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naraburns  nihil supernum  2yr ago (text post)   31475 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 7, 2022

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So you don't think the prefrontal cortex contributes meaningfully to who you are as a person, and that judgment and reasoning aren't part of your personality? I think this is a strange way to understand the human mind.

I mean, isn't what anti-racists want is for people to use their moral judgment and reasoning abilities to suppress impulses to act racistly? Or is the goal to eliminate every racist urge in all human brains, no matter how deep it's buried?

I wouldn't label myself an "anti-racist" I'd label myself a "non-racist" if forced to. But I don't think

eliminate every racist urge in all human brains, no matter how deep it's buried?

Is as crazy as you think it is. You could get me as drunk as you want, I'll never hit my mother or my wife, or really any woman. That is ingrained in me at a deeper level. One might achieve a similar degree of non-racism with proper cultural upbringing.

So you don't think the prefrontal cortex contributes meaningfully to who you are as a person, and that judgment and reasoning aren't part of your personality? I think this is a strange way to understand the human mind.

Maybe I'm phrasing my argument poorly. Let's use the old Freudian division: in my view the drunk you is your id, your deep and base desires; the sober you is id managed by superego, societal training and politeness, producing the ego. Which we call "you" or your personality is a secondary question, "then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes;" if you yell slurs at black people when drunk your id is racist. It's possible for a person to have a non-racist id, to genuinely not see race as a valid category for insult and negative judgment.

If you believe something inside, but your judgment tells you not to say it out loud, we call that political correctness. If one thinks Black people are inferior, but doesn't say it out loud sober because of political correctness, I'd call that a belief in racism. I think fat people are ugly and inferior, I don't say that out loud because of political correctness, it's a belief I hold, if you get me drunk and in an argument with a fat person I'll probably call him a whale.

What if you don't think Black people are inferior, but the particular person in front of you, who happens to be black, is inferior?

Call them a pleb for having a work study job instead of rich parents or a scholarship, obviously.

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