How to argue like a white racist

 

Here in one place is the list of the most common arguments that white racists use on this blog, listed roughly from the most common to the least:

1. Anything but race– Racism is over. There must be some Logical Explanation that has nothing to do with race.
2. Blame-shifting – Blacks like to use the race card, crying racism and blaming whitey, but blacks are to blame for their own mess. Racism is so 1968.
3. ad hominem – question a commenter’s intelligence, character, age or motives.
4. Whites are individuals – so you cannot make general statements about whites. Besides, that would be racist.
5. “Blacks are racist too” - but they do not like to admit it. Find a case where a black person did something just as bad as what they are pointing out.
6. “You are the racist one” - turn the tables.
7. “I am offended” – how dare they call you a racist! You do not see a person’s colour – they could be purple for all you care!
8. Arab trader argument – whites are not as evil as black people like to think. For example, it was not just white people who traded slaves: Arabs did it too! Few blacks know that, so make sure to point that out whenever you can.
9. “But that happened to me too!” – whatever blacks complain about, try to find a case where a white person – you, a friend, someone in the news -  experienced the same thing.
10. Point out how “ghetto” and disagreeable black people are– because they are and it needs pointing out. No wonder no one gets along with them!
11. Talk down to them – they are imagining things, they do not know what they are talking about. How dare blacks tell us what we are like. What do they know? Are they white?
12. straw man – argue against some stock position that is kind of like the post. That way you can copy your comments from another blog. Or from Ann Coulter.
13. Blacks need to be colour-blind – if they just stopped seeing race and talking about it so much then racism would go away!
14. Start quoting rape statistics – out of the blue, if necessary. Rates of imprisonment are good too.
15. The white inventor argument – whites invented everything so shut up already.
16. Demand proof – Make them prove it beyond a reasonable doubt with facts and figures. Find holes in whatever facts they present. Find counter-facts.
17. Make it about the past - and point out that your family never owned slaves. When are they going to stop living in the past?
18. Go back to Africa – if it is so bad here, then go back to Africa already!
19. Bootstrap – I made it on my own without help from anyone.  Blacks expect something for nothing!
20. Some of my best friends are black – so there is no way I am racist!
21. Might makes right – all through history.

Most of these arguments take neither the truth nor the experience of black people seriously – because what matters most is white people and their feelings, particularly about feeling good living in a racist society.

See also:

• More on some of these arguments, but as seen from my point of view:
  • blame-shifting
    • crying racism
    • blame whitey
  • “Whites are individuals”
  • “I am offended”
    • purple people
  • The Arab trader argument
    • racism is not natural - despite what many whites want to believe
  • The white inventor argument
  • “You are the racist one” – I already know
  • “Blacks are racist too”
  • “Some of my best friends are black”
  • “Go back to Africa”
  • Bootstrap – based on blindness to white privilege
  • derailing – a set of tactics which uses some of these arguments
• colour-blind racism – the racism that underlies these arguments
• How to tell if a commenter is white – partly by using some of these arguments
• What this blog has taught me about white people