I'm going to say something cynical and opportunistic here, myself: when I saw the headline go by on FB, I said to a friend in chat, "Fuck, Ferrett probably just wrote the column I was going to write later on tonight." Thankfully, you didn't; that being said, I agree with what you've said so far.

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I'm tired and you're better educated, so feel free to engage Lee Sharpe on Facebook.

I usually wait for you to write 'em for me.

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From the article you pointed to in The Atlantic: "It is comforting to think of racism as species of misanthropy, or akin to child molestation, thus exonerating all those who bear no real hatred in their heart."

Uhm. It is?

"They were good people, who consented to evil in the pursuit of power."

These are commonly thought of as evil people. (and defending George Wallace.. let's not go near there)

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I like how that link says, over and over again, that Ron Paul's supporters say stuff has been taken out of context, and at one point even goes so far as to say "He said they should be read and quoted in their entirety to avoid misrepresentation."

And intermingled with all the times it says that are a bunch of quotes taken out of context. Genius. By quoting "out of context" they pretend to provide Paul's side of the story, and then by quoting out of context they provide the other side. That sounds almost Fair and Balanced!

I have no position on the specific question of whether what he said is racist or deliberately inflammatory, because I still haven't seen what the quotes were taken from. It seems perfectly plausible to me that the quote you used as the link could be, in context, something like "given the statistics the bureau is providing, combined with statistics about failures to convict, we can safely assume 95% bla bla bla, which is patently ridiculous so at least one of those given statistics are evidently drivel."

Alternatively it might just be like the question of whether it's racist to say that on average, according to a study, black people have a lower IQ. I contend that it's a bit racist to measure that (why did you make that divide and not, say, compare the IQ of tall vs short people?), but given that it's been measured, stating it as a fact is not racist unless you are using it to draw a racist conclusion (eg. "therefore we should not hire black people!")

If he was commenting on statistics which actually said that 95% of the black males in DC are criminals then saying so is not racist of him.

(Also, unrelatedly, I would bet that more than 95% of Americans of any color are "semi-criminal" - who hasn't ever made a mix tape or the like for a friend? Who has also never broken the speed limit?)

Before posting this comment (at this point in the comment) I did a little poking around and found an example of Ron Paul saying something like "67% of blacks are in jail" (not actually what he meant, but you can tell what he meant from context), and it's pretty definitely not a racist remark in this context, though it appears pretty strongly to be racist without context. Youtube link.

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If he was commenting on statistics which actually said that 95% of the black males in DC are criminals then saying so is not racist of him.

"Given the inefficiencies of what D.C. laughingly calls the `criminal justice system,' I think we can safely assume that 95 percent of the black males in that city are semi-criminal or entirely criminal." - Ron Paul, 1992

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Yes, we already got that part quoted, right there in Ferrett's post? My point is, if the statistics he's talking about at the time said that, say, 90% of black males in the city had been [correctly] convicted of crimes, and another statistic that he's talking about said that half the people who have never been convicted of crimes are, nonetheless, criminals, then it would be pretty reasonable to assume that 95% of black males in DC are "criminals or semi-criminals". Just because the quote seems clear-cut doesn't mean the context is irrelevant.

Repeating the same quote doesn't provide context.

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And repeating the claim that maybe there just might be some statistics out there that might possibly make that statement anything other than racist doesn't provide any proof of anything other than your wanting to give Paul the benefit of the doubt despite the available evidence indicating that he doesn't deserve it.

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It has nothing to do with whether I want to give him the benefit of the doubt. If you'd looked at my subsequent comments you'd see that, in fact, I didn't, I wanted to remove the doubt.

The point of "repeating the claim" was that there was valid scope for doubt, and every article talking about it only increased that doubt, by repeatedly quoting the exact same phrase and not providing context, in the face of objections that the context was important. As it turns out, the context didn't actually help at all, but if people would just give the fucking context as a response to that challenge (which I did, about three comments down) the whole counterargument would be shot down.

Instead they just quote the argument as immutable fact, occasionally quote the counterargument, and then somehow that's expected to be the end of it.

The point being, it really is easy to smear someone by quoting them out of context, and though it turns out it wasn't happening that way with old Ron Paul quotes, it's still naive to believe a smear, especially in a political context, just because someone quotes something that appears to support it. Glancing at your LJ for an example, you could fairly easily be framed as "supporting gangs" with a little quote-cherry-picking from your comments about Attack The Block, and it wouldn't even be entirely a misrepresentation, but the context makes it fairly clear that you're not actually saying that gangs are a good thing. I'd hope people would look into it rather than just jump on the bandwagon.

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Saying "maybe there were some statistics out there somewhere that would make what Paul said not be racist anymore" is giving him the benefit of the doubt.

And if you want to argue that the context makes Paul's stated belief that 19 or every 20 black males in Washington DC is a criminal be not racist, then provide some.

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I don't, and never did, want to argue that, I just said that in the very comment that you're replying to.

But if you want to murder babies, please stop wanting to murder babies.

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You wrote the following: It seems perfectly plausible to me that the quote you used as the link could be, in context, something like "given the statistics the bureau is providing, combined with statistics about failures to convict, we can safely assume 95% bla bla bla, which is patently ridiculous so at least one of those given statistics are evidently drivel."

So unless you were using a definition of "perfectly plausible" that no other human being has ever used in the history of the existence of the phrase, you damn well did exactly that.

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And you wrote the following: "And if you want to argue that the context makes Paul's stated belief..."

Which I don't.

Do you believe that
"it is perfectly plausible that the missing context could make that quote from Paul's newsletter something like..."
is synonymous with
"the context [definitely] makes Paul's stated belief..."
?

Or, for that matter, do you believe that every other human being has always used the phrase "perfectly plausible" to mean "it is the case that"? Because that's basically what you just said.

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It is perfectly believable that there's a context that would make the claim something other than a racist statement. I gave one example of such a context, so it's not only believable, it's true that there is a context.

And from the evidence that was provided, it was perfectly believable that it might have been in that context, because the evidence provided for the "prosecution" didn't include the newsletters nor this additional quote you've just given. If they had, then it would no longer have been plausible. And that was my point from the start - that given the evidence presented, including the fact that the "defendant" was saying the context was important, it was perfectly plausible that the context was important.

And then I went on, a few comments later (but before you started arguing with me), to say essentially "now I have found the context, and it turned out it wasn't important."

And you're simply lying or wrong with your "not even close" bullshit. It was what you said. You were explicitly telling me that by saying it was plausible, I "wanted to argue" that it was true. Just because you didn't understand doesn't mean what I was saying was wrong, or that I was using the wrong words.

When inadequate evidence has been provided, and an alternative explanation has been suggested, it is perfectly plausible that an alternative explanation might be true, until better evidence either way is presented. It's equally perfectly plausible that the original accusation is true. I don't assume "innocent until proven guilty", but I certainly don't want to assume "guilty because someone said so".

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And you're simply lying or wrong with your "not even close" bullshit.

It was neither bullshit, not wrong, nor a lie.

In the absence of any context other than the overwhelmingly large number of indisputably racist things that were in Paul's newsletters during the time in question, it is not perfectly believable that his claim that 95% of all black males in Washington DC were criminals was anything other than racist, and no amount of bluster on your part will or can change that.

As for your assumption, it's not even "innocent until proven guilty"; it's "innocent because I just pulled something out of my ass that I refuse to provide any support to back up."

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You have a remarkable problem understanding that there is a difference between the assertion "the quote was not racist" and stating the uncertainty "the quote could be not racist".

There is a huge difference between these two things, and consistently telling me that I'm saying the one I'm not, even when I've just said explicitly that that's not what I was saying, is quite frustrating.

A lack of sufficient evidence is enough to demonstrate "could be [not]", but it takes substantial counterevidence to demonstrate "is [not]". To me, a quote (from a party that may have an agenda) that appears to suggest something, coupled with an assertion that the quote is so out of context that it's misleading, and the ability to come up with a hypothetical context that would make the difference, equals that lack of sufficient evidence. Which is what I was commenting on in the first place - I have never suggested that he was innocent, if you look again at my comment at the top of this thread (and read it, ideally) you'll see that I was commenting on how bad the article is for citing 'counterarguments' saying it's out of context and yet not providing any more context. I provided a hypothetical context not to say "he is innocent", but to show that the third criterion for "lack of sufficient evidence has been provided" was also met.

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You have a remarkable problem understanding that there is a difference between the assertion "the quote was not racist" and stating the uncertainty "the quote could be not racist".

You're simply lying or wrong with that bullshit.

As I have said more than once to you, if you want your claim that what Paul (or the person writing under Paul's name) might not be racist to be plausible, then you need to provide something to back it up. As long as you are either unwilling or unable to do so, all we have to go on is all the racist garbage that Paul's newsletters contained back then to form a judgment from.

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Except, and this was my point, we didn't have the racist garbage that Paul's newsletters contained to go on, we had some people quoting excerpts of the racist garbage, which is something I'm not comfortable forming a judgement on.

And as I have said more than once to you, I don't want a claim that Paul's writing might not be racist to be plausible, and that is not "my" claim no matter how many times you say it is. My claim is that not providing the evidence, especially when it's been explicitly requested, makes a case very badly. Ironically the exact same claim that you're making!

Obviously I can't possibly provide evidence for my position, because what evidence could possibly prove "that evidence is of poor quality"?

Mind, if your point is actually "the people saying that you should read it in context should be providing that context" then I agree, but again, what we were working with was an article that quoted people saying that the context was important, but not saying who those people were or where they said it, so for all we could know those people might well have provided the context when they said it. Even if the article had just added "we did look at it in context and it was still horrible and racist" that would have made a difference, but all the article did was put the quotes out of context and then quote people saying that the context was important, then left it at that, implying that nobody had bothered to check and thus that the objection could have been valid.

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My point is and has been that your claim that there might possibly be some context out there somewhere under which things like Paul's claim that 95% of all black males in DC are criminals would not be racist is at best wildly implausible given how you keep refusing to provide any; because of all the other racist passages from the Paul newsletters that have come to light over the years.

It's put up or shut up time for you. Provide the context that I've been asking you for for I forget exactly how many days now, or you will be rightfully dismissed as not worth wasting any further time and attention on. Your call, dude.

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I already said, before you even commented the very first time on my post, that I had found the context it was in and it didn't make the quotes any less racist. And I already told you that.

I also, in that first post, provided a context in which the quoted claim wouldn't have been racist, if it had been in that context, so I already did show that there "might possibly be" some context out there. As well as already acknowledging that there wasn't.

I've already provided what you ask for, a context under which the claim would not be racist, thus proving my contention that it was plausible that it could have been in such a context, and I've already agreed with you that it wasn't in such a context. I don't really know what you're disagreeing with now, but it doesn't seem to be me.

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No, you did nothing of the sort. You claimed that because some statistics might possibly exist somewhere that might possibly, just maybe, might show that Paul's claim that DC managed to be such an outstanding statistical outpost that, unlike any other city in the entire United States of America, 95 out of every 100 black males who lives there is a criminal, was something other than a racist statement was perfectly believable.

That goes beyond merely not being believable (perfectly or no); it's one of the stupidist tucking things I have read in years. So since you yourself have admitted that no such statistics can be offered, why not just stop posting rather than keep doubling down on the tucking stupid? Either way, thanks for confirming that you're not worth wasting any more of my time on, and this will be my last reply to you. Huh-bye now.

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Okay, I realize you've said you're not replying any more but I have to ask anyway, because I really don't understand where you're coming from. Which of these premises is the one you are disagreeing with?

1. That when discussing a statistical report that has to do with a comparison of something racially charged, eg. percentage of different races convicted of crimes, it is very easy to say something which, removed from that context, would appear extremely racist, but which does not show racism (from the person discussing it at least) inside the context.

2. That a small quote taken out of context, and for which no context is supplied or readily available, could easily have come from a context which was a discussion of a statistical report. (Or a discussion of other people's opinions, or a satire, or a myriad of other contexts that could completely change the meaning.)

Please note, neither of these premises have anything whatsoever to do with Ron Paul, because my point had nothing to do with Ron Paul beyond that the article that I was annoyed by was about him. My annoyance at the article was unrelated to Ron Paul.

I didn't say anything about "because some statistics might possibly exist somewhere", I gave a single example of a context that could change the meaning to something devoid of racism. Because the existence of one example, though there are many more, is sufficient to show that the context might be important.

The reason I don't stop posting "because I have admitted that no such statistics can be offered" is because I'm not fucking arguing that Ron Paul is not racist, and you don't seem to be able to get that through your thick skull. I don't have to offer any existing statistics because A CONTEXT THAT WOULD CHANGE THE MEANING IS SOMETHING THAT EXISTS. My point does not require a context that DOES change the meaning to be something that exists, but because you're arguing with "Ron Paul is innocent", something that isn't my point at all and never has been, you insist most vehemently that I have to provide nonexistent evidence to refute your strawman or my argument is dumb.

Perhaps this short summary will make my argument clearer: there is no way to tell, from looking at the original article, anything it cites, and a cursory Google search, whether the quotes given are more similar to:
1. Abraham Lincoln said "You can fool some of the people all the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all the time."
or
2. Jonathan Swift said "a young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food."

Both are genuine quotes (probably), but (at least) one gives an extremely misleading impression in the absence of context. And since the context, in the Ron Paul case, couldn't be easily found, what compelling reason was there to assume that it's not more like quote 2? (To clarify, again, I have dug up the actual context and proven to my satisfaction that it's not more like quote 2, but that doesn't in any way mitigate my original point, that the article actively provided reason to doubt by saying people said the context was important, and then didn't provide anything to assuage that doubt.)

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I personally, if I saw that quote from a random person I didn't know and I knew it was part of a larger speech and the rest of the speech wasn't present, would assume either that the speech was actually about some statistics being nonsense or that the line is a joke about how bad the justice system is, not about how many blacks are criminals at all.

I'm not saying it is either of these things, nor that I disbelieve it was exactly what it appears to be on the surface, but I am saying I wouldn't make the leap that a selected quote says everything that was being said. I've tried finding it in context, and all I can find is it being quoted over and over again without context, occasionally saying that it was part of a response to "a 1992 study by the National Center on Incarceration and Alternatives", which I also can't find so I can't tell if it actually does say something that implies that.

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All that said, I did finally manage to find some actual pages from "Ron Paul's Political Report" that do say racist things even in context, and I don't believe "I don't endorse any of the things that were published by my people with my name on them for ten years", so now I will accept the premise that Ron Paul is (or, at least, was ten years ago) racist.

Here are some scanned pages.

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...just noting the thing that the IQ test thing reveals, which is that IQ tests are often culturally biased, although they are posited as a neutral/objective measurement.

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I don't think the series really got good until "Ron Paul and the Goblet of Fire-everyone-at-the-Fed."

-Alex

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me too!

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An opportunist who utilizes the stereotypes and lies about minorities to get ahead? STILL A RACIST.

WTF? Seriously, what the fucking fuck?

I'm sure I'm now going to be told that I'm:

1) Oversensitive
2) don't Understand the Real Issues Here
3) have An Attitude
4) should watch my Tone
5) Am a Racist for Seeing Race

or any one of another million derailing, bullshit, arguments from fucking apologists.

Ferrett, I like you a lot, and I like a lot of your opinions. But this one? This one is pure shit.

Your underwear is showing dude.

N.

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It would possibly be helpful, and less likely to get you called such names, if you defined your terms and explained why that's still racism/why racism and opportunistic assholism are the same thing.

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Not entirely. I am instead going to say that you claims have no support other than to indicate personal belief. Ferret, whom I personally disagree with here, has at least provided some sample as to why he believes as he does. That said, neither claim (his or yours) was presented in a manner that leads me to believe it is intended to be discusses.

You claims, to remove any misunderstanding, are below:

1) An opportunist who utilizes the stereotypes and lies about minorities to get ahead? STILL A RACIST.

and

2) Ferrett, I like you a lot, and I like a lot of your opinions. But this one? This one is pure shit.

--
On a personal note, I have an issue with this comment; "I'm sure I'm now going to be told that I'm:

1) Oversensitive
2) don't Understand the Real Issues Here
3) have An Attitude
4) should watch my Tone
5) Am a Racist for Seeing Race

or any one of another million derailing, bullshit, arguments from fucking apologists."

This preemptive attack against the character and intentions of those here is intellectually dishonest and makes you guilty of the very thing you have accused others of.

.02

Jesse

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I get what you're saying here, but is it really apologism to say this guy's worse than a racist?

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FWIW, I agree with you entirely. Seeing an entire group of people as an exploitable entity and not as people is racist, and a person who can do so with the intent of exploitation is a racist.

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Ferrett,

I'm sorry I cursed on your journal, and lost my temper. I stand by my opinion however. I'm mostly sorry that I am not able to express myself more clearly on this matter, in a way that is more diplomatic. It's a little too close to my heart, and my daily life, and my family's experiences, for me to keep cool about.

This video by Jay Smooth was a bit of a balm to my heart this morning, and helped me come to a place where I could post this apology for my vitriol.

http://www.illdoctrine.com/2011/11/my_tedx_talk_how_i_stopped_wor.html

Maybe it will help others understand why it's so hard for me to talk about this without emotion.

N.

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I wouldn't expect you to talk about it without emotion. Why wouldn't it be next to your heart? Come on, this shit is rooted in who you are and who society defines you as. And if you didn't disagree with me strongly on occasion, I'd be suspicious of you. There is no apology needed.

That said, I wrote a follow-up post on it today, which I suspect you'll also disagree with, but at least it'll clarify things more. Or perhaps not.

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My question: when did Ron Paul become the only racist Republican candidate? As far as I can tell, he's guilty of saying in print the sort of things that (speculating) Gingrich says behind closed doors at GOP fundraisers.

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Openly racist 10+ years ago is much worse than secretly racist for the intervening ten years, obviously!

More seriously, it's much more provable and thus much more usable as ammunition against voting for him and thus makes him much more difficult to get elected than a secret racist.

So that's what he's really being accused of, by people in similar factions. The other side is accusing him of being racist, because they can prove it, but his own side is accusing him of being difficult to elect. They don't mind that he was racist.

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I agree with nex0s, by it's very definition BOTH are racism. What you call "opportunism" is actually just another part of the definition of racism (see #2 below). Whether it is because of a personal belief or because of a desire to curry favor it's still racism.

Definition of RACISM
1
: a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race
2
: racial prejudice or discrimination

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No doubt it's racism. What I'm wondering is whether he's a racist, which is an entirely different thing. Also see: today's essay on the topic.

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His actions are racism. His refusal to apologize for them, his doddering, his YEARS AND YEARS of espousing them, make him a racist. Full stop.

It's pretty clear. What does he have to do to be a racist in your eyes? String a man up? Dance around in a white hood?

What, taking money from Storm Front, taking photos with them, and publishing a racist newsletter for TEN YEARS isn't enough? Calling all black men (that would include, btw - my nephews, my brother, my father, my uncles, etc) criminals? And more?

Why is it so hard for you to call a spade, a spade? (Pun intended.)

How about this:

I see a lot of white people debating whether or not a white guy is racist. There's one black person in this debate as far as I can tell, and that's me, and I'm saying he's a racist.

How about you take my word for it?

N.

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Asian, not black, but cosigning this on everything except for the kinship ties to black males.

Benefiting from racism is racist.

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This white Jew cosigns as well.

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He sure sounds racist to me.

And I'm a libertarian who thinks Ron Paul might be the closest thing we've got to a step in the right direction.

But...yeah. He just called almost all black men criminals. Hard to pick nits about that.

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And I think it’s important to draw a distinction here between “racists” and “opportunists.”

No, it's not. Racist is as racist does. You're just quibbling about etiology.

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