Ta-Nehisi Coates Rules, The Thread

https://www.singlepayeraction.org/2011/09/19/ralph-nader-cornel-west-unveil-proposal-to-challenge-obama-in-primaries/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibsP6XN2dIo

For the record, you can 100% criticize Obama's record without calling him an Uncle Tom or cosigning people who do; this is not about "Obama was right" as much as it "white people on the left are quick to decry racism right up until they get to use it themselves"

Did Nader ever apologize for that remark? If he did, I never heard about it.

of course he didn't, why would he?

He doubled down, if anything.

https://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/05/nader-defends-obama-slur/

getting punched in the face, w/l?

sorry to chime in on that point only. but come on, the man profits hugely on our indiscipline.

not sure if i'm misreading, but my intended snarky point was "rs likely considered that a win too, what an ahole."

i cant imagine looking at this scenario and thinking coates leaving twitter is some kind of "bad look" ... the fuck?

^^^

seconding that

did anyone in here already link RL Stephens much more substantive left critique of TNC? it's a more serious thing, not a glib guardian blog post, that i'd hoped somebody with a bigger platform like west might mount:

https://www.viewpointmag.com/2017/05/17/the-birthmark-of-damnation-ta-nehisi-coates-and-the-black-body/

Yeah, that was linked upthread. Frederik didn't find that one very convincing, either.

tbh i didn't find that one convincing either

here he is on west for whatever that's worth for passerby

I think the Cornel West riff on Coates is rather shallow, sort of like an interview riff rather than a substantive take on Coates and his work. It's more about West projecting his intersectional line rather than taking up Coates on his own terms.

— R.L. Stephens (@RLisDead) December 19, 2017

(its a thread)

yeah this seems to repeat his point which i am probably extremely reductively compressing: tnc is too pessimistic

which imo...idk y'all, is the revolution gonna solve racism

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

i already regret posting about this at all

i do think there's something to his point about reconstruction reparations being qualitatively distinct from TNC's suggestions in what they have the potential to make possible

I know I'm pulling it, context-free, from a paragraph but:

Because he fails to deeply consider the real, material resistance of the masses, the kind that guided Fannie Lou Hamer, Coates idealizes racism.

I mean

like idk i think RL is onto something in naming that so-called "class based remedies" are necessary but insufficient--but necessary--to root out racism

anyway i don't wanna derail us from our thread locus

hoos look at where you are

check that address bar

I think we spoke about RL Stephens several times, as he republished that piece a bit. And no, I'm just tired of it, it's always the same critique, no? The absolutely awful thing about the West thing is that he wrote something stupid on twitter, then Coates showed that it was a misread of the very first page of his book, and still then West got The Guardian to publish something just as stupid. What's the point of Coates even trying, at this point 'critiquing' him seems to lead to getting published no matter how awful it is.

This tweet:

I think Coates has a muddled view of race and racism, oscillating between essentialist mystification and grounded historical analysis. I think he retreats to interiority and fatalism because he's afraid of *revolution*, of what it would take and what it would mean to win.

— R.L. Stephens (@RLisDead) December 19, 2017

It's like, taking these absolutely simple things, which Coates is absolutely entitled to think and say and write, and demand that he does something else. And that is not what being a writer is. And it's so so personal, it's never 'Coates is great, but don't believe that it's the whole truth about racism', it's 'Neoliberal, supporter of American Imperialism, blind to Settler Colonialism', etc.

You baited and switched there, though--it's one thing to say he mixes history with D&D, which is a question of style, and another to say he muddles history with essentialism, which is a question of the soundness of an argument.

though i say that taking it as read that we'd agree essentialism is a bad move, when maybe we wouldn't

But it's a stylistic mix. He describes the history, then uses fantasy language to describe the way it works. He doesn't literally say that Thomas Jefferson wrote a curse into the constitution and since then racism shall rule. He describes how racism is baked into the founding of America, and then depicts it as an eldritch, in a metaphor. It's a question of literary style, and RL Stephens is not a particularly good literary reader, imo.

i think one big difference between RL and TNC is their ages--like 2 decades apart? i expect RL will be much more pessimistic after 18 years of DSA not amounting to shit :)

flopson i'm gonna have at you over that in a better thread

i wish the revolutionaries well, but imo it's not a coincidence that the writer who is puppy-dog excited about The Revolution is 26, and the more pessimistic pov is from a 42 year-old

listen Goosebumps try writing a grown up book before you criticize Coates and West u Halloween ass chump

As far as I'm concerned optimism is a job responsibility for anyone serious about making change in the world. SEIU 1199's advice to rookie organizers has it "every worker is showtime"--optimism is a political choice as much fatalism.

yo hoos

https://i.imgur.com/jynZPlp.jpg

Jefferson had nothing to do with the Constitution.

He smuggled a curse into it.

(I guess I know, he was off getting high with the french, and didn't return until Act 2, I don't really care)

theres a reason RL Stephens keeps getting referenced over & over again & sadly its not bc hes got an especially well articulated critique of ta nehisi coates

I mean, he's a friend of mine. I produced his radio show for 3 years. Tell me more though.

Arrrre you privy to a preponderance of TNC critiques by leftists? I'm sure not.

what odds u want on revolution hoos?

lol

Hoos otm

lol

which imo...idk y'all, is the revolution gonna solve racism

to attempt an answer to this: anyone who claims perfect knowledge of post-revolutionary (I know, I know) conditions is lying, and certainly any post-capitalist society's character would necessarily be defined in large part by what came before. the optimist's view is that if you remove the material basis for conflict between people - no more struggling for resources with the elimination of artificial scarcity, no competition over wage labour in something like a planned economy, etc - then perhaps systemic racism can at least be significantly attenuated over generations. what I don't think is in question for this same crowd is that current economic arrangements (or slightly altered/cosmetically "improved" iterations thereof) never will.

lol

― Listen to my homeboy Fantano (D-40), Wednesday, December 20, 2017 1:20 AM (twenty-one minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

does this mean you've got more critiques you're sitting on or does this mean you're passive aggressively ignoring my question

like if you're suggesting "people are lifting up his points because he's a black critic" i'd say that belies that he's a good writer with the mind of the law student he is--harvard law forum seemed to think he was worth bringing in. if you don't think his arguments are worth their salt, maybe say that instead.

......lol maybe it doesn't belie but nobody ever said i was a sharp writer

God dammit I wrote a response and it got eaten by the internet

Hold on when I get to a laptop I’ll write it up again, but tbc I wasn’t being glib to be pass agg but bc we had a big argument about RL previously

fair fair ilu sorry i'm salty about my friend