On Tue, Nov 10, 2015 at 3:13 PM, Charlie <[email protected]> wrote:

> But what is the relevance of whether PEN-L members are mostly white
> (whether that is actually the case or not)?



"whether that is actually the case or not"? Are you really that blind, or
are you just trying to be coy? I am willing to bet you $1 - or its
equivalent in your favorite cyber-currency) that it is indeed actually the
case.

Look, my remark was a cheap shot, I will admit that, but a considered one.
I fully understood that I'd hurt some feelings and I really regret that
because there are people on PEN-L who are among the most intelligent,
fair-minded and well-intentioned that I know.

But this discussion about the possible dysfunctions of a hypothetical
future cashless society seems frivolous and out-of-touch in a way that is
uncharacteristic. (Imagine instead an article which speculates about the
ill effects of a future where the Internet allows everyone to telecommute
and therefore there is no such thing as a workplace anymore. I am sure
PEN-Lers will immediately pile on and heap scorn over how silly such an
idea was. Is this one any better?)

It is not a bad thing to be aware and appropriately humble about our own
cognitive biases and limitations.




> Gratuitous tagging by race, often ahead of income or class as in raghu's
> example, is part of the replacement of class politics by identity politics
> over the last forty  years.



Great, now you are borrowing the rhetoric of Bill O'Reilly.

The idea that "identity politics" (what a sterile euphemism to use to
describe the struggle of subjugated racial groups!) is somehow reducible to
"class politics" is a silly fairy tale that some leftistslike to tell each
other.
-raghu.
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