Prometheus 6

for the subconscious nature of racination, and, points out the limits of deductive techniques as against the psycho-evolutionary challenge of deracination?

Actually, more of the latter than the former, but bottom-line, a terse encapsulation of both..., effective manipulation of that essential psycho-logical bi-cameralism (deduction vs induction) is the essential kernal of the challenge facing anyone endeavoring to serve as an evolutionary change agent.

The primary challenge is discovery vs. justification. The racination process lives entirely within the justification process, as do most anti-racist attempts I've seen,

and I hope I can get it all boiled down before too terribly long. I am a HUGE fan of Dawkins selfish gene books. But I profoundly deviate from Dawkins in my stubborn insistance that the allegedly mechanical blind watchmaker (dna) is minded and conscious.

Racism is a form of fundamentalism.

Believers wrongly accuse Dawkins of being himself a fundamentalist, a fundamentalist atheist. He argues the difference: that given proof he was wrong he would at once change his opinions, whereas the true fundamentalist clings to his faith whatever the challenge. What he doesn't satisfactorily answer is the sense that people of faith have of the divine, a true experience for them that encompasses love and joy and celebration - all the things Dawkins finds in the physical world. He doesn't comprehend that for many people reasoned argument is not the final arbiter of how they choose to live their lives. They are swayed by feelings, moved by loyalties, willing to set logic aside for the sake of psychic comfort. Tell them that all this is the product of chemical and electrical activity in the brain and they will at best assert that God made it thus. For decades now we have been willing to let such diversity of unverifiable beliefs exist among a democratic tolerance of ideas. But this, the assumption of the secular outlook, can no longer be taken for granted. The clouds are darkening around tolerance.

Darkening indeed....,

As you've noticed, I'm sure, but not really ever commented on, I model race on a religious, and more specifically Christian, system/syntactic/semantic base. It's not just modeling, imoho, if you're going to hack these huge phukking racination bugs out of the psycho-logical code base, you're going to be compelled to use scripting and coding tools that operate at a pre-deductive level. I'm not claiming zero-days on any such grandiose exploits, mind you, but I am quite confident that this is an optimal framing of the problem space in an American context.

The racination process lives entirely within the justification process,

You have just now put your finger on our verymost fundamental disagreement. Like Dawkins, however, I am open to having my opinion changed. The racination process is constructed within the justification process, however, its implementation and transmission occur at that lower psycho-assembler level...,

as do most anti-racist attempts I've seen,

Sho's you right on that point. It's also why ALL anti-racist attempts here-to-date have failed. You'll note that in parallel, all effective racist political programs (non-marginalized) have been ported over to coded, language of form expressions which allow plausible deniability. These expressions operate so as to compartmentalize the pre/post deductive awareness of racism. It's a helluva psycho-social coding trick...,

Case in point, Pat Buchanan is an architect of the new racist programme. But you would be very hard pressed to prove that he is a racist based on what he has written - it's why he continues to have currency in the mainstream.

that I won't be able to continue until later today. Learning Center responsibilities beckon.., I'll catch up with you later on.

As you've noticed, I'm sure, but not really ever commented on, I model race on a religious, and more specifically Christian, system/syntactic/semantic base.

I did not notice that. I saw you modeling it on instinctive brain and body activity expressed in a technological metaphor. You then choose what to do via your religious semantic system.

It's not just modeling, imoho, if you're going to hack these huge phukking racination bugs out of the psycho-logical code base

It starts with modeling, though. Are you curing a vitamin C deficiency or a vitamin A deficiency?

You'll note that in parallel, all effective racist political programs (non-marginalized) have been ported over to coded, language of form expressions which allow plausible deniability.

Simple formula: abstraction. I think a really clumsy example would make it clearest; unfortunately it seems to have scrolled off the Breaking Blue page.

Paging Tavis Smiley and Tom Joyner (Matt Stoller)

We need a conversation about race. Please talk to the blogs.

Posted at 09/16/2006 10:28:18 PM EST - #

We do love the Google cache, though...

"Case in point, Pat Buchanan is an architect of the new racist programme. But you would be very hard pressed to prove that he is a racist based on what he has written - it's why he continues to have currency in the mainstream."

What I find interesting is that Pat Buchanan and his views on race, ethnicity and other related matters does continue to have currency in the mainstream as long as Buchanan and his adherents and supporters confine their discussion and views to African Americans. If, however, Buchanan et al. venture into issues seen as bordering on what is perceived as the concerns or perogatives of Jews (e.g. Israel's policies toward Palestinians), Asians or Hispanics then the rug is pulled out from under them and he and his supporters are told to take a seat in the stands. As long as the issue pertains to African Americans, however, Buchanan's views and the perspectives of those who appear to share his views are considered a legitimate part of the mix.

Actually his anti-Mexican position is getting pretty damn popular too.

and are a looooong waaaaay away from any kind of commonality that would allow for discursive engagement on this theme;

I did not notice that. I saw you modeling it on instinctive brain and body activity expressed in a technological metaphor. You then choose what to do via your religious semantic system.

What you said.., kind of, but for the longest, as with the reference I made I made on the experiment will fall thread - I modelled/described it in those same terms.

Bomani Jones has an excellent piece up about Dave Chappelle. In it he uses the term, subconscious intellectual that will become a recurrent part of my lexicon.

Instead of *moral objectivity*, *spiritual athleticism* and other terms I have glommed onto in the past to describe the tangible difference between black and white culture/psychology, henceforward, I'll begin using *subconcious intellectual* - THIS - imoho is the distinguishing structural hallmark of black culture and its unique productions - including individual black psychology. Anyway, here's how I expressed my AHA moment over there - and I believe it directly applicable to the issues raised over here.

I have been describing Blackness as a cognitive body of christ for a while, and am only recently seeing how to Work my way out toward a more secular psycho-logical description. To me, religious praxis is nothing other than depth psychology and what folks call spiritual, I am very much at ease calling "subconscious".

Here's a flagrant example of me struggling with this descriptive approach here last year. At that time, you and PT were struggling with me - and a helluva long way from feeling it.

It starts with modeling, though. Are you curing a vitamin C deficiency or a vitamin A deficiency?

Neither. and neither are you. You're seriously trying to stimulate the growth of gills on an organism that has never been subject to the environmental stimulus that would provoke such specialization. While the humanity is shared in common, the psychological organs of perception/introspection - are not.

You already know this fact;

What I want you to understand in exchange for giving you the advice is the difference between the internal perceptions Black and white people each name 'racism.' Basically, white folks' race issue is they don't want to be held responsible for racism. Black people's race issue is they don't want to experience racism.

What you resist is my interpretation that this condition has caused psychological specialization as deeply in our organism as I consider it to be. Now, I agree with you that from an historical perspective, and as a governance strategy, racination arose at the level of justification. However, once implemented, it ran buckwild within the psyches of its hosts and infected parts and processes that it's authors probably never anticipated. or maybe they did....? That piece of history is neither here nor there to me.

I'll give you a specific case in point. IMO - yo boy dwshelf was doing the very best he could, with what he had. That cat was desperate to swim, and from time to time, he could be shown a glimpse of what a gill is, and what a gill does. Poor thing never made it past being sir nose devoidofunk though, did he? His persistance of effort is why I never really got mad at him - but wouldn't hesitate to tease him.

Now for real, I gotta go to Work.

"What you resist is my interpretation that this condition has caused psychological specialization as deeply in our organism as I consider it to be."

I don't disagree with this take at all. It seems self-evident to me.  

I have been describing Blackness as a cognitive body of christ for a while, and am only recently seeing how to Work my way out toward a more secular psycho-logical description.

Thank you. I always felt you presented your metaphor as a requirement. To me, THAT was our biggest difference.

Here's a flagrant example of me struggling with this descriptive approach here last year. 

Still a fucked up piece of scripture. YMMV, of course. Does V, in fact...

What you resist is my interpretation that this condition has caused psychological specialization as deeply in our organism as I consider it to be.

What I resist is going all that deep. My proposal that started all this unexpected discussion wasn't about all that deep modification of other folks. It just wasn't. The subsequent converstation became about such deep modification, and I resist connecting the content of my initial post to some plan to cure racism. It was about behavior...nothing more.

Actually his anti-Mexican position is getting pretty damn popular too.

It's hard to continue being seen as an example of a "model minority" when your demographic growth indicates that sooner rather than later you will be a majority. White folks in San Francisco loved the Asians until they were perceived as taking over the Richmond District.

Then there was teh Great Japanese Scare, when they were going to buy up the country and (even more traumatic) change our management style.

I'm sure that all those blue collar and middle-management white collar workers at Ford, GM and Chrysler are glad that the Japanese were turned back at the shore and, thus, prevented their own employers from adopting any Japanese management principles like "shared vulnerability" which is actually quite useful in assembly line work. 

Thank you. I always felt you presented your metaphor as a requirement. To me, THAT was our biggest difference.

As a student of historical application, I am at a loss to think of any other - reasonably well documented - cultural dramas in which the parallels are this close. That it centers on psycho-history - as much as a record of events - renders it even more inaccessible. Frankly, recognition of the gospels as psychological commentaries is not particularly mainstream.

What I resist is going all that deep. My proposal that started all this unexpected discussion wasn't about all that deep modification of other folks. It just wasn't. The subsequent converstation became about such deep modification, and I resist connecting the content of my initial post to some plan to cure racism. It was about behavior...nothing more.

All that deep?

Dood, it is what it is. There is no powerful or persuasive overtly racist movement in the American political mainstream. On the other hand, understood as a bastion of simple identity politics and utilizing tools and methods, there doesn't have to be.

Just my opinion, but all the overt behaviour modification you're gonna get, you've already gotten, and the pushback on that has been tremendous. The era of political correctness and multi-cultural respect is thankfully over. It was only ever a surface phenomenon masking depths of identity politics and psychology - like frosting on a turd. Where I come from, no matter how much frosting you slather on a turd, it'll never become a cake.....,

I don't disagree with this take at all. It seems self-evident to me.

It appears we've nearly arrived at a backporch consensus.

At this deeper level, the depictions of African phenomena are remarkably consistent. Take the case of Joe Lieberman: he has been depicted in black face with George Bush, as a lawn jockey (aka Porch Monkey), and Mr. Bojangles. But there is a twist…when Lieberman is depicted within “white� cultural paradigms, Lieberman is often feminized and the context is almost invariably sexual. There is a pattern here: A Cabinet Post, A Little Necking, Auld Lang Syne, Codless, Sitting In A Tree, Love Connection and others.

It seems like the artist has trouble capturing any African cultural phenomena in ways that do not comport with latent memories imbibed over decades. Does that mean this artist is racist? It doesn’t matter because this artist can consistently be relied upon to provide material that will be of considerable value to racists. The artist is clearly a white supremacist (which is not a function of biology or ethnicity - anyone can join the group). The artist appears to convert objects of scorn to “others� in order to communicate a heightened level of contempt. It’s an interesting tactic. It’s not unique - in fact, it’s timeless. It’s like a graduate seminar in high-tech hate: Photoshop 505: Dehumanization and Objectification or Using an Artistic Viewpoint to Scapegoat.

“Forced exposure creates honesty.� Truer words…

To which one might retort, "the job then is to expose the latencies and force them into awareness" not when the memetic parasite uses metamorphic justification to defend itself against such exposure and exorcism. The personality cannot observe itself except with great difficulty. However, personality A. can observe personality B. with great insight and precision. Challenge comes in getting B. to hear anything that A. may have to tell him. The mechanical response, the collection of automatisms of which the ordinary waking state is comprised, resists all such intervention.

Just my opinion, but all the overt behaviour modification you're gonna get, you've already gotten, and the pushback on that has been tremendous.

Of course, that apples to Black folks as well, right?

Finally, the question I didn't see an answer to yet:

And what do you think will be the effect on the Black psyche of seeing an honest attempt to give them what they say they need be rejected out of hand, or fail due to inability on the part of the subject?

I've gotta reverse the order of these to maximize response coherence.

And what do you think will be the effect on the Black psyche of seeing an honest attempt to give them what they say they need be rejected out of hand, or fail due to inability on the part of the subject?

It's a done deal magne. Equality under the law and the spirit of the law is what we said we needed. The former was granted and the latter has been systematically - and predictably - withheld. THAT is the essence of the psycho-social miscalculation of the Civil Rights Movement. The answer to this question is that the effects on the Black Psyche are diverse and observable all across America in the fragments of our formerly more topographically unitary communities. What you see is what you get.

Of course, that apples to Black folks as well, right?

Yes it apples. But if you accept the premise that we're psychologically altered by our longstanding environmental pressures, then it becomes an apples/oranges problem. Black folks are oranges, in a society of apples. So, we gots to Work with one another somewhat differently. Knowing what we know, it's now time for a hardcore "each one, teach 50" psychological insurgency. Children learn more from what you are than from what you teach, and activating goal-oriented Black Consciousness in children is a cinch compared with the the coincidental longterm installations in my business partners heads. Wash, rinse, repeat to the point where it's stable in a topologically constrained youth population. That is an imperative goal, imoho.

Which brings us back around to the socio-political APB that Cobb knocked right straight out of the ballpark a few days ago..., among other interpersonal prescriptions that we need to be diligently promoting and developing.

But if you accept the premise that we're psychologically altered by our longstanding environmental pressures, then it becomes an apples/oranges problem.

You're funny.

That's where I started.

It's another one of the examples that makes me feel you require specific terminology.

Every branch of science endeavors to elaborate and to establish an exact language for itself. But there is no universal language. For exact understanding exact language is necessary.… This new language is based on the principle of relativity; that is to say, it introduces relativity into all concepts and thus makes possible an accurate determination of the angle of thought—making it possible to establish at once what is being said, from what point of view and in what connection. In this new language all ideas are concentrated round one idea. This central idea is the idea of evolution … and the evolution of man is the evolution of his consciousness.

G. I. Gurdjieff, paraphrased from page 70 of IN SEARCH OF THE MIRACULOUS

what you said....,

Now where exactly do you propose we go from here?

Keeping in mind the entire discussion started as an admittedly useful sidetrack, and since beneath the terminology nothing countered anything I said (which determination was a part of the thread's usefulness), I clear the stack and continue processing.

As for Gurdjieff, it's like this...I know people who bombed studying analytical geometry but did well with economics. In economics they found the same calculation techniques taught in analytical geometry but they were attached to concepts they could relate to. Those same calculation techniques, attached to different concepts, are used in electronics.

I equate the calculation techniques with denotations and the concepts attached from specific field with connotations. And once I get the meaning I don't need the specific words anymore.

It's another one of the examples that makes me feel you require specific terminology.

The terminology takes a backseat to the fact that the experiment has been attempted previously and all the results have been published and are easily enough known.

My interest is in understanding the results obtained by forbears - and in not repeating any of the tactical errors evident from their experimental endeavors.

Keeping in mind the entire discussion started as an admittedly useful sidetrack, and since beneath the terminology nothing countered anything I said (which determination was a part of the thread's usefulness)

At no point was my objective to counter anything you had said, rather, my objective was to underscore the permanence and intractibility of the psychological specialization that has arisen in America and to more precisely understand your take on the same. A year and few months ago, for example, PT was arguing rather strongly against this observation, while now, he seems to agree that the schism is a whole lot deeper.

Frankly, I'm still in the process of engaging the phenomenon through copious field Work, direct measurement, and applied engineering. The direction of my own program is orthogonal to those previously endeavored, while fully cognizant of their results.

The direction of my own program is orthogonal to those previously endeavored, while fully cognizant of their results.

Actually, it's not.

What do you teach that's different than what any mainstream educational authority suggests? 

The Work...,

Which is...

to make the slow (justifying) mind observe and remember parts of the much faster psyche. I haven't had any of them long enough to go beyond relating the interior terrain - in terms they can easily grasp - helping them construct a map of the same, then encouraging them to maintain, read, and use that map as a matter of course. What makes it better still, is that Jappa is a singular resource on the language of form and 20th century uses and abuses of the same - entertainingly able to concretize things that I can only describe.

mainstream educational authority (whatever that is) doesn't even remotely approach the external outline of what we teach, unless you're aware of another program offering;

1. popular cultural production (comics creation)

2. hacktivist tools and techniques (open source software)

3. presented from a Black partisan perspective

btw - we've stretched the meaning of "comics" to encompass any type of digital media the kids would like to experiment with. Here's some of the official blurbiage;

Mayhem Academy is an academically oriented, open source media project that seeks to expose, preserve, and advance works of creativity (chiefly, but not limited to, MA themed works). Individuals, communities and organizations have begun telling digital stories that enthrall, entertain and often move audiences to take positive action. Plain text or the cool detachment of "objective" media do not come close to matching the emotional power of multimedia stories laced with personal narrative.

Previous arts based efforts, the Toomer/Orage assembly in the 20's and 30's (and Mumbo Jumbo which points back at the earlier formation and its milieu while encouraging faith-based modernity), i.e., not to get stuck on dogmatic forms but have faith in your own vital and original expressions - focused on pointing adult attention toward genuine psychological methods.

Sadly, the literary coding proved impenetrable to most adults, remains impenetrable to most - though the cultural productions in which these pointers were embedded retain a great deal of exterior subversive and insurgent edutainment value. Most scholars don't even get the "pointing at" aspect of these Works, and those who study long enough to at least grasp what's afoot, never take the next step of actively seeking out and then employing the psychological methods to Work on themselves.

It's like this P6, 99.999% of the public knows what wu shu is, but 99.99 can't use it to whoop anybody, and fewer still know that its its interior disciplines nien kung and chi kung lead to personal evolution.

What makes it better still, is that Jappa is a singular resource on the language of form and 20th century uses and abuses of the same - entertainingly able to concretize things that I can only describe.

What is Jappa?

unless you're aware of another program offering;

1. popular cultural production (comics creation)

2. hacktivist tools and techniques (open source software)

3. presented from a Black partisan perspective

btw - we've stretched the meaning of "comics" to encompass any type of digital media the kids would like to experiment with.

Personal expression in digital media using open source tools?

There's a HELL of a lot of them.

What's the message you're using this to present? Those are mere connotations as you present it, but it's actually central to your purpose.

99.999% of the public knows what wu shu is, but 99.99 can't use it to whoop anybody, and fewer still know that its its interior disciplines nien kung and chi kung lead to personal evolution.

Around here wu shu pork is Chinese food...talk about interior discipline...

I'll just keep doing what I do, and well, you'll blog....,

I just wanted to see this orthoganality.

This may have been the most interesting conversation (to me) that has ever taken place here. I count this as an continuation of My experiment will likely fall on its face. I knew it would be interesting when T3 said

Your framework appears to anticipate most of the opposition that might come from "the ranks." Moreover, the goals are sufficiently modest to minimize the adverse impact of casting your lots with psychopaths, murderers and misfits. Be safe!!

"[C]asting your lots with psychopaths, murderers and misfits." And all I planned was telling white folks how not to act racist in political situations. I honestly thought folks would see that as a Good Thing. I still don't understand why it is NOT seen as such...

And it's obvious it's not.

I also don't understand why no one will simply SAY that (okay, T3 got close enough that he gets full credit).

I just wanted to see this orthoganality.

1. I'm not an essentialist

2 . I am, however, what you might call a "cognitivist" see recent heated dispute in this vein.

3. Having devised - what for me - is a powerful and internally consistent account of why we are as we are, it occurred to me that American racination is a special case of something more widespread and well-established.

4.. The root cause of our difficulty is attributable to the normative mode of cognition in this society, which mode has been variously pointed to as deductivist, conformist, people of the word, or neurotypical It is my opinion that racism cannot take hold in other than neurotypical hosts.

5. Blackness is a wholistic, beneficial, cognitive adaptation arising in response to a particularly adverse and overt instance of neurotypicality. (the racist meme)

6. Neurotypicality doesn't want you to correct its norms, it wants you to conform to its standards or die..., which is precisely why you can't tell these folks jack shit and meaningfully expect it to matter.

"[C]asting your lots with psychopaths, murderers and misfits." And all I planned was telling white folks how not to act racist in political situations. I honestly thought folks would see that as a Good Thing. I still don't understand why it is NOT seen as such...

7. IMOHO - Because it falls on ears that cannot hear, and eyes that cannot see...,

8. I have elected to embrace and emphasize our acquired differences (mutation - if you like). (there's your first ninety degrees of novelty - right there)

9. My partisanship falls somewhere on a spectrum which oscillates between that of Charles Xavier and Erik Magnus Lehnsherr - depending on which phase the Moon is in. (there's your other ninety degrees, making my approach to the problem 180 degrees from the norm and thereby effectively orthogonal)

"I still don't understand why it is NOT seen as such..."

Sure ya do.  The "ranks" are deeply rooted in a cultural-historical-operational context that has limited utility for white folks.  In fact, most of the "ranks" would just as soon drop kick as fool as temporarily educate them.  They've (we've) all said as much at various point.

Moreover, nulan's point about looking back at the operational failures of our ancestors/elders is applicable here.  A number of them ventured down this very path (more or less) and most retreated from this path with some serious scars.  The scars were principally borne of their faith in the redemption of folks they didn't quite understand.  King is on this list.  He came off the list in "Where Do We Go From Here."  But who would know that?  No one reads that book.  DuBois was on the list.  He came off and took his Great Barrington ass to Ghana - and Stayed - and told the NAACP to kiss his black, communist, african ass.  I suppose Lenita McClain was on this list before she committed suicide.  

What you are experiencing here is the deepest sentiment of concern that someone of your considerable talents not piss away your hard-earned genius casting pearls before swine.  The swine are certainly psychopaths, murderers and misfits.  I don't believe I need to elucidate on that point.  I would count folks like WJC and GWB in that group - as well as their respective fan clubs.  To the extent that dabbling is viewed by "the ranks" as a waste of time and precious resources, your proposal meets with opposition.

If we live in the present (Marian Wright Edelman has some great stuff on this), there is a sense of urgency that attends our choices and drives our expectations.  What you've proposed comes off as a leisurely, intellectual exercise - the outcome of which is already known.  Given that, the "ranks" would ask why bother?  Seriously - why bother?  What is the reward?  If you take full measure of the opportunity cost here, you might select another path - you might not.  It's a choice - and I'm sure it would bear some fruit.  But the question of quality and quantity remains.

I say this not to suggest that we should all be doing the same thing.  After all, Bayard Rustin and Malcolm X and Gordon Parks all had different approaches.  We each should do what we can with what we have and with what we can seize.  So, the question comes back again - given all that can be done, why this?  why now?  OR why not this?  why not now?

As I've stated upstream, "the goals are sufficiently modest to minimize the adverse impact of casting your lots with psychopaths, murderers and misfits. Be safe!!"

I wish your Mayhem Academy was around two generations ago. I can't tell you the difference it would have made for my family. Comic books and the opportunity for media creation could have radically transformed our world. I'm reading this thread and I am FEELING the import of your activities because they are truly rooted in where are kids are and where they can go. Great stuff.

I haven't participated in this thread until this morning. Principally, that was due to not having read through the initial post concerning logic and discovery. I would have to say, on the face of it, that the author may not know as much about processes of discovery as would be required to effectively distinguish it from logic.

The author of Medu Netcher explains (to my satisfaction) about the notion that discovery (or non-empirical) ways of knowing enable humans to access an infinite (transpersonal, if you will) repository of knowledge. Logic, by comparison, is more finite - and equally susecptible to challenges of validity and replicability. I suppose it's not entirely clear to me that logic is the foundation for computation. It is entirely conceivable that the origins of computation lie within the discovery of Nile Valley women (several millenia ago) through dream or revelation. The same can be said of the construction of Incan pyramids through sweat lodges and discovery thorugh hallucination.

I would contrast this open question (and these are open questions) with the logical tradition that is alleged to have birthed the many academic disciplines taught in universities. We know, clearly, these disciplines may be founded in part on logic - but also on a deeply-seated need to disprove the allegations of Ancients that northern Europeans were a brutish, ignorant and ugly horde.

Let's just say the Germans had their work cut out for them. Weren't these "scholars" hallucinating when they sought to overthrow the testimony of the Ancient Greeks and Kemites?
Weren't they dreaming when they theorized that craniology and dick length dictated character and brain strength? Pass the weed, bruh - said Blumenbach to Rushton to Seligman to Wattenburg to Volney to ___.

I don't buy this line between the two as particularly useful. Given that our ancestors LIVE in the realm of discovery and that discovery are replicable (they most certainly are), there seems to be considerable value for US in seeing this line for what it is.

I may have missed something in my interpretation - am welcome correction with respect to the excerpt you posted.

CN, I gotta let your response go because T3 went to the topice of the lesson., EXCEPT to note that neurotypicals may not want to be corrected, but when change comes they flow right with it (being pretty much incapable of resisting).

T3, the distinction isn't between discovery and logic, it's between discovery and justification. Logic is ONE useful tool in discovery; it is the entirety of justification (and I want you to note I don't justify shit). And that had nothing to do with the discussion as it developed. That's one of the reasons I keep topics damn near ridgidly in their respective lanes most of the time...I have never had a conversation online that shifted topics midstream that didn't conflate the topics, thereby ending any utility you can get out of it.

Now...it IS something of a leisurely experiment. It's just not that hard for me to create all the rope they need to hold it down or hang themselves. So why this, why now? Well, frankly the moment has past. But there's a whole lot of Black folks who do not believe in the permanence of racism. A lot of them read DKos and MyDD. I picked MyDD because it's not as noisy as DKos. My intent WAS to identify and neutralize all excuses while everyone was watching. It is a physical fact that some white folks will get it, so I acknowlege the possibility of success, however faint that possibility. And the real deal is, Liza's complaint had less than zero chance of changing things...as I said in another thread, those that began the process will not own it at the end. Steve Gilliard linked posts by the three main FDLers folks complained the same day Liza and Terrance's apologies were published...he has more daily readers than Vogue. If they keep their noses clean until December, that move is over.

But my focus was

And what do you think will be the effect on the Black psyche of seeing an honest attempt to give them what they say they need be rejected out of hand, or fail due to inability on the part of the subject?

On the other hand, what do you think would be the impact on Black folks' reality if it succeeded?

Seriously, I'm talking win-win here.

In general, I count on people reacting as people do...which means if I tell them what I'm trying to get them to see they'll see their understanding of what I told them rather than what's in front of their face. This is a major reason I just do rather than explain. The other reason, well, I'll get arrogant and quote Gautama:

In case anyone says the Tathagata attained the consummation of encomparable enlightnment, I tell you truly Subhuti, that there is no formula by which the Buddha attained it.

I can make my thinking more transparent though, and explain some of the tools and supports I have and use. It's something I'd have done a while back if I wasn't juggling personal life. But here we are now.

Given that our ancestors LIVE in the realm of discovery and that discovery are replicable (they most certainly are), there seems to be considerable value for US in seeing this line for what it is.

T3, there's a non-obvious practical reason for Working with children. Not only are they not as full of shit as adults, who may in fact be only broken machines repeating absurd self-justifications ad infinitum, they also have relatively unimpaired access to the realm of discovery. To the extent that you can help a child keep his/her access unimpaired, - and no one else is going to do that - Work serves a higher purpose.

At the end of the day, this issue is fundamentally about cognition and can only be addressed via cognitive activism. Racination just happens to make for a VERY OBVIOUS set of symptoms - which point in the direction of something far more formidible...,

‘The first abstraction distinguishes our body from the environment, reducing our perceived size from “everything� to a few feet, and that habitual mode of perception repeats ad infinitum.’

o:O:o

Organisms are actually a living hypostasis of something in another dimension. We call the being(s) that ‘live over there’ ‘God.’ — but our models of this are absurdly primitive — almost as primitive as our stories surrounding it. Perhaps even more interesting is that we attack each other and our world, based on differences and errors in the human ‘dolls’ of god, intelligence, liberty and community. One of the most important things we can notice is that human beings never make imaginal replicas of things they have not directly experienced. Literally ‘we do not invent’ — we make a ‘reflective artifact’ of things and beings we had actual contact with.

Why are there so many spiritual dolls of God and not-God in our human cultures, and why are we attacking our own intelligence, children, peoples and planet with them?

http://www.organelle.org/organelle/dolls/dolls.html

I get your drift. Back to your question, though. I believe that your efforts (if viewed on a sufficiently broad and dynamic canvas) could energize those black folk with low to zero expectations of white folks to work amongst themselves. That's one of the main things I took from King, DuBois, Douglass, etc. I mean, there is a fairly significant divide (operational, philosophically, and otherwise) between those leaders whose speeches and advocacy among whites (K-D-D) and those leaders whose efforts prioritized intergenerational institutional development (Washington-Garvey-Muhammad)...It has always seemed to me that the priority needed to be on the internal development because that was where a critical mass of advocates could come from...the other approach seemed like so much dissipation.

Let me give you another group that could be positively affected: those middle class Black folks who are in fundamental agreement with our more activist cohort but are scared shitless by the language, attitude and presentation used.

The conversational mode helps...a LOT...but that means your post is more hook than message. Consider one question in the very short thread my experiment generated:

I"ve thought about your advice: "Instead consider us to be a set of related constituencies," and it seems self-evident, but still good advice. It's a little terse, so I'm probably not getting the nuance of what you're advising.

I mean, okay, there are more genetic diffences within races than between. Race is a illusion to the extent that it is a social construct. Certainly not an illusion within a society that enforces it. And it does make good sense to see a race as a set of allies, constituency groups with shared interests, and sometimes history, or at least a group that recognizes they've been pigeonholed by others and need to address that. Of course, I don't really see my own race that way, but it still seems like decent advice, a possibly useful way to view other races.

I can imagine how this advice might be useful. But unless this specific conversation keeps going, I'll file this bit of advice away with all the other bits until it becomes relevant.

I'm not sure yet how this advice helps or hurts the developing post-Clinton/pale-bloggers-meet-up blogfight.

...and my response.

I was very specific in saying it's a modeling tool for political purposes only. Filing it away until it becomes useful is exactly what you should be doing with it.

It would have been useful pre-luncheon. Picture Mr. Clinton planning a campaigning trip through some locality. The flacks would fan out ahead, they'd be seeing this constituency and that one and word would get out...I think Terrance actually made that point on DKos.

Risking the wrath of FDL, it would help avoid blackface absurdities. If you have an idea and you're not sure if it will offend one your constituencies, you don't use it. That simple.

Primarily though, the idea is kind of a set of cultural training wheels for the folks who said, "we want to do better, but what shall we do?" And I offer it because in the end it really is something white liberals need to do on their own. If their intent is correct, maybe they need a starting point and maybe a push in the right direction. That's the intent of the advice.

Beyond that, we're counting on your liberal vision. Seriously. The weight of disproving racism has always fallen on Black people and culturally speaking, we're kinda tired. Especially since, legally, collectively, socially, we've never been the source of the problem.

My observation...folks can feel free to correct.

There's not a lot of wiggle room for white folks in there. More importantly, this

Beyond that, we're counting on your liberal vision. Seriously. The weight of disproving racism has always fallen on Black people and culturally speaking, we're kinda tired. Especially since, legally, collectively, socially, we've never been the source of the problem.

...is a statement "the crew" really wants white folks to absorb thoroughly...said in a way the middle class contingent would be comfortable repeating. Comfortable integrating into their own thought processes.

It's not just the splash, you know. The ripples count too.