Pratyush

It’s so fascinating to see (ostensibly) white people use “white” as a slur against other whites. We are witnessing an evolution of racial identity politics. Here are my thoughts on what is going on (thread):https://twitter.com/MrAndyNgo/status/1049310554953641984 …

1. Just as “whiteness” is often used in the place of what was formerly known as “white privilege”, “white” is increasingly used as a dogwhistle for “white supremacist”. The focus of the derision shifts from the sin (supremacy/privilege) to the sinner (whites).

2. At the same time, “white” (in lefty circles) is morphing into an ideological category, which can be joined/abandoned. Whites can absolve themselves of their “whiteness” by adopting the "right" politics, POC can become avatars for “whiteness” by adopting disagreeable politics.

3. In other words, while the terminology used (signifier) becomes explicitly racial, the meaning is becoming detached from race altogether, referring instead to a brand of politics. This is not common outside elite circles, so understandably it leads to confusion and anger.

4. This is how you end up with the Sarah Jeongs of the world. Perhaps she is a racist (her tweets indicate she is), but it is likely that her language really is (as repeated by her defenders) a *performance*. It might indicate real racial hate, but it doesn’t necessarily need to.

5. This may be sounding like a defense of her words - I assure you it is not! Instead, I think the fury directed towards her was aiming at the wrong target. Jeong was defended by a whole cast of progressive writers, nurtured by elite institutions, and now is legitimized by them.

6. She did not come about in a vacuum, nor were her tweets shocking to her coherts. She, and others like her, are the products of a system that has tacitly accepted ways of speaking and describing the world which have nothing to do with how things actually *are* (reality)…

7. ...but rather, the language is increasingly formed by how they believe the world should be and how it should become that way (politics), and to signal to others their devotion to the “cause”.