Why Does Everything Have to Be About Race?: 25 Arguments That Won't Go Away
Keith Boykin
Bold Type Books
Nonfiction, History/Law/Politics/Sociology
****+ (Good/Great)
DESCRIPTION: Slavery's been over for ages - why keep bringing up the past? Isn't "equal opportunity" just reverse racism against whites? Why can't we just ignore race altogether? Don't all lives matter? Every time someone mentions racial discrimination and inequality, these and more arguments inevitably pop up, shutting down discussions and derailing progress and demanding time and energy to answer questions that have quite definitively been answered innumerable times (just not the way that those who benefit from ongoing racial inequality would like). In this book, writer Keith Boykin dissects 25 common arguments that have been used to prevent real progress on issues of race, racism, and equity from history to modern times.
REVIEW: Reading this after the election of November 2024 - when a significant portion of the American public deliberately and definitively rejected progress on race (and pretty much every other front), setting the stage for a near-inevitable rapid race backwards on a scale I doubt I'll see recovered in my lifetime - puts a certain painful spin on this book, which deftly explores America's history of racial injustice and its often haphazard and temporary attempts to correct a problem of its own making. Boykin draws on history, personal experience, and current events to demonstrate how racism infiltrates every aspect of policy and life; the reason "everything has to be about race" is because there's no way for any remotely meaningful discussion on any problems facing the country today to occur without acknowledging how race has skewed America and its ostensible promise of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness since before the founding documents were drafted. It would be like trying to discuss forestry without talking about all that pesky woody plant life everyone keeps dragging into the conversation. The fact that these policies rooted in historic and ongoing racism also tangibly hurt other demographics makes it all the more urgent that they be addressed, but arguments like the ones presented here are designed to keep the topic muddled and turn those demographics against each other, tiring themselves out with explanations and infighting and semantics.
By turns informative, inspiring, and depressing, it makes for interesting reading, though I sadly can't help but suspect that a nation that hasn't apparently learned a thing in over two hundred years of existence - that apparently would rather slit its own throat and throw itself into the grasp of an avowed and proud traitor and authoritarian, potentially abandoning democracy altogether, in a pivotal election where race was very much a factor - is unlikely to ever actually address the problems of race and racism and systemic inequality without near-complete self immolation first... and maybe not even then.
You Might Also Enjoy:
How to Be an Antiracist (Ibram X. Kendi) - My Review
Born a Crime (Trevor Noah) - My Review
They Called Us Enemy (George Takei) - My Review
Showing posts with label law. Show all posts
Showing posts with label law. Show all posts
Friday, November 15, 2024
Tuesday, July 23, 2019
The Mueller Report (The Washington Post)
The Mueller Report
The Washington Post, with Rosalind S. Helderman and Matt Zapotosky
Scribner
Nonfiction, Law/Politics
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: The official public documentation of the Special Council investigation into possible foreign interference, and later attempts to cover up crimes, associated with the American 2016 presidential election, presented with footnotes and additional related material.
REVIEW: This is not the sort of material I regularly read, but some documents are too important to ignore. The Mueller report is one of them.
The rating takes into account the overall thoroughness of the investigation, which was made under difficult (and sometimes hostile) circumstances. Though dense and thick with names and associations, not to mention copious legalese (particularly in the sections on whether or not there is any standing to even question Presidential authority and conduct), the gist of matters is not difficult to ascertain. Oddly enough, it's post-election conduct that raises the most red flags and is the most damning; proving knowledge of Russian interference pre-election is much more difficult, given the layers of contacts and general insulation of the candidate from acting individuals. Couple that with an official White House stance that facts are malleable (the infamous stance that the president has a right to "alternative facts" being just one example) and that certain people are above the law (in direct violation of Constitutional intent, that all powers should be checked and balance and should, first and foremost, exercise their authority for the good of the American people and not the self), plus the numerous convictions already on record related to these events, and there's simply far too much smoke for there not to be a fire somewhere, even if it's not the one the Special Council initially investigated. The process itself appears to have been undertaken with utmost impartiality.
The ultimate picture is grim indeed, a tangled web that the best conspiracy thriller authors would hesitate to posit, yet backed up by testimony and evidence as actual occurrences. Failure to act on these findings paints an even grimmer picture of the state of our nation, as partisan wrangling and posturing appears to take precedent over actually reading the gathered evidence. As the last lines state in words that may well go down in history: "Accordingly, while this report does not conclude that the president committed a crime, neither does it exonerate him." This is not an exoneration by any means, but while not every avenue investigated here resulted in suspect findings, those who have benefited from these events - regardless of proof of personal knowledge of shadiness or active wrongdoing - appear to have successfully placed themselves beyond reach of further investigation, let alone trial.
You Might Also Enjoy:
The Prince (Niccolo Machiavelli) - My Review
The Rights of Man (Thomas Paine) - My Review
What Unites Us (Dan Rather) - My Review
The Washington Post, with Rosalind S. Helderman and Matt Zapotosky
Scribner
Nonfiction, Law/Politics
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: The official public documentation of the Special Council investigation into possible foreign interference, and later attempts to cover up crimes, associated with the American 2016 presidential election, presented with footnotes and additional related material.
REVIEW: This is not the sort of material I regularly read, but some documents are too important to ignore. The Mueller report is one of them.
The rating takes into account the overall thoroughness of the investigation, which was made under difficult (and sometimes hostile) circumstances. Though dense and thick with names and associations, not to mention copious legalese (particularly in the sections on whether or not there is any standing to even question Presidential authority and conduct), the gist of matters is not difficult to ascertain. Oddly enough, it's post-election conduct that raises the most red flags and is the most damning; proving knowledge of Russian interference pre-election is much more difficult, given the layers of contacts and general insulation of the candidate from acting individuals. Couple that with an official White House stance that facts are malleable (the infamous stance that the president has a right to "alternative facts" being just one example) and that certain people are above the law (in direct violation of Constitutional intent, that all powers should be checked and balance and should, first and foremost, exercise their authority for the good of the American people and not the self), plus the numerous convictions already on record related to these events, and there's simply far too much smoke for there not to be a fire somewhere, even if it's not the one the Special Council initially investigated. The process itself appears to have been undertaken with utmost impartiality.
The ultimate picture is grim indeed, a tangled web that the best conspiracy thriller authors would hesitate to posit, yet backed up by testimony and evidence as actual occurrences. Failure to act on these findings paints an even grimmer picture of the state of our nation, as partisan wrangling and posturing appears to take precedent over actually reading the gathered evidence. As the last lines state in words that may well go down in history: "Accordingly, while this report does not conclude that the president committed a crime, neither does it exonerate him." This is not an exoneration by any means, but while not every avenue investigated here resulted in suspect findings, those who have benefited from these events - regardless of proof of personal knowledge of shadiness or active wrongdoing - appear to have successfully placed themselves beyond reach of further investigation, let alone trial.
You Might Also Enjoy:
The Prince (Niccolo Machiavelli) - My Review
The Rights of Man (Thomas Paine) - My Review
What Unites Us (Dan Rather) - My Review
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