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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   30616 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 22, 2025

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So, Kamala Harris has her book tour with the election retrospective. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it blames other people for a few things. But what drew some attention is that apparently some of the digs at fellow Democrats were notable, actually giving some the impression that she must be retiring from politics, though she's since tried to unburn some bridges.

What's drawing possibly the most attention is her description of the VP selection process. She said Josh Shapiro was too ambitious and had started for asking details about the VP's residence. She said that Tim Walz was actually her second choice, which is a bit hurtful if you're Tim. Eyebrows have been raised at this, but even more so at her reason for not choosing her first choice, who was Pete Buttigieg - literally described as the "ideal partner", if not for this one flaw, she says.

He's gay.

"We were already asking a lot of America: to accept a woman, a Black woman, a Black woman married to a Jewish man. Part of me wanted to say, Screw it, let's just do it. But knowing what was at stake, it was too big of a risk. And I think Pete also knew that -- to our mutual sadness." (book excerpt per the Atlantic)

It did not really go over well. Buttigieg himself said he wished she had more faith in Americans. She was confronted about it by Maddow recently, here's a clip, asking her to elaborate, as it's "hard to hear."

"No, no, no, that's not what I said. That - that's that he couldn't be on the ticket because he is gay. My point is, as I write in the book, is that I was clear that in 107 days, in one of the most hotly contested elections for president of the United States against someone like Donald Trump, who knows no floor, to be a black woman running for president of the United States, and as a vice presidential running mate, a gay man. With the stakes being so high, it made me very sad, but I also realized it would be a real risk. No matter how - you know, I've been an advocate and an ally of of the LGBT community my entire life, so it wasn't about, it wasn't about - so it wasn't about any any prejudice on my part, but that we had such a short, we had such a short period of time. And the stakes were so high. I think Pete is a phenomenal, phenomenal public servant. And I think America is and would be ready for that. But when I had to make that decision with two weeks to go. You know, and maybe I was being too cautious, you know, I'll let our friends, we should all talk about that, maybe I was, but that's the decision I made - and I'm and I - as with everything else in the book and being very candid about that. Yeah. With a great deal of sadness about also the fact that it might have been a risk. (ed: Maddow's interjections removed. Maddow then just goes on and asks about running in 2028, response "that's not a focus right now")

I saw one twitter user summarize her answer as: "I didn’t not choose Pete because he was gay… I didn’t choose him because he is gay and I had 107 days."

This raises a number of questions. Was it right to be tactical like that? Was she correct about the tactics? Was it particularly absurd to say it out loud? Was this just an excuse, and there was some other reason? Is it hypocrisy by Harris? Is her point about having less time to run a campaign cope, or on some level a legitimate objection that such a short campaign must by nature adhere to different rules and strategies?

On the one hand I can see it. It was a short campaign, and the overarching philosophy was to play it safe. In retrospect, probably wrong. (And also an I told you so moment for me). In that light Harris is being perfectly consistent. On the other hand Kamala herself acknowledges that her own identity was potentially a barrier, is the concept of 'too much diversity to handle' a real thing, much less from those on the left? It is true that even Obama had his doubters about whether his campaign was doomed because of racism. Personally I don't buy that, I don't think it made much of a difference, but some people do think about it and still do think along the same lines. The flipside of that is also true, however: say she names Pete, would any alleged homophobia backfire onto Trump and his team, would it supercharge identity politics within the base, or is it a non-issue altogether?

My honest opinion? Again, like Obama: I don't think him being gay would matter. He's a great communicator, and would have been an asset. Although, he would need something of substance to explain, so it's not a full slam dunk, and I don't think it swings the election unless Pete gets to tack on his own new policies.

(There's other stuff to say about the memoir but I'll leave that for a different top-level post if people want to get into it.)

I think a gay candidate could win a presidential election and I think a woman, including a black woman, could too.

I feel strongly, though, that it’s a question of type. A woman president could be maiden, mother or crone (there are examples of all three winning elections in recent history), but she must across as kind, at least to her allies, and wise. Kamala seemed kind enough, but not wise, and Hillary did not seem kind.

Oprah would win a presidential election for the Democrats. A gay man in the Scott Bessent / Tim Cook mould (soft-spoken but assertive, not necessarily ultra-masculine but not really camp) could win, probably for both the Democrats and the Republicans at this time. I think a gay black man would struggle, although it isn’t impossible. I don’t think a lesbian could win.

Like others I am struggling to see the "Kind" in Kamala's persona. This is colored by race and gender, but my impression was that she genuinely hates white men and was incredibly selfish.

my impression was that she genuinely hates white men

I loathe Kamala as much as anyone here and have said so many times, but this seems like an odd accusation given that she’s married to a white man.

It is unfortunately common for people to hate a group but still have friends/lovers/spouses in the group. There are certain race and gender combinations I like less than others but I wouldn't hesitate to marry the right person for any reason.

That gets into the whole "Are Jews White?" debate. Has Doug expressed a view?

It's basically only on places like the Motte that anyone considers American Jews non-white.

I'd disagree, by pointing to two Jewish employees as Stanford who objected to being lumped into the "white" group by the DEI program. From Inside Higher Ed:

Two Jewish employees of Stanford University’s Counseling & Psychological Services (CAPS) division filed federal and state complaints alleging a hostile environment for Jewish employees in a diversity, equity and inclusion program created internally for CAPS staff.

…

“There was a blind spot in this DEI program when it came to Jewish identity,” Lewin said. “It erased Jewish identity. There was no space for these Jewish employees to share their lived experience, to raise their concerns about anti-Semitism. When they tried, they were attacked.”

…

The complaints allege that “the CAPS DEI program engages in intentional racial segregation through race-based affinity groups” and it “relies upon racial and ethnic stereotyping and scapegoating by describing all Jews as white or white-passing and therefore complicit in anti-Black racism.”

According to the complainants, CAPS staff were divided into two race-based discussion groups who met separately as part of the DEI program -- a “whiteness accountability” group and a separate group for people of color.

Albucher’s and Levin’s respective complaints allege that Jewish staff were “pressured to attend the DEI program’s racially segregated ‘whiteness accountability’ affinity group, which was created for ‘staff who hold privilege via white identity’ and ‘who are white identified, may be newly grappling with or realizing their white identity, or identify as or are perceived as white presenting or passing (aka seen as white by others even though you hold other identities).’”

“The DEI committee has also endorsed the narrative that Jews are connected to white supremacy, advancing anti-Semitic tropes concerning Jewish power, conspiracy and control,” the respective complaints allege. “By endorsing an anti-Semitic narrative that designates Jews collectively as ‘oppressors’ and responsible for systemic racism, while simultaneously denying the uniqueness of Jewish ancestral identity, the DEI committee fosters anti-Jewish sentiment and encourages hostility toward Jews (including Dr. Albucher and Ms. Levin).”

AFAIK it's a pretty minority position among American Jews to consider themselves non-white, and in practice, has largely the same impact as badly-passing trans women: the world continues to view them as men, regardless of how they self-identify.

In an American context, Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews are white, have always been white, and have never been considered anything other than white. One silver lining of America having so many laws throughout its history clearly delineating who counts as white and who doesn’t (which was relevant for determining things like who got to marry whom, who got access to which parts of public infrastructure, and even at times who was considered for citizenship) is that we can see exactly who counted as white and who didn’t! In the South, for example, there is a very long history of Jewish businessmen and slave traders, as well as Jewish politicians (such as Judah P. Benjamin, a member of the Confederate States Cabinet) which could not have been the case in such a racially-stratified society if those men were not universally recognized as white!

I don't think I've ever seen being married to [x] as being genuinely interpreted as evidence against hatred against [x]. Because of limitless ability for people to practice cognitive dissonance and compartmentalization, and also because "hatred against [x]" never literally means "hatred against each and every last individual who belongs to [x] category, without one single exception even theoretically possible" (otherwise, the amount of accusations of "hatred against [x]" would drop by several orders of magnitude lower than it is now). In practice, one common trope is "one of the good ones," where "hatred against [x]" actually describes a bigoted negative affect one attaches to individuals belonging to [x] category, and "one of the good ones" is someone for whom whatever negative bigoted beliefs they have about [x] either doesn't exist or exists in small enough amounts to be overcome by their positive attributes.

I don't think I've ever seen being married to [x] as being genuinely interpreted as evidence against hatred against [x].

Sure you have. In fact it seems like a very strong piece of evidence against hatred.

You’re repeating a lot of progressive psychobabble, but the on-the-ground reality is that in the vast majority of cases, an individual who is motivated by a generalized hatred of a particular group is very unlikely to marry a member of that group. This is highly intuitive because of what marriage usually entails. You are not just marrying an atomized individual; you are marrying into a family, a social sphere, an inherited community, etc. By marrying a (Jewish) white man, Kamala committed to spending the next decades of her life surrounded by his white in-laws, his white friends, his white children from a previous marriage, the mostly white people who are part of whatever hobbies and social spaces he inhabits, etc.

Presumably Kamala Harris was not facing the binary choice of A) marry Doug Emhoff or B) die alone. She could have had her pick of plenty of well-placed non-white men. The fact that she chose Emhoff, knowing that by doing so she’d be inviting a large number of white men to become intimately involved with her life, is a pretty strong indicator that she does not in fact hate white men, does not want to limit the number of white men in her life, etc.

You're forgetting a critical point: white self hatred is far more widespread than for any other group.

White male and non-white female relationships are absolutely plagued with this dynamic. The wide can rail about ytppl as much as she wants. If Doug's family is a bunch of California leftists, nobody's going to even argue.

Nothing in your comment indicates that people actually genuinely believe the argument you're making, over the ones I pointed out. I don't doubt that somewhere, someone likely had a genuine reaction of "he's married to [x], therefore the likelihood that he has hatred for [x] is lower," if only for Bayesian reasons. But, I'll reiterate, I've never actually observed this happening anywhere. By my observation, people consider it exactly as discredited as the "My best friend is black/gay/trans/etc." explanation for why someone isn't racist/homophobic/transphobic/etc. in basically exactly the same ways (note that some people will say that this is discredited because it's a lie - this person's best friend actually isn't black/gay/trans/etc. - this is one form of discrediting it, but the more common one is that presuming that that statement were true, it still says nothing about whether or not that person has hatred for [x]). Because "hatred" is such a loose term that can encompass a near limitless range of behaviors and attitudes.

But, I'll reiterate, I've never actually observed this happening anywhere.

You are observing it right now, in this very conversation. And in fact you have observed it many times; the entire reason that progressives had to invent this galaxy-brain contrarian psychobabble you’re regurgitating is because so many normal people intuitively recognized that someone who hates X is actually pretty unlikely to form a long-term intimate relationship with an X. This view has not been “discredited”. It remains true, and you have let Social Science™️ enjoyers gaslight you into believing that “Oh, everyone knows that’s been discredited.” It has not! The contrarian critical theory take is actually just wrong!

Alright, fair enough. If you're saying you genuinely buy this argument and genuinely don't consider it discredited, then I have no grounds with which to claim that you are wrong. But, honestly, none of this is galaxy-brain contrarian psychobabble. The ability of humans to compartmentalize apparently-contradictory views is something that has been observed long before anyone ever came up with modern critical theory.

More to the point, the word "hatred" when used to describe someone like Harris "hating white men" is clearly meant to invoke the same kind of meaning as when someone claims that someone like Trump "hates women" or someone like Charlie Kirk "hated gay people." It's perfectly reasonable to complain that this re-definition of "hatred" in order to keep the negative affect and connotations while expanding its scope to include entirely loving and empathetic behaviors towards someone is dishonest. I consider that as a non-discredited way of arguing against accusations of hatred: my behavior only counts as hatred under your deranged, stupid re-definition of hatred, and I don't respect your deranged, stupid re-definition. But I do consider the argument that "this other behavior I engage is inconsistent with someone who hates [x]" as fully discredited, because it's neither engaging with the actual accusation nor engaging with the reality of cognitive dissonance.

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But, I'll reiterate, I've never actually observed this happening anywhere.

Literally the only place I don't see it happening is in progressive strongholds like Reddit and so on. Most people, in my experience, assume that you don't hate (insert group here) if you freely choose to hang out all the time with a member of that group. Which is eminently sensible. The progressive argument for how someone can hate black people while being married to a black person is a terrible argument that doesn't align at all with how people actually behave.

She's married to a white man. I could believe she's indifferent to prejudice suffered by white men, but outright hatred seems a bit extreme.

Isn't there an old(?) joke about "Not asking a white supremacist the race of their significant other."

I've got no idea, I'll take your word for it.

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