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Let’s stop talking about intent and focus on outcomes

This is the second installment of a series of posts on lessons we progressives should take on the election. The overview is here.

One area that the message put forth by progressives is counter-productive is when intents are discussed instead of outcomes.  (Conservatives, of course, do this, too, but they are not my focus here.)  Let me go through some examples.

The biggest example is using the term “racist.”  I don’t know that we’ve had an actual racist President in several decades, but every election that term is brought out. People said Mitt Romney was racist because of some "free stuff" comments after his NAACP address.  McCain was called a racist who reminded Rep. Lewis of George Wallace.  It happens virtually every election. The end result is that the term "racist" is so watered down that it has lost its meaning.  People are so jaded that, when the KKK announces its support for Trump and the KKK and the American Nazi party praises Trump's choice of Bannon, people on the right just shrug because we called Romney a racist.  We have to stop doing this.

Many conservatives (just like many progressives) grew up in racist households, where their parents really thought people of color were lesser. Those children knew that was wrong, and they grew up fighting with their parents, either explicitly or implicitly, about the issue.  They just want things to be equal, with everyone acting as if race doesn’t exist, and that’s not an unreasonable position.  But then they are called racist, usually because of not strongly denouncing racially disparate impacts.

I very strongly think that racially disparate impacts are hugely important and systemic in our country. Inter-generational poverty, disproportionate arrests for the same crimes, different looking people sitting in positions of power in interviews and other places, etc.  Study after study shows that this is a huge deal. But -- and this is my overarching point -- we shouldn’t talk about it in terms of intent. Though there are people that are overtly racist, most people I know and you know only have some mild, subconscious racism, and when it shows up consciously it bothers them.  I think we should approach these issues as empirical problems of impact, avoiding discussing motivations and preferring to focus on solutions. If there is an empirical problem, find an empirical solution, and do not impute motivations.

There is a very similar narrative with sexism.  Yes, there are truly sexist people out there, and this brand of bigotry is often more acceptable in polite society, through jokes and gender-specific roles. But we say people are thinking bad things instead of about how the outcomes are not what a fair system should produce.  Romney, again tone deaf, didn’t mean anything by his “binders full of women” comment, and he doesn’t hate women, I suspect. There is no war on women (like there is no war on Christmas).  Really, come on.  It’s not a dislike of women, it’s a desire to have traditional roles and values be respected.  I think those values are often misplaced, and I think they often have a disparate and negative impact on women, and I think we should leave it there and not question the motives of the other side.  Even when we are right about guessing about motives, nobody will admit these negative things, but by linking the argument to an unprovable internal negative motivation, the discussion is derailed and we cannot get anywhere.

Homophobia is a particularly silly term.  There are certainly people out there that are afraid that gayness will somehow rub off on them, but most people that believe homosexuality is a sin are not actually afraid of gay people.  Again, we are guessing on what is going on in people’s heads when we say “homophobia,” and we go down a bad road when we do that.  Instead, we should focus on our stories and values instead of disparaging or negatively guessing at theirs.

And I really think there could be common ground with many, many people.  When the average person looks at the Ferguson report, they say ... hey, we should fix those systems and lower that impact, as long as we can do it without being racist. It's usually the same with other populations.  And even when it's not, we should recognize that there is a difference in kind between consciously thinking black people are lesser and thinking rules should be race neutral even if white people have a system leg-up already.  Surely we all see that is true.

So let's stop linking our arguments to guessed-at intents and focus more on empirical problems that need objective solutions.

Thoughts?

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