposes a proselytising lay religion. Like all such religions, it aims to become universally accepted and to annihilate opposition.
And another thought. The entire race thing, posed in the way it is posed in the US -- and bleeding, unfortunately, over all the English speaking countries, because of the reality of cultural hegemony -- is a peculiarly American curse. I do not know how much it stands out from within, but to an external eye it is blatant... this race concept based on skin colour comes directly from the racist past of the United States, it is a crude slaver mentality category that does not contemplate ethnicity or culture but a broad, vague phenotype by which to divide human beings into groups, always superior vs inferior.
The Europeans with pale skin are not the same "race". For over two millennia we talked of race to mean peoples with common background, culture, usages, and vague similar looks, all these together. One reads the texts up to the 18th century: the French are called a race, and so the English, and the Welsh, the Scots, the Germans, the Dutch and the Flemish. The same all over the continent: a thousand races, whose looks are the least distinguishing trait.
And Africans are not the same race either. Go tell that to Hutu and Tutsi and see where you end. One of my mates at Oxford was the son of a Zulu prince; he used to laugh when we spoke of racism (granted, it was the 70s), saying that he would take a white devil any time over a lowly Xhosa, and blamed the apartheid for having given power to a race, the Xhosa, whom his people considered inferior.
Populations all over the world entertain prejudices, and racial prejudices, according to their history and tradition. To overcome these, the tools of modern anti-western-anti-racism are not going to work. But they make for a lot of righteous claims that only remove the chance for discussion and the hope to find solutions, which can never be easy or one-sided.
The entire discourse today hinges on a concept of race that is the one developed during the 19th century and perfected by the theorists of Nazism. I am amazed that this does not get brought up more often. Perhaps it is another of our beloved taboos.
Absolutely agree.
I should have specified an incident.
The first that came mind was Justin Trudeau.
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/02/17/parliament-scolds-justin-trudeau-for-saying-conservative-jewish-lawmaker-stands-with-nazis/
That someone's ideas, thoughts, books or art should be first judged by that person's sex and ethnicity is the height of barbarism and explictly anti-thought and anti-human.
The reason the Race & Gender Red Guard will never not cling to this argument is twofold: 1) being marked as a member of a Protected Victim class is too valuable of a credential to relinquish, why would you willingly give up a weapon that allows you to win every argument and send your opponents cowering in fear? (not to mention its use in employment etc); and 2) the liberal class who governs academia funded, built and wielded the great superweapon of our time, the Bigotry Accusation, imagining that it would only be turned on conservatives and other political opponents.
But the Bigotry Accusation has escaped the lab and is probably one of the strongest forces in modern America, the modern heresy/blasphemy charge, the ultimate trump card, the way to muzzle all dissent (esp among liberal academics).
Fundamentalist "antiracism" is now the official belief system of every educational and cultural institution in the Anglosphere and unless you pledge fealty to it, you can expect to be marked as an enemy of the state. The ideological takeover aka Long March is complete and once again our colleges are run by a priesthood of theocrats.
Can I make the assumption that you have read Hannah Arendts work?
I am not smart enough to understand all of the Jewish implications of her books but I got a little bit of insight into the complexities of the stigmatism then compared to now.
It seems ' don't say the word Jewish or I will not listen to you' now applies in the opposite the discussion about white males.
The connection may seem weak but to me this is all about generalisations and scapegoating.
There is no doubt of the fact that there is a connection between banking and Jewish people. This is due to a number of factors pointed out in Hannah Arendts work.
There are other factors such as Jewish higher IQ and their insular communies that are excellent wealth accumulators that lack the western corruption scaling elements.
So what group is now scapegoated for the corruption in banking ( debt slavery) and historical slavery ? Along with everything else? -Corrupt white men ( how many articles I have read about white psychpaths as CEOs) and their offspring are guilty by proxy.
The PC brainwashing of University academics and mainstream media etc. Requres them to bias selection of pieces of already ' adjusted' history has enabled a superb bit of scapegoating!
Interesting how politicians are getting away with calling holocaust survivors offspring Nazis and walking out of parliament without apologising or even getting a slap on the wrist. Where as no one else can talk about anything Jewish, especially in banking?
99.9% lies everywhere. But all will be well- nature abhors a vacuum and isn't fond of imbalance.