The Neoracists. A new religion is preached across America. It's nonsense posing as wisdom.

One can divide antiracism into three waves. First Wave Antiracism battled slavery and segregation. Second Wave Antiracism, in the 1970s and 1980s, battled racist attitudes and taught America that being racist was a flaw. Third Wave Antiracism, becoming mainstream in the 2010s, teaches that racism is baked into the structure of society, so whites’ “complicity” in living within it constitutes racism itself, while for black people, grappling with the racism surrounding them is the totality of experience and must condition exquisite sensitivity toward them, including a suspension of standards of achievement and conduct.

Third Wave Antiracist tenets, stated clearly and placed in simple oppositions, translate into nothing whatsoever:

1. When black people say you have insulted them, apologize with profound sincerity and guilt. But don’t put black people in a position where you expect them to forgive you. They have dealt with too much to be expected to.

2. Black people are a conglomeration of disparate individuals. “Black culture” is code for “pathological, primitive ghetto people.” But don’t expect black people to assimilate to “white” social norms because black people have a culture of their own.

3. Silence about racism is violence. But elevate the voices of the oppressed over your own.

4. You must strive eternally to understand the experiences of black people. But you can never understand what it is to be black, and if you think you do you’re a racist.

5. Show interest in multiculturalism. But do not culturally appropriate. What is not your culture is not for you, and you may not try it or do it. But—if you aren’t nevertheless interested in it, you are a racist.

This is an excerpt from his new book, "The Elect: Neoracists Posing as Antiracists and their Threat to a Progressive America". "John McWhorter teaches linguistics and music history at Columbia University, hosts Slate’s Lexicon Valley podcast, and is Contributing Editor at the Atlantic." He is black.

McWhorter's term "Elect" for the antiracists reminds of the "Anointed" in Thomas Sowell's great book "The Vision of the Anointed: Self-Congratulation as a Basis for Social Policy".

>>One can divide antiracism into three waves. First Wave Antiracism battled slavery and segregation. Second Wave Antiracism, in the 1970s and 1980s, battled racist attitudes and taught America that being racist was a flaw. Third Wave Antiracism, becoming mainstream in the 2010s, teaches that racism is baked into the structure of society, so whites’ “complicity” in living within it constitutes racism itself, while for black people, grappling with the racism surrounding them is the totality of experience and must condition exquisite sensitivity toward them, including a suspension of standards of achievement and conduct.

I would agree that there were 3 waves but the timing is off.

First was the abolition of slavery (and promotion of education and voting rights for black Americans in the 1800s).

Second was desegregation (which was a movement that took decades but increased after WWII). And Jews and Irish and other people had encounted discrimination in America in the 20th century as well. The Constitution has been amended to specifically guarantee protections for all now.

The third “notion” of “anti-racism” is the one that says America and Americans and American institutions and business heirarchies were founded on racism, profited from racism, and will always be racist and therefore must be torn down. It comes from Marxist agitators and black separatists (especially in the uniquely American “black muslim” preachers of hate and division). It’s there in the 30s, 40s, 50s, and 60s. Carried on into the 70s and 80s and 90s on up til now.

Was Al Sharpton’s shakedown of corporate America in the 1980s principled? Threaten protests etc, get a check, and then walk away with no further words against this or that company and no change in policies or composite of the workforce or leadership?

Communist AF claims to be “anti-racist”. But they aren’t. They are quite antisemitic.

If few leftists have complained, then everyday commercials exhibit the version of America the vast majority of the libs (all races) accept and want.

That is: mixed race couples and buddies, most whites as goofballs, blacks out of poverty buying everything and acting like non-goofy “white”. Anything else?

So, many of the tenets in this article, although taken too seriously by the left, are fringe.

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