Comment by bpt3
6 days ago
I concluded that PG thinks we as a society should stop wasting an enormous amount of resources on performative activities solely designed to appease (and in some cases enrich) a very small, fickle, and vocal portion of the population.
That's very achievable and beneficial to society overall imo.
Which performative activities, though, for which very small, fickle, and vocal portion of the population? Have you seen Musk's or Zuck's antics lately? Condemning the lesser offender(s) can gain favor with the greater, but it's useless for making any real point. Who's being performative now?
> designed to appease (and in some cases enrich) a very small, fickle, and vocal portion of the population.
Note that the people enriched here aren't the poor minorities, it are the self proclaimed leaders of these movements that gets high positions in governments and companies and thus enrich themselves.
There is no value in making those grifters richer, even though there is value in helping poor people.
Is it an "enormous amount of resources"? How do you think it compares to the amount of resources historically put into racism, including all the waste and lost opportunity costs?
In my experience, most people complaining about wokism are projecting their own annoyance at language policing into some kind of massive social problem. But I'm open-minded, and if you have a good argument that the resources put into wokism far outweigh the losses from racism, I'm happy to listen. PG's essay makes no effort to present that argument.
It is used against you. Occupy wallstreet was dead instantaneously when people suggested skin color to be relevant for speakers. This follows a text book example of toxic middle management. That supposedly affluent students, especially those in antropology related studies don't understand these political dynamics is a problem itself.
Some people in higher positions in many companies quickly understood it. And there it will also be used against you. If you aren't in on it that is.
Of course the impact is massive, it is a source of the success of many populist political leaders because people believe the intellectual left has abandoned them. And I am not sure if that is incorrect in the first place.
This isn't wokeism vs. racism, that is a wrong axiom in the first place.
> Is it an "enormous amount of resources"?
Compared to the value provided, I would say so.
> How do you think it compares to the amount of resources historically put into racism, including all the waste and lost opportunity costs?
Over all of human history? Obviously less. No idea why that's relevant. Wasting resources on performative activities or worse isn't going to correct a wrong that occured 200 years ago, or 50 years ago.
> In my experience, most people complaining about wokism are projecting their own annoyance at language policing into some kind of massive social problem. But I'm open-minded, and if you have a good argument that the resources put into wokism far outweigh the losses from racism, I'm happy to listen. PG's essay makes no effort to present that argument.
It was the entire point of his essay imo. We're being distracted from important matters and actual improvements by people who want to play oppression Olympics to the benefit of no one other than them.
So your point isn't so much that language policing costs a lot, it's that it doesn't provide any value. But what if it does? What if the way people talk publicly about other people does impact behavior? Do you think the social stigma attached to the n-word, and the consequential reduction in its public use, helped contribute to equal rights? What about slurs against gays, or Jews? Maybe there is some value in policing language after all?
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