Megan McArdle explains why it's unfair to call out Arnold Kling for his recent comments:
Now, of course, we have a black president, and James Wolcott stands ready to police any reference to him for signs of racism. This is a charge so serious that it shuts down any possible discourse, and is thus much loved by people who do not care to be disagreed with. Would it be racist of me to note that Mr. Wolcott's accusations seem vaguely redolent of the tactics of one Senator Joseph McCarthy?
I wrote about this during the election, but white people are far less concerned about racism than they are about accusations of racism, because racism isn't really a part of their experience, but being accused of being racist is. So this is a pretty self-serving argument: Kling's racism isn't problematic, because it doesn't "shut down the discourse" but Walcott calling out Kling is out of line because it might hurt some delicate feelings. Note that this is a reactive form of speech policing, the sort McArdle is criticizing: I can say what I want, but you can't criticize it because it "shuts down the discourse." Oh, and criticizing Kling is "McCarthyism" and tantamount to telling all libertarians to "shut up."
I'm really less concerned with whether a person is "a racist" because I think everyone's racist. I can remember getting lectures from teachers in high school about how if we were a class of white kids, we'd know how to behave. I'm much more concerned with calling out individual actions as racist, and if you want to complain about that, well you're just shutting down the discourse.
As for my "hiding" the context of the quotation from Kling about reparations, I thought it was fairly obvious that Kling had produced a flimsy pretext simply to use the word. In fact, I explained that in a later post, and if one wants to "hide" something on the internet, one generally doesn't link to it. McArdle somehow failed to note either of those things. Why, that's such a grevious omission of context, I'm shocked her magazine let it stand. Someone please grab my pearls for me, that I may clutch them.
Also, for future complaining, I'm about as white as this guy and this guy. Maybe I should drop more references to "bling" in my blogging. Or McArdle could just read some of the other blogs at her magazine.
-- A. Serwer
