It was fascinating, that the MAGA American conservatives lump the US together with Europe into "the West" though there has been significant differences in the averages people world view (and the elites ofc)
Europe (ofc also diverse internally) is a secular or secular-becoming continent. There wouldnt be any big movement fighting to put the 10 commandments into class rooms. This affects formally religious countries like Spain or Ireland and now also Poland.
Even most conservatives (at least in Germany) see gay rights as the part of the German way of life. See also the last judgement of the European Court of Justice regarding Hungary.
MAGA is lava for election in many many countries.
Also "in the West" people in countries like Canada, Australia or most European countries don't like to be lumped together with the US anyway. So why MAGA people care?
For MAGA, saying the quiet part out loud, "the west" = white people. While I dislike looking at everything solely through a racial lens, I think in this case it applies.
There really is no sense in pretending that this is not a white supremacy movement. They are saying it out loud. Now we just need to figure out what this means and how to deal with it.
Irish people, German people, Scandivian people: yeah, sure, of course they have culture.
But "white" is not a culture, it's a social construct that exists primarily for exclusion. CF: people who are now, and previously weren't, considered white (Poles, Italians, some Jews, etc).
If whiteness exists only to delineate the in groups/out groups, the only "culture" of whiteness is that of protecting the power of those deemed to be "white".
So, yeah, I think "maintaining the culture of white people" inherently requires a concept of white supremacy.
Keep in mind, you replied to a comment that claimed that "the West" is used as another name for "White" and that's precisely how it's used in those circles.
So, to paraphrase, you deny that there's Western culture and it's part of European Culture. That is, you deny that there are cultural threads common for most of Europe and more so for Western Europe. I hope, I've said enough to convince you that you're wrong.
> But "white" is not a culture, it's a social construct that exists primarily for exclusion.
And? Using your logic, one can say that "German is not a culture, it's a social construct that exists primarily for exclusion" - if you were consistent, you'd also question the right of Germans to have a culture given that Bavaria, Saxony, etc do have cultural differences. The hair-splitting can go even further but the point should already be clear.
> So, yeah, I think "maintaining the culture of white people" inherently requires a concept of white supremacy.
So you claim that "maintaining the culture of Chinese people" inherently requires a concept of Chinese supremacy? Replace Chinese with German, Saxon, whatever... it doesn't compute.
Culture can be used as an excuse for supremacy and there are many other excuses too but fighting excuses instead of fighting supremacy can only help the supremacists.
Ok, but the people who look like me, who have historically been called "white people", do have a distinct, shared culture (or the people who aren't "white" wouldn't be able to point out how we act and what we do and our manner of speech). So what are these people called? What is their culture called? What are we renaming white-people tacos to? (and, no, tostadas are not the same thing as white-people tacos)
While I don't think my culture needs to be preserved nor do I care about being a "racial minority" (I live in a neighborhood where the majority of the people who live here are "non-white" - and, no, I didn't gentrify, it's actually just a very young neighborhood), I do want to be able to share my culture and traditions with other people. That's the whole basis of culture... sharing it with others.
And there's another thing. People who don't look like me call me "white people". What should they be calling me instead?
I think it would be a lot easier to shut white supremacists down if we had competent answers to these questions instead of thought terminating cliches like "white people don't have culture".
This is a rude statement to claim as you are denying the existence of a group of people. Just because a group can consist of other subgroups that does not mean a larger group does not exist.
>it's a social construct that exists primarily for exclusion.
Everything can be a social construct if you want to try and frame it as one and while the actual definition may be complex it is not any more complex than other groups of people like Chinese which also consist of subgroups which people may or may not consider the same Chinese as one another. To say that the term of white is used primarily for exclusion that is wrong and I think more reflects the kind of content you consume.
Interesting point and in the European context I do agree.
I like to add that if people consider themself as "white", their respective culture is "white culture" though as I know only the USA has such a strong race concept in their culture in opposite to Canada, Brazil, Australia or Germany (all immigration countries)
Because they perceive themselves as leading something bigger than a USA-only movement. Their concept of themselves has them being much more important than just affecting one nation.
It is funny that in terms of values they are not a leader but a follower of Russia. The origin and protector of all their conservative values - including fake Christianity, view on power and gender, race, minorities government structure and so on and so forth.
They crave access the authority and gravitas that they perceive as extending from the lengthy history of Western Europe, and they covet subservience to the divine rule of kings.
I think the religion difference is a lot smaller than you're giving it credit for. In Germany, most conservatives vote for an explicitly Christian political party and Good Friday is a public holiday. It's also my understanding, although I haven't researched this in detail, that German public schools are permitted or even required to offer religious instruction far beyond what would be allowed in the US.
The party is called the "Christian Democratic Party" but in practice pushes no christian policies. 47% of germans are legally atheists. Only 5% regularly visit mass.
All very true, but I don't think it contradicts my point. Perhaps the lower prevalence of religious participation in Germany makes German secularists more comfortable with religious symbols and practices.
The churches are rather pro-refugee, the majority in Germany is rather not. What do the conservatives do in a democracy? They follow the majority.
The German state is linked more to religions but rather trajectory it is becoming more secular. My example about Texas shows the different direction and shows how Germany is changing into a different direction then what MAGA people want.
When Americans describe themselves as "Christian" they are effectively talking about a different religion than the "Christian" in CDU. Americans that do fit into that same bucket use words that describe the so-called "mainline" Christianity like "Catholic" or "Lutheran."
The only thing that modern evangelical churches have in common is they read the same bible and believe Christ was resurrected, but their theology is different, their practices are different, there is no formal clergy or clerical education/scholarship, and their values typically invert from what every other Christian denomination teaches. And there are more cults than you can possibly imagine.
> It was fascinating, that the MAGA American conservatives lump the US together with Europe into "the West"
This is not “MAGA Americans” characterization. It is the outcome of 2000+ years of history culminating in the U.S. being primarily populated by European peoples and the post WWII world order, with highlights including the Marshall Plan and NATO.
No citizen in a nuclear-armed state need learn anything about anyone else, save perhaps about other nuclear-armed states.
The Westphalian system of armed states had its legs chopped out from under it after 1945, but it's taking a while for a new way to materialize.
This is one of the reasons why the Absolute Worst Thing is a nuclear-armed state with uncertain borders. Look around the world and you'll see that the "trouble spots" we spend a lot of time looking at in the news, are those places where nuke powers get to feeling itchy and twitchy about where exactly their countries end.
It was fascinating, that the MAGA American conservatives lump the US together with Europe into "the West" though there has been significant differences in the averages people world view (and the elites ofc) Europe (ofc also diverse internally) is a secular or secular-becoming continent. There wouldnt be any big movement fighting to put the 10 commandments into class rooms. This affects formally religious countries like Spain or Ireland and now also Poland. Even most conservatives (at least in Germany) see gay rights as the part of the German way of life. See also the last judgement of the European Court of Justice regarding Hungary. MAGA is lava for election in many many countries.
Also "in the West" people in countries like Canada, Australia or most European countries don't like to be lumped together with the US anyway. So why MAGA people care?
For MAGA, saying the quiet part out loud, "the west" = white people. While I dislike looking at everything solely through a racial lens, I think in this case it applies.
There really is no sense in pretending that this is not a white supremacy movement. They are saying it out loud. Now we just need to figure out what this means and how to deal with it.
Maintaining the culture of white people does not require white supremacy.
"White people" do not have culture.
Irish people, German people, Scandivian people: yeah, sure, of course they have culture.
But "white" is not a culture, it's a social construct that exists primarily for exclusion. CF: people who are now, and previously weren't, considered white (Poles, Italians, some Jews, etc).
If whiteness exists only to delineate the in groups/out groups, the only "culture" of whiteness is that of protecting the power of those deemed to be "white".
So, yeah, I think "maintaining the culture of white people" inherently requires a concept of white supremacy.
> "White people" do not have culture.
Keep in mind, you replied to a comment that claimed that "the West" is used as another name for "White" and that's precisely how it's used in those circles.
So, to paraphrase, you deny that there's Western culture and it's part of European Culture. That is, you deny that there are cultural threads common for most of Europe and more so for Western Europe. I hope, I've said enough to convince you that you're wrong.
> But "white" is not a culture, it's a social construct that exists primarily for exclusion.
And? Using your logic, one can say that "German is not a culture, it's a social construct that exists primarily for exclusion" - if you were consistent, you'd also question the right of Germans to have a culture given that Bavaria, Saxony, etc do have cultural differences. The hair-splitting can go even further but the point should already be clear.
> So, yeah, I think "maintaining the culture of white people" inherently requires a concept of white supremacy.
So you claim that "maintaining the culture of Chinese people" inherently requires a concept of Chinese supremacy? Replace Chinese with German, Saxon, whatever... it doesn't compute.
Culture can be used as an excuse for supremacy and there are many other excuses too but fighting excuses instead of fighting supremacy can only help the supremacists.
Ok, but the people who look like me, who have historically been called "white people", do have a distinct, shared culture (or the people who aren't "white" wouldn't be able to point out how we act and what we do and our manner of speech). So what are these people called? What is their culture called? What are we renaming white-people tacos to? (and, no, tostadas are not the same thing as white-people tacos)
While I don't think my culture needs to be preserved nor do I care about being a "racial minority" (I live in a neighborhood where the majority of the people who live here are "non-white" - and, no, I didn't gentrify, it's actually just a very young neighborhood), I do want to be able to share my culture and traditions with other people. That's the whole basis of culture... sharing it with others.
And there's another thing. People who don't look like me call me "white people". What should they be calling me instead?
I think it would be a lot easier to shut white supremacists down if we had competent answers to these questions instead of thought terminating cliches like "white people don't have culture".
>"White people" do not have culture.
This is a rude statement to claim as you are denying the existence of a group of people. Just because a group can consist of other subgroups that does not mean a larger group does not exist.
>it's a social construct that exists primarily for exclusion.
Everything can be a social construct if you want to try and frame it as one and while the actual definition may be complex it is not any more complex than other groups of people like Chinese which also consist of subgroups which people may or may not consider the same Chinese as one another. To say that the term of white is used primarily for exclusion that is wrong and I think more reflects the kind of content you consume.
Interesting point and in the European context I do agree. I like to add that if people consider themself as "white", their respective culture is "white culture" though as I know only the USA has such a strong race concept in their culture in opposite to Canada, Brazil, Australia or Germany (all immigration countries)
Separate but equal right?
Because they perceive themselves as leading something bigger than a USA-only movement. Their concept of themselves has them being much more important than just affecting one nation.
It is funny that in terms of values they are not a leader but a follower of Russia. The origin and protector of all their conservative values - including fake Christianity, view on power and gender, race, minorities government structure and so on and so forth.
They crave access the authority and gravitas that they perceive as extending from the lengthy history of Western Europe, and they covet subservience to the divine rule of kings.
I think the religion difference is a lot smaller than you're giving it credit for. In Germany, most conservatives vote for an explicitly Christian political party and Good Friday is a public holiday. It's also my understanding, although I haven't researched this in detail, that German public schools are permitted or even required to offer religious instruction far beyond what would be allowed in the US.
The party is called the "Christian Democratic Party" but in practice pushes no christian policies. 47% of germans are legally atheists. Only 5% regularly visit mass.
All very true, but I don't think it contradicts my point. Perhaps the lower prevalence of religious participation in Germany makes German secularists more comfortable with religious symbols and practices.
The churches are rather pro-refugee, the majority in Germany is rather not. What do the conservatives do in a democracy? They follow the majority.
The German state is linked more to religions but rather trajectory it is becoming more secular. My example about Texas shows the different direction and shows how Germany is changing into a different direction then what MAGA people want.
When Americans describe themselves as "Christian" they are effectively talking about a different religion than the "Christian" in CDU. Americans that do fit into that same bucket use words that describe the so-called "mainline" Christianity like "Catholic" or "Lutheran."
The only thing that modern evangelical churches have in common is they read the same bible and believe Christ was resurrected, but their theology is different, their practices are different, there is no formal clergy or clerical education/scholarship, and their values typically invert from what every other Christian denomination teaches. And there are more cults than you can possibly imagine.
> It was fascinating, that the MAGA American conservatives lump the US together with Europe into "the West"
This is not “MAGA Americans” characterization. It is the outcome of 2000+ years of history culminating in the U.S. being primarily populated by European peoples and the post WWII world order, with highlights including the Marshall Plan and NATO.
Yet many Americans (not only) don't make a big attempt to understand other Western countries.
No citizen in a nuclear-armed state need learn anything about anyone else, save perhaps about other nuclear-armed states.
The Westphalian system of armed states had its legs chopped out from under it after 1945, but it's taking a while for a new way to materialize.
This is one of the reasons why the Absolute Worst Thing is a nuclear-armed state with uncertain borders. Look around the world and you'll see that the "trouble spots" we spend a lot of time looking at in the news, are those places where nuke powers get to feeling itchy and twitchy about where exactly their countries end.