1/31/2024 0 Comments Fear insecurity guilt lies figleafWe can see this sort of strategy at work in Kellyanne Conway’s comments below, about why we should accept Trump’s after-the-fact explanation of offensive comments regarding a disabled reporter (showing, incidentally, that the strategy is not confined to the dodging of racism allegations): The “head” may cause one to make racist-sounding utterances, but the truth about a person lies in their “heart,” which one can insist (even in the face of very substantial contrary evidence) is non-racist. One of these, for example, is to insist that racism is a matter of what is one’s “heart” rather than one’s “head” (Hill 2008: 103). Hill also discusses further strategies used by White people to avoid acknowledging racism. Anything which can be seen as falling short of this can be seen as not racist. Jane Hill (2008) itemizes some of the ways that White people’s folk theories set a high bar for what counts as racism: for example, they tend to hold that racism is a matter of fully conscious beliefs and intentions, and that to be a racist one must condemn all members of a racial group, and view all members of a racial group as biologically inferior. The Norm’s lack of precision means that individual speakers will form their own views on the subject, and White speakers will generally adopt a very high bar for what counts as racism. I have argued elsewhere (Saul 2017, 2019a) that it is best understood as Don’t be racist, leaving unspecified what it takes for an utterance to count as racist. It also makes people uncomfortable about voting for those who hold such views. Mendelberg does not offer a precise formulation of this norm, though she notes that it forbids open expression of support for legal discrimination and segregation, and claims of biological inferiority. This is a norm which forbids overt expression of very obvious racism and is endorsed even by people who harbor quite high levels of racial resentment (explained below). The need for racial figleaves comes from the widespread (though by no means universal) acceptance of what Tali Mendelberg calls the Norm of Racial Equality (Mendelberg 2001). (In the case of a diachronic figleaf, it may even be that the audience makes the inference and then, based on the figleaf, reconsiders it and decides that the speaker/R is not racist after all.) A figleaf is uttered, which allows the audience to avoid making this inference. The utterance R is the sort of thing that might cause an audience to think that the speaker is racist (or the sort of thing that might itself be deemed racist). More precisely:Ī racial figleaf is an utterance which (for some portion of the audience) blocks the conclusion that (a) some other utterance, R, is racist or (b) the person who uttered R 4 is racist.’Ī racial figleaf may be synchronic, occurring at the same time as the utterance R or it may be diachronic, occurring at a different time from R. Racial figleaves serve to block inferences to the claim that some particular utterance R is racist, or that the person who uttered R is racist. 3 In addition, it discusses possible extensions of the concept. This article explains how figleaves work, and explores the application of the notion to other forms of prejudice, such as sexism. There is good reason to believe that this makes them a potent and dangerous force in shifting norms. Figleaves, then, play a very important role by enabling much more blatant expressions of racial resentment than those that can be dogwhistled. Although readers of this chapter will most likely not find this figleaf effective, it is still very widely used, and effective with some-as well will see, figleaves do not need to be all that widely successful in order to be useful. is an utterance that would otherwise be seen as racist. A classic but overly simple figleaf, effective only with a limited group, would be “I’m not racist, but R,” where R. Figleaves allow one to get away with what would otherwise be seen as racist utterances, thereby shifting the norms of what counts as racism for those that accept the figleaf. 2Īnother, less widely examined, technique is the figleaf-something which just barely covers a thing that you’re not supposed to show in public. This has also been fairly widely studied. As a result, tapping into the racial resentment while not too obviously violating the anti-racism norm-for example, via dogwhistles-has proved a highly effective electoral strategy. It is overwhelmingly likely that the same is true elsewhere as well. In the United States-which has been more thoroughly studied in this regard than many countries-a norm against being racist coexists with quite widespread racial resentment among White people, at varying levels of conscious awareness. Please note: this chapter quotes examples of racist and sexist speech.
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