I then saw numerous reviews from sources I previously deemed decent that treated the book with extreme vitriol.
It might be relevant to bring up near mode and far mode. In near mode, people are thinking about the prospect of being forced to attend one of her seminars and being unable to disagree at risk of losing their jobs, in far mode it is “interesting and provocative”.
I’m really not sure what you’re trying to do here, but I feel like your phrasing could be interpreted like creating a dichotomy between: 1. People who this impacts (in near mode), who will be very much hurt by this work.
2. Armchair, ivory-tower intellectuals who smirk and find the same sorts of interest in this book that they would get from the next “provocative” Game of Thrones book.
As such, the clear implication (that some readers) might take away is that I sit very much in the camp of (2), that just finds it interesting because the issues don’t actually matter much to me. So my opinion probably shouldn’t matter as much as those in (1).
It’s possible that such a criticism, if it were meant, might be justified! I’ve been wrong before, many times. But I wanted to be more clear if this is what you were intending before responding.
I’d note that far-mode being-interesting-and-provocative, as I used it, often means that for some people it will be difficult.
Previous discussions introducing athiesm/veganism/altruism also really upset a lot of people. They clearly led to a whole lot of change that was incredibly challenging or devastating to different people.
Often interesting-and-provocative could be very bad, like both extreme left-wing and extreme right-wing literature.
I think it means the reaction to the book is not really the reaction to the book itself, but rather to the political powers this book represents.
I can imagine having a talk with DiAngelo about the book; maybe it would be interesting and we would agree about many things, or maybe we would just scream at each other, dunno. But that is unlikely to happen. What is more likely to happen, is someone reading the book, and then yelling at me for not agreeing with some idea in the book. Possibly in a situation where this might get me in trouble.
I think it means the reaction to the book is not really the reaction to the book itself, but rather to the political powers this book represents.
I think it’s very likely that you’re right here. I do wish this could be said more. It’s totally fine to argue against political powers and against potential situations. Ideally this argument would be differentiated around discussion on this particular book/author.
What is more likely to happen, is someone reading the book, and then yelling at me for not agreeing with some idea in the book. Possibly in a situation where this might get me in trouble
I agree that there are lots of ideas in the book that are probably wrong. To be clear, I could also easily imagine many situations where unreasonable people would take either the wrong ideas too far, or take their own spin on this and take those ideas far too far. I imagine that in either case, the results can be highly destructive.
I hope that these sorts of fears don’t prevent us from understanding or understanding interesting/useful ideas from such material. I think they make this massively harder, but there might be some decent strategies.
I would be curious if people here have recommendations on how they would like to see these ideas getting discussed in ways that minimize the potential hazards of getting people into trouble for unreasonable reasons or creating tons of anxiety. I think that this book has generated a lot of high-anxiety discussion that’s clearly not very effective at delivering better understanding.
I was never good at convincing other people, so I am not qualified to give advice about how to talk to other people. Speaking for myself, if I am told something with a friendly voice, I am more likely to consider it seriously than if someone screams at me. Even better, if I can voice my objections or ask additional questions, and receive a reasonable response. (Reasonable doesn’t mean “totally destroyed by a clever verbal argument”. Saying “yeah, that’s complicated, and I don’t actually have all the answers, but nevertheless here are a few things I want you to consider” works fine with me.) Sometimes it takes time to process.
Problem is, I don’t know how much this advice can be generalized. I don’t consider myself to be a typical person. I am already a nice guy who doesn’t want to hurt anyone, so if you show me how to make the world a better place, I am happy for the info. I also care about truth, so I will reject ideas that seem wrong to me. As far as I know (I am never sure about modeling other people), not all people are like this… and I don’t know what approach would work with them. What convices those who want to hurt others, or who don’t care about reality? Sorry, I have no idea. And if you want to solve racism, I am afraid that those are the people you need to convert, somehow. Perhaps some of them respond well to threats by force; but if you use such threats indiscriminately, then you risk accidentally making enemies of people like me.
I suppose a reasonable debate requires some filtering of participants for some baseline goodness and sanity. Then, I guess, provide lots of data, both in near mode (someone’s personal experience) and in far mode (statistics). Then, allow discussion. This, unless it somehow obviously backfires, I would already consider a small victory. People will remember something, which is better than most online interactions.
(Of course, this involves the risk that you were wrong about something, and people will point it out in the debate. In such hypothetical situation, are you open to feedback? If you are seen as dogmatic, smart people will realize that all evidence you have presented so far has been filtered by a dogmatic mind, and will devalue it accordingly.)
If you want an online debate, some anonymity would probably be helpful. If you want an offline debate, it definitely should not be related to anyone’s job.
I wasn’t intending this as a criticism. I was merely trying to identify the difference in perspective.
I think the quote might make it seem that way—people often quote when they are rejecting a framing—to say that’s what they say, not me. However, I was just trying to indicate that I hadn’t come up with the phrase myself.
Thanks so much for clarifying! Sorry to have misinterpreted that.
I think this topic is particularly toxic for online writing. People can be intensely attacked for either side here. This means that people of positions feel more inclined to hint at their positions rather than directly saying them. Which correspondingly means that I’m more inclined to think that text is meant as being hints.
If you or others want to have a private video call about these topics I’d be happy to do so (send me a PM), I just hate public online discussion for topics like these.
It might be relevant to bring up near mode and far mode. In near mode, people are thinking about the prospect of being forced to attend one of her seminars and being unable to disagree at risk of losing their jobs, in far mode it is “interesting and provocative”.
I’m really not sure what you’re trying to do here, but I feel like your phrasing could be interpreted like creating a dichotomy between:
1. People who this impacts (in near mode), who will be very much hurt by this work.
2. Armchair, ivory-tower intellectuals who smirk and find the same sorts of interest in this book that they would get from the next “provocative” Game of Thrones book.
As such, the clear implication (that some readers) might take away is that I sit very much in the camp of (2), that just finds it interesting because the issues don’t actually matter much to me. So my opinion probably shouldn’t matter as much as those in (1).
It’s possible that such a criticism, if it were meant, might be justified! I’ve been wrong before, many times. But I wanted to be more clear if this is what you were intending before responding.
I’d note that far-mode being-interesting-and-provocative, as I used it, often means that for some people it will be difficult.
Previous discussions introducing athiesm/veganism/altruism also really upset a lot of people. They clearly led to a whole lot of change that was incredibly challenging or devastating to different people.
Often interesting-and-provocative could be very bad, like both extreme left-wing and extreme right-wing literature.
I think it means the reaction to the book is not really the reaction to the book itself, but rather to the political powers this book represents.
I can imagine having a talk with DiAngelo about the book; maybe it would be interesting and we would agree about many things, or maybe we would just scream at each other, dunno. But that is unlikely to happen. What is more likely to happen, is someone reading the book, and then yelling at me for not agreeing with some idea in the book. Possibly in a situation where this might get me in trouble.
I think it’s very likely that you’re right here. I do wish this could be said more. It’s totally fine to argue against political powers and against potential situations. Ideally this argument would be differentiated around discussion on this particular book/author.
I agree that there are lots of ideas in the book that are probably wrong. To be clear, I could also easily imagine many situations where unreasonable people would take either the wrong ideas too far, or take their own spin on this and take those ideas far too far. I imagine that in either case, the results can be highly destructive.
I hope that these sorts of fears don’t prevent us from understanding or understanding interesting/useful ideas from such material. I think they make this massively harder, but there might be some decent strategies.
I would be curious if people here have recommendations on how they would like to see these ideas getting discussed in ways that minimize the potential hazards of getting people into trouble for unreasonable reasons or creating tons of anxiety. I think that this book has generated a lot of high-anxiety discussion that’s clearly not very effective at delivering better understanding.
I was never good at convincing other people, so I am not qualified to give advice about how to talk to other people. Speaking for myself, if I am told something with a friendly voice, I am more likely to consider it seriously than if someone screams at me. Even better, if I can voice my objections or ask additional questions, and receive a reasonable response. (Reasonable doesn’t mean “totally destroyed by a clever verbal argument”. Saying “yeah, that’s complicated, and I don’t actually have all the answers, but nevertheless here are a few things I want you to consider” works fine with me.) Sometimes it takes time to process.
Problem is, I don’t know how much this advice can be generalized. I don’t consider myself to be a typical person. I am already a nice guy who doesn’t want to hurt anyone, so if you show me how to make the world a better place, I am happy for the info. I also care about truth, so I will reject ideas that seem wrong to me. As far as I know (I am never sure about modeling other people), not all people are like this… and I don’t know what approach would work with them. What convices those who want to hurt others, or who don’t care about reality? Sorry, I have no idea. And if you want to solve racism, I am afraid that those are the people you need to convert, somehow. Perhaps some of them respond well to threats by force; but if you use such threats indiscriminately, then you risk accidentally making enemies of people like me.
I suppose a reasonable debate requires some filtering of participants for some baseline goodness and sanity. Then, I guess, provide lots of data, both in near mode (someone’s personal experience) and in far mode (statistics). Then, allow discussion. This, unless it somehow obviously backfires, I would already consider a small victory. People will remember something, which is better than most online interactions.
(Of course, this involves the risk that you were wrong about something, and people will point it out in the debate. In such hypothetical situation, are you open to feedback? If you are seen as dogmatic, smart people will realize that all evidence you have presented so far has been filtered by a dogmatic mind, and will devalue it accordingly.)
If you want an online debate, some anonymity would probably be helpful. If you want an offline debate, it definitely should not be related to anyone’s job.
I wasn’t intending this as a criticism. I was merely trying to identify the difference in perspective.
I think the quote might make it seem that way—people often quote when they are rejecting a framing—to say that’s what they say, not me. However, I was just trying to indicate that I hadn’t come up with the phrase myself.
Thanks so much for clarifying! Sorry to have misinterpreted that.
I think this topic is particularly toxic for online writing. People can be intensely attacked for either side here. This means that people of positions feel more inclined to hint at their positions rather than directly saying them. Which correspondingly means that I’m more inclined to think that text is meant as being hints.
If you or others want to have a private video call about these topics I’d be happy to do so (send me a PM), I just hate public online discussion for topics like these.