I’ve often observed people defend themselves or others against accusations of racism, sexism, and whatever by replying that they are not intentionally being bigoted.
It’s not ridiculous to infer from that observation that many people believe that, in order to be racist/sexist/whatever, one must be intentionally bigoted.
That said, I think it’s the wrong inference. What I infer from it is instead that many people emotionally reject such accusations and grab whatever arguments they can think of to counter them, even arguments that depend on premises that many of those same people would rightly reject as absurd when phrased in the abstract.
(Comment retracted because it was based on a misreading.)
I’ve often observed people defend themselves or others against accusations of racism, sexism, and whatever by replying that they are not intentionally being bigoted.
It’s not ridiculous to infer from that observation that many people believe that, in order to be racist/sexist/whatever, one must be intentionally bigoted.
That said, I think it’s the wrong inference.
So, according to you, what is the definition of being “racist/sexist/whatever” that would allow us to draw the conclusion that this inference is wrong? And what is the reason why we should agree on this definition?
To consider a less controversial analogy, if you are accused of theft, there are multiple necessary conditions in the standard definition of theft that you can use to counter the accusation if your act did not involve any one of them. For example, you might argue that the property claim of the accuser is invalid, that the taking was unintentional or done under duress or out of life-saving necessity, that the act is excusable under the de minimis principle, etc., etc.
Now, if it often happens that there is a complete agreement on facts but there is still a disagreement on whether a given act constitutes theft, we can only conclude that the definition of “theft” is controversial and non-standardized, so it doesn’t make any sense for people to talk about “theft” before they’ve made it explicit what exact definition they apply. Which indeed may be the case—sometimes there are conflicts between people coming from cultures or milieus that have very different ideas on what constitutes a valid property claim, what counts as duress or necessity, what is excusable under de minimis, and so on. Such conflict has no objectively correct resolution, and the outcome depends on who will prevail by means other than rational discussion of facts and logic. And if it makes sense to accuse someone of theft, it is only under the assumption that there is an agreed-upon definition of theft that is clearly satisfied by the fact asserted in your accusation.
Yet unlike this analogy, you seem to believe that there is some objective sense in which someone is “racist/sexist/whatever,” despite the evident lack of agreement on what these terms are supposed to mean, or even whether they make any sense at all.
Nope, I don’t believe that “racism” (etc.) is any more objectively defined a category than “theft”, and I don’t think there’s any particular definition of it we should all agree on. I agree with you that disagreements about category membership can arise even when there’s agreement on facts, both with respect to “racism” (etc.) and more or less every other human category.
(This is not surprising, given that the way human brains categorize percepts and concepts maps very imperfectly to how we imagine definitions working; the whole idea of categories having definitions is a very poor approximation of what’s going on. But that’s a digression.)
If anything I’ve said implies that “racism” or any other category has an objective definition in the sense you seem to mean here, I’ve completely missed that implication and am likely very confused. If you feel inclined to unpack what it was I said that implies that, I’d be appreciative.
Looking back, it seems like I misunderstood your comment. Specifically, I misinterpreted what exactly the “wrongness” in the last paragraph refers to, which makes my criticism inapplicable. My apologies.
I’ve often observed people defend themselves or others against accusations of racism, sexism, and whatever by replying that they are not intentionally being bigoted.
It’s not ridiculous to infer from that observation that many people believe that, in order to be racist/sexist/whatever, one must be intentionally bigoted.
That said, I think it’s the wrong inference. What I infer from it is instead that many people emotionally reject such accusations and grab whatever arguments they can think of to counter them, even arguments that depend on premises that many of those same people would rightly reject as absurd when phrased in the abstract.
(Comment retracted because it was based on a misreading.)
So, according to you, what is the definition of being “racist/sexist/whatever” that would allow us to draw the conclusion that this inference is wrong? And what is the reason why we should agree on this definition?
To consider a less controversial analogy, if you are accused of theft, there are multiple necessary conditions in the standard definition of theft that you can use to counter the accusation if your act did not involve any one of them. For example, you might argue that the property claim of the accuser is invalid, that the taking was unintentional or done under duress or out of life-saving necessity, that the act is excusable under the de minimis principle, etc., etc.
Now, if it often happens that there is a complete agreement on facts but there is still a disagreement on whether a given act constitutes theft, we can only conclude that the definition of “theft” is controversial and non-standardized, so it doesn’t make any sense for people to talk about “theft” before they’ve made it explicit what exact definition they apply. Which indeed may be the case—sometimes there are conflicts between people coming from cultures or milieus that have very different ideas on what constitutes a valid property claim, what counts as duress or necessity, what is excusable under de minimis, and so on. Such conflict has no objectively correct resolution, and the outcome depends on who will prevail by means other than rational discussion of facts and logic. And if it makes sense to accuse someone of theft, it is only under the assumption that there is an agreed-upon definition of theft that is clearly satisfied by the fact asserted in your accusation.
Yet unlike this analogy, you seem to believe that there is some objective sense in which someone is “racist/sexist/whatever,” despite the evident lack of agreement on what these terms are supposed to mean, or even whether they make any sense at all.
Nope, I don’t believe that “racism” (etc.) is any more objectively defined a category than “theft”, and I don’t think there’s any particular definition of it we should all agree on. I agree with you that disagreements about category membership can arise even when there’s agreement on facts, both with respect to “racism” (etc.) and more or less every other human category.
(This is not surprising, given that the way human brains categorize percepts and concepts maps very imperfectly to how we imagine definitions working; the whole idea of categories having definitions is a very poor approximation of what’s going on. But that’s a digression.)
If anything I’ve said implies that “racism” or any other category has an objective definition in the sense you seem to mean here, I’ve completely missed that implication and am likely very confused. If you feel inclined to unpack what it was I said that implies that, I’d be appreciative.
Looking back, it seems like I misunderstood your comment. Specifically, I misinterpreted what exactly the “wrongness” in the last paragraph refers to, which makes my criticism inapplicable. My apologies.
No worries; glad the confusion was easily remediable.