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This goes the other way, too: I've seen LGBTQ friends complain about conservative signs that say, "we support all sexes, races, religions" for not "mentioning anything LGBTQ" and "even said sex instead of gender."
That is to say, it is simply tribal signaling. The reason I am annoyed by white-bashing isn't because I identify with my racial coalition. As you mention, much of my outgroup is literally caucasian.
The white people that support her simply see a neon sign that says "ingroup." You see a neon sign that says "outgroup" but is it really because they call out straight white men (ironically by not calling them out), or because calling out straight white men is the kind of things your outgroup does?
You're still focusing on the words as being vehicles for literal meaning the way a scientist would use language. What do you mean they can plausibly say they support anyone? The sign is a rather obvious signal of conservative allegiance posted in the 2020s. You don't need plausibility to get that documentary "What Is A Woman?" removed for hate speech when the signaling game is obvious to everyone except mistake theorists.
Absolutely nobody makes this distinction you're making between:
what the conservative sign did -- listing a couple of axis (axes?) and omitting other axes
what the politician did -- listing a couple of directions on an axis and omitting other directions
What good is the right's subtle dog whistles (according to you) if they still get called out on them? Think anti-Trumpers talking about how Trump dogwhistled to white supremists or the white working class during his 2016 campaign. How would you argue to someone that one side actually does it differently?
I'm not asking to explain why This Dogwhistle is different than That Dogwhistle, I'm asking to explain why we see the same calling out on both sides. (Actually, do we see the same calling out on both sides?)
Something that I feel is lost on a lot of progressives and the progressive adjacent (IE much of the motte) is that if you're hearing dog whistles you're the dog.
The typical claimed "dogwhistle" cases that I keep seeing follow a pattern:
Conservative speaker says [specific words]. Conservative audience claps.
Liberal commentator says, "By [specific words], speaker meant [bad thing by implication]! Both speaker and approving audience are bad!"
Conservative commentator responds, "What? No, by [specific words], speaker meant [facial reading of words], which is not bad, and the audience understood [facial reading of words] and agreed, which is also not bad!"
L: "No, that's just the convenient excuse, [specific words] has always meant [bad thing by implication]; [facial reading of words] is just an irrelevant distraction. Dogwhistle!"
C: "...So how is someone supposed to convey [facial reading of words], if he can't say [specific words]?"
L: "Not my problem!"
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I think that is far too simplistic. After all cats can also hear dog whistles. Because having high frequency hearing was evolutionarily advantageous for them to hear small prey. Notably the small prey can also hear them.
Someone hearing a dog whistle can mean they are the dog, but they might also be the dog's prey. If something is being used as a way to say Jew without saying Jew, then it would behoove Jews themselves to develop the ability to tell the difference themselves to know when they are being targeted. And then in a political coalition, their allies.
Someone hearing a dog whistle, can therefore be a dog, a cat or a mouse. How they react is what gives you actual information. If they bound towards it tail wagging then they are probably a dog, if they flee for cover they are a mouse. If they hiss and wander off to piss on your carpet, they are a cat.
I don't this necessarily invalidates my point, but you make both a good point and a offer a fun analogy.
Touche'
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I get what you mean but isn’t this obviously not true? Maybe I’m misunderstanding what a dogwhistle is but if I wrote on here “the rootless cosmopolitan bankers are conspiring against white christians” everyone would understand it’s an antisemitic dogwhistle. If I said “no I’m just referring to the literal bankers guys, YOU’RE the antisemite for thinking bankers = jews!” nobody would/should believe that
Or maybe the antisemites actually mean "rootless cosmopolitan bankers" and just think they're identical with jews.
Q: "Why don't you just say jews, if you clearly mean it?"
A(ntisemite): "I don't specifically mean jews. Well, obviously they are jews, but if they weren't that wouldn't change anything, and if jews weren't attacking white christians I wouldn't have a problem with them. So I'm talking about the actual core of the issue."
But this also means one could complain about ruthless cosmopolitans without identifying them with jews - the entire position works without any reference to jews.
So we can't actually know a priori whether a given mention of "ruthless cosmopolitans" refers to jews.
And if you keep insisting "obviously it has to mean jews" it starts sounding a lot like "rootless cosmopolitans obviously are jews", and at this point you're reinforcing the narrative you're supposedly attacking.
It's like the old joke about the man who gets arrested after saying "Nicholas is an idiot" in Moscow, and when the defends himself claiming he meant a different Nicholas, not the beloved Tsar, the police responds with "Liar! When you talk about an idiot, you can only mean the Tsar!"
At the very least the connection "rootless cosmopolitans=jews" is embedded in your worldview, which is a dangerous situation, and the more you talk about and say "Please join me in fighting the popular perception that everyone from Comoros is a flaming gay", the more you're spreading the malicious meme.
So people who don't have this connection in their worldview, and don't want it to, become increasingly suspicious, while the actual antisemites are secretly gloating.
You can't very well fight against the perception that comorans are gay while calling "Man, Comorans are weird" a homophobic dogwhistle.
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There is still the following conundrum--let's say there is a speaker who believes two things:
"The rootless cosmopolitan bankers are conspiring against white Christians" is a statement that is literally true, ignoring subtext.
Individual Jews may be inside or outside the definition of "rootless cosmopolitan bankers" on a case-by-case basis; he doesn't care.
This speaker simultaneously believes both 1) and 2), and would like to express that thought reasonably concisely. How?
(As a side note, I was already aware of the anti-Semitic history of the "rootless cosmopolitan" phrase, but I also know of people that fit the facial definition. @HlynkaCG mentioned "the Davos set;" I think some of them have referred to themselves as "citizens of the world.")
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As @themottealt9000 said, I feel like your response here kind of illustrates my point.
You're associating "rootless cosmopolitan bankers" with a racial phenotype because you (and everyone else in your secular progressive bubble) are predisposed to frame things in terms of race. In short you can hear the racist dog-whistle because racism (IE judging people on the basis of race) is an integral component of your worldview. You're the dog.
Meanwhile outside that bubble "rootless cosmopolitan bankers" is simply an accurate description of "the Davos set" and their various allies, cheerleaders, and hangers on.
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It does sound like you're misunderstanding what a dogwhistle is. If everyone would understand that it means something else, then, by definition, it cannot be a dogwhistle.
Of course, imperfect dogwhistles can exist, as can dogwhistles that no longer work due to information spread (at which point it is no longer a dogwhistle).
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I mean, I did literally just parse that as "PMC types" before I caught the point you were making.
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I think you just proved his point... First im not sure Ive seen "bankers" called out on the right, typically it is elites, globalists, big tech, etc. Calling out bankers and financial institutions is more left coded in my experience.
Second, most on the right tend to be more pro Isreal and find more in common with religious jews than with blue tribe.
I mean shit, how many times has Ben Shapiro been labeled a literal nazi by the left?
Frankly someone claiming another party's innocuous statements are "dog whistles" indicates that the claimant refuses to extend any charitability to the other party and is defacto acting in bad faith. They are merely searching for an excuse to hate the outgroup.
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