Steve Bannon at the Oxford Union

[iNow]

In fairness, it’s not like we have one lone data point on which to evaluate Bannon. We have more than one talk he gave once one time.

There is a whole portfolio of work out there from Bannon spanning decades, evident priorities for the media company he ran and appallingly consistent story themes, speeches he wrote for politicians, and scores of other data that informs the conclusion here... the conclusion that he’s hardly some champion or poster boy for post-racialism.

This discussion isn’t occurring in a vacuum, Alex... or, at least it shouldn’t be. 

Edited November 29, 2018 by iNow

[Phi for All]

12 hours ago, Alex_Krycek said:

You put that line in quotes as if I actually wrote that, when in fact I never made such a statement, nor did Bannon. 

I think you're being a tad emotional about this, Alex. It was VERY clear (at least to me) that John Cuthber was using quotes because he was writing his his analogy as if spoken, not as a direct quote from anyone. I can appreciate that it feels weird for a self-proclaimed liberal to defend someone with a record like Bannon, but I think you're also feeling the profound effect of a professional public speaker who is very good at persuasion.

[Alex_Krycek]

8 hours ago, Phi for All said:

I think you're being a tad emotional about this, Alex. It was VERY clear (at least to me) that John Cuthber was using quotes because he was writing his his analogy as if spoken, not as a direct quote from anyone.

Not at all.  From my perspective, the way Cuthber structured that sentence seemed to imply that I made such a comment.  I was simply pointing out that I didn't.  My view is that Cuthber is choosing to make assumptions that aren't based in fact - a leap too far, if you will.

8 hours ago, Phi for All said:

I can appreciate that it feels weird for a self-proclaimed liberal to defend someone with a record like Bannon, but I think you're also feeling the profound effect of a professional public speaker who is very good at persuasion.

I think you're reading into things a little too much.  I find Bannon's point of view interesting, yes, considering the information that I have so far been told about him as a liberal, and the juxtaposition of that framing with the actual content of his speech, which was neither racist nor extremist, but actually very sobering and provocative.  I can definitely understand after hearing what he actually talks about why someone like Bannon would be perceived as a threat to the system, someone who should be discredited at all costs, by the power brokers of our society (namely big banks, multi-national corporations, government bureaucrats, etc).  Perhaps labeling him a racist is the best way to do that.  I commend the Oxford Union for hosting such a controversial figure and letting the public decide for itself regarding the merits of his argument.   

[MigL]

Most people have varying views on a lot of subjects.

S Bannon has some interesting viewpoints, and I can consider just the ones I favor or agree with.
I don't need to call him a racist neo-con.
Just like I can consider A Gore's views on climate change ( the science ) and disregard the hyperbole.
I don't need to call him a bleeding-heart liberal pinko ( is my Archie Bunker showing ? )
Or I can consider the valid points made in the Bible about the way to treat your fellow man, and disregard the flights of fancy.
I don't need to call it a mythology indoctrination manual.

[iNow]

31 minutes ago, Alex_Krycek said:

I commend the Oxford Union for hosting such a controversial figure and letting the public decide for itself regarding the merits of his argument.   

Me too. I have no patience for the way so many students at universities in recent years are shouting down speakers and forcing their schools to dis-invite them.

We don't kill bad ideas with silence. We kill bad ideas with better ideas.

[MigL]

Almost happened in Canada about a month ago.

[CharonY]

1 hour ago, iNow said:

Me too. I have no patience for the way so many students at universities in recent years are shouting down speakers and forcing their schools to dis-invite them.

We don't kill bad ideas with silence. We kill bad ideas with better ideas.

I agree with the over notion, though I will add the caveat that there is a good point of not giving certain folks a platform. The main arguments are that a) in public spaces populist appeal and personal charisma tend to have more sway on opinion than arguments and b) it can lead to normalization of radical views, if promoted sufficiently. Personally I am not sure about how to navigate this situation. At minimum I probably would like to see a discussion of the involved party pro and con the invitation of a given person rather than a reflexive protest.

With regard to Bannon there are several thing of note. It is difficult to characterize anybody accurately what folks say, provided they are at least a little bit guarded. So it is possible that Bannon is just an anti-establishment populist with an unknown personal conviction. It is also possible that all his actions are strategic with no personal conviction at all. That being said, there are several elements of note. As already mentioned, under his leadership Breitbart turned further toward what he refers to as alt-right with distinct racial, anti-semitic and white supremacist undertones. Perhaps it is unfair to call Bannon racist, but hes is clearly comfortable in that environment. Likewise, in Europe he supported far right movements. If not a racist, he actively promotes far-right politics which are in fact centered on or at least adjacent to racism. His views also have a strong nativist streak with a sense that immigrants are a threat to Western civiization (and was instrumental in implementing the travel ban).

Rather obviously he seems to have an agenda, but one that he does not clearly elaborate. The dangerous bit is that he uses tidbits that in itself are easy to agree on and uses it strategically to further his strategic interests. He described his strategy to win over disaffected white men as he realized that they felt threatened by identity politics (that is, any identity that does not include them). So again, he may be not a white nationalist (well, he actually considers him a nationalist), but he clearly instrumentalists folks that either are or can be swayed to it. In some ways that worries me far more than the Tiki-torch carrying crowd as, regardless of his own conviction, he can and wants to act as an multiplier for them.

[iNow]

2 hours ago, CharonY said:

that there is a good point of not giving certain folks a platform. The main arguments are that a) in public spaces populist appeal and personal charisma tend to have more sway on opinion than arguments and b) it can lead to normalization of radical views, if promoted sufficiently. Personally I am not sure about how to navigate this situation.

You and me, both. It's not easy to figure out best path here.

In much the same way, I support free speech and want to battle back bad ideas with good ones, yet in parallel don't want the Westboro Baptist Church protesting at funerals about god hating fags or Nazis being allowed to host rallies in front of synagogues.

There's a line to be drawn somewhere beyond yelling fire in a crowded theater. The placement of that line, however, is extremely dynamic between one situation and the next, and also from one person to another.

2 hours ago, CharonY said:

At minimum I probably would like to see a discussion of the involved party pro and con the invitation of a given person rather than a reflexive protest.

Agreed

[John Cuthber]

19 hours ago, Alex_Krycek said:

You live in England.  How do you know what the race situation is really like in the United States?

Because it's impossible for stuff like the BLM protests to happen if the racism isn't actually major.
And then there's stuff like racial data on unemployment, death rates, poverty,  infant mortality and so on.

It's really not hard to show that there's a major problem there.
 

19 hours ago, Alex_Krycek said:

You put that line in quotes as if I actually wrote that,

You understood the use of quotes earlier. How come you forgot?
 

On 11/27/2018 at 9:48 PM, John Cuthber said:

If he had said " I think all the black guys complaining about racism are liars" would people notice the racism there?
How different is it from what he did say?
 

19 hours ago, Alex_Krycek said:

You live in England.  How do you know what the race situation is really like in the United States?

Because it's impossible for stuff like the BLM protests to happen if the racism isn't actually major.
And then there's stuff like racial data on unemployment, death rates, poverty,  infant mortality and so on.

It's really not hard to show that there's a major problem there.
 

 

 

19 hours ago, Alex_Krycek said:

Further, to suggest that because a white person doesn't think race is a major problem means they are also calling black people liars is a racist statement in itself.  You're assuming some kind of malevolent intent on the part of the person who doesn't immediately agree with your assumptions.

Actually I did say there was another possible reason for not recognising that there was a problem.

 

On 11/27/2018 at 9:48 PM, John Cuthber said:

Because he's either racist or dimwitted, and I think we can rule out the second option.

19 hours ago, Alex_Krycek said:

If you were to poll a white person in those neighborhoods and ask them if racism is "a major problem" and that person said "no", they would be answering truthfully within the realm of their own experience. 

Right up to the point where you notice context.
In one case the context is "in my neighbourhood" and the other is " I'm involved in national politics; if I only focus on my  neighbourhood, I'm failing to do my job."
 

Edited November 29, 2018 by John Cuthber

[CharonY]

1 hour ago, iNow said:

In much the same way, I support free speech and want to battle back bad ideas with good ones, yet in parallel don't want the Westboro Baptist Church protesting at funerals about god hating fags or Nazis being allowed to host rallies in front of synagogues.

I admit, I have been flip flopping on this issue throughout my life. As a teen I was convinced that there are absolute things (like Nazi rallies) that should be forbidden. As a young adult, I was more of an advocate of the marketplace of idea things. But at some point I had the inkling that if we take the really bad ideas seriously, even if only to dismantle them, we actually do give it publicity and power. The latter thought was mostly driven on research how emotions, rather than fact sway emotions. The rise of populism but also radicalism seems to support that, and especially with the spread of new means of communication. So right now I simply do not see a good answer.

Or to take a turn of your phrase, I am just not convinced anymore that bad ideas ever stay dead.

[iNow]

2 minutes ago, CharonY said:

if we take the really bad ideas seriously, even if only to dismantle them, we actually do give it publicity and power

Indeed, and we're facing an extremely similar problem more broadly now when trying to rebut obvious lies. It's off topic here, but this article covers the idea I'm trying to convey.

Summarized, don't repeat the lie. Instead emphasize the truth.

https://medium.com/berkman-klein-center/how-to-refute-a-lie-bb315d3b93fc

Quote

But there is one big drawback to fact-checking and lie-correcting. The more often a lie is repeated, even in the context of debunking it, the more believable it becomes. Familiarity provides the impression of truth. Furthermore, false statements, even when we know they are false, influence our emotional response to people and events.

 

[geordief]

1 hour ago, iNow said:

Indeed, and we're facing an extremely similar problem more broadly now when trying to rebut obvious lies. It's off topic here, but this article covers the idea I'm trying to convey.

Summarized, don't repeat the lie. Instead emphasize the truth.

https://medium.com/berkman-klein-center/how-to-refute-a-lie-bb315d3b93fc

 

Fact checking and lie detecting don't have to be overdone.They should be used like (imperfect)  reference books  rather than an ongoing commentary.

 

But it seems good policy not to over repeat the lie and rather to emphasise the truth.

I wonder where the repetition of the truism that DT's lies are now up in the thousands and that he can reasonably be  called a "stranger to the truth"  fits into all that....can that too be overstated?

Will his supporters buy into his supposed struggles against what they might prefer to see as an oversimplified  kind of truth? (It ain't what you say ;It's the way that you say it)

[iNow]

Good questions, but I’m hesitant to let yet another thread become focused upon and centered around the nefarious DJ-T

[Raider5678]

On 11/27/2018 at 2:21 PM, Alex_Krycek said:

The article clearly has a strong viewpoint against Bannon, and that's fair enough.  I know Mother Jones is a fairly liberal publication.   As far as direct quotes from Bannon himself proving his racist views, the article has none.  It's more or less just conjecture and "explanations" from convenient third parties. 

On 11/27/2018 at 2:20 PM, Ten oz said:

Don't be ridiculous. You can't expect them to cite their sources to be taken seriously, that's a ridiculous idea.

On 11/27/2018 at 11:33 AM, Alex_Krycek said:

The man who we were all told is a racist monster

Being labeled as racist is objective, mainly because there is no clear-cut thing that defines someone as racist.

Obviously, if you run around advocating the extermination of all nonwhites, you're considered racist. 

But I also know a large number of people who openly say that everyone who voted for Donald Trump is a woman-hating racists. 

Steve Bannon, at a speech, said: "Wear the label of racist as a badge of honor." Immediately it was taken out of context, just him saying that, and was used to say he's proud of being a racist. Here and about 15 other news organizations, including CNN, BBC, etc.

Then you look into it, and he's basically saying that once people call you a racist, homophobic, etc when you're talking to them, you know they have no answer to what you're actually saying. Essentially, character arguments don't make you right.

So does saying "wear the label of a racist as a badge of honor" make him racist? It's objective.

[Ten oz]

On 11/27/2018 at 2:21 PM, Alex_Krycek said:

The article clearly has a strong viewpoint against Bannon, and that's fair enough.  I know Mother Jones is a fairly liberal publication.   As far as direct quotes from Bannon himself proving his racist views, the article has none.  It's more or less just conjecture and "explanations" from convenient third parties. 

In an interview with MotherJones Steve Bannon said the following:

Quote

“Look, are there some people that are white nationalists that are attracted to some of the philosophies of the alt-right? Maybe,” he said. “Are there some people that are anti-Semitic that are attracted? Maybe. Right? Maybe some people are attracted to the alt-right that are homophobes, right? But that’s just like, there are certain elements of the progressive left and the hard left that attract certain elements.” Here

One can argue there is nothing racist in itself that Bannon admits some racists are drawn to his movement. Likewise one can argue that Bannon seeking to suppress black voters in 2016, Linked Here , can be viewed more as a shrewd move to win rather than a racist act. Then their is Bannon's The Movement which collaborates with Nationalists throughout Europe pushing anti-Immigrant and anti-Islamic policies among other things. Nothing about seeking to limit immigration is overtly racist. 

I don't think it matters whether or not Steve Bannon says individual words one can point to as racist. Actions speak louder than words. If Steve Bannon were to succeed with all his political goals  white nationalists groups would be more powerful, Black voter disenfranchisement worse, Less immigrants would be legally able to migrate, and etc. Lets forget the language Steve Bannon does or does not use and let's look at the policies he promotes. I understand there are extremes on both the left and the right. Steve Bannon was correct when he said perhaps White Nationalists, ant- Semitics, and homophobes are drawn to the right but the left has extreme elements too. The difference to me is that no portion of the extreme on the left seeks to prevent their opposition from participating in Democratic processes. The most extreme portions of the left do not seek to  limit Conservatives, Libertarians, and etc from participating (living in this country and/or voting). The extremes on the right absolutely want to limit participation. The extremes on the right want to end birthright citizenship, limit legal immigration (green cards, education visas, work visas, etc), restrict voting, and so on. One can argue it doesn't make Steve Bannon a racist but clearly his proposals seek to strip non-whites from participating in democracy. It's a serious danger in my opinion. 

Democracy seeks a level of fairness within a society by allowing people the right to cast a vote for what they want. Democracy is an attempt at promoting fairness. Democracy doesn't ensure the best outcome. Sometime the most popular ideas are the worst ideas. Democracy isn't about ensuring the best possible outcome. That is impossible. Perhaps Steve Bannon has some really good ideas. Perhaps some of his ideas are better than the ones his critics have. I don't think it matters those ideas pull society away from fairness. I am not willing to sacrifice the voices of others to some political end I prefer. Steve Bannon is. 

 

[Ten oz]

@CharonY and @iNow allowing speech and being willing to listen to views that challenge one's own beliefs is generally known to be a good thing. While good in theory I think in practice it can be exploited to monopolize a discussion. Lots of things compete for people's attention. Whether it's a soda ad on TV or an op-ed online there is a finite amount of time one's intended audience is paying attention for. Yielding that time not advantageous. 

As an Analogy lets say 2 people are debating an issue from different perspectives. One is Pro and the other is Con. They each get equal time. If Pro spends half of their time acknowledging Con's ideas where their may be common ground but Con doesn't reciprocate and takes all their time for their ideas exclusively Con's ideas winds up with 75% of all the available time. Pro probably loses that debate. More often than not the idea a person hears most becomes accepted. From a time restricted perspective both Pro and Con are better off focusing on what they have to say and avoiding each others points much as possible. 

Along the lines of finite amounts of time a University cannot host every speaker on every issue. They have a a dozen or so opportunities a year to provide their students. Many students will only attend one or two events in their whole time on campus. With so many things which can be discussed and so many new ideas which students can be exposed to I think it is a shame when Campuses host people like Milo Yiannopoulos. I understand wanting to appear tolerant but time is limited and people can always seek those voices out on social media, talk radio, cable news, and etc. Good voices shouldn't be yielding the little time they have just for the sake of optics. Granted a good voice vs bad voice is relative but the Pro vs Con analogy works both ways. Yielding the time one has with people's attention only results in less time. 

[iNow]

10 minutes ago, Ten oz said:

Along the lines of finite amounts of time a University cannot host every speaker on every issue. They have a a dozen or so opportunities a year to provide their students.

I align with the overall content and tone of your posts, though do wish to clarify I never suggested every speaker should be hosted, only that I'm disappointed with how often those who are already approved to speak get shouted down and dis-invited.

[Ten oz]

7 minutes ago, iNow said:

I align with the overall content and tone of your posts, though do wish to clarify I never suggested every speaker should be hosted, only that I'm disappointed with how often those who are already approved to speak get shouted down and dis-invited.

I didn't mean to imply you had implied anything. I was just adding my thoughts. 

[Alex_Krycek]

15 hours ago, Ten oz said:

In an interview with MotherJones Steve Bannon said the following:

One can argue there is nothing racist in itself that Bannon admits some racists are drawn to his movement. Likewise one can argue that Bannon seeking to suppress black voters in 2016, Linked Here , can be viewed more as a shrewd move to win rather than a racist act.

Yes.  It's difficult to pinpoint the motivation exactly.  As the article says: 

Although Wylie insisted that he himself did not take part in these programs, he testified to their existence.

“One of the things that provoked me to leave was discussions about ‘voter disengagement’ and the idea of targeting African Americans,” he said. “I didn’t participate on any voter suppression programs, so I can’t comment on the specifics of those programs.”

"Voter disengagement" could mean a number of things.  It could mean that they were trying to influence black voters not to support Hillary Clinton, which they largely didn't.  Both Democrats and Republicans have an interest in certain segments disengaging from the opposing party, ideally switching sides and voting for the their party instead, or just not voting at all.  This is the whole purpose of negative ads.  Contrast this with Bannon's stated strategy of wanting to convert working class blacks and hispanics to his side and its difficult to tell what they were actually doing with CA.

Quote

Then their is Bannon's The Movement which collaborates with Nationalists throughout Europe pushing anti-Immigrant and anti-Islamic policies among other things. Nothing about seeking to limit immigration is overtly racist. 

I agree.  Every country has a right to control its borders. Indeed, practically every country in the world has stringent immigration policies compared with the US.  The country that is deporting most of the Caravan at the moment is Mexico, and many Mexicans hate the influx of the asylum seekers into their country. Article here.

Mass immigration generally can't be sustained, especially for poorer countries like Hungary, which is why they are so adamant about protecting their borders.  Even the most liberal countries like Sweden are rethinking their immigration policies because of problems with migrants (who are mostly young men).

Quote

I don't think it matters whether or not Steve Bannon says individual words one can point to as racist. Actions speak louder than words. If Steve Bannon were to succeed with all his political goals  white nationalists groups would be more powerful, Black voter disenfranchisement worse, Less immigrants would be legally able to migrate, and etc. Lets forget the language Steve Bannon does or does not use and let's look at the policies he promotes.

These seem to be based on "citizenship first", not ethnicity first.  He seems to be an economic nationalist, not a white nationalist.  If you believe in the concept of a nation state and citizenship then his policies are completely logical.  He seems to support a skills based immigration system.

Quote

I understand there are extremes on both the left and the right. Steve Bannon was correct when he said perhaps White Nationalists, ant- Semitics, and homophobes are drawn to the right but the left has extreme elements too. The difference to me is that no portion of the extreme on the left seeks to prevent their opposition from participating in Democratic processes. The most extreme portions of the left do not seek to  limit Conservatives, Libertarians, and etc from participating (living in this country and/or voting). 

This is factually inaccurate.  There are many factions on the extreme left who want to shut down free speech of conservatives, denying them their constitutional rights.  They've succeeded in many cases.  This has been happening for a while now.  The far left group Antifa for example, openly promotes violence to suppress the right to free assembly and free speech of conservative groups.  The far left uses the stigma of "racist" , "bigot",  "white supremacist" etc to publicly shame speakers and remove them from the public square. They've tried to do this to Jordan Peterson, for example.  There are also many on the left who generally hate white people (or those of European descent), Christians, and openly call for the destruction of the State of Israel. 

Quote

The extremes on the right absolutely want to limit participation. The extremes on the right want to end birthright citizenship, limit legal immigration (green cards, education visas, work visas, etc), restrict voting, and so on. One can argue it doesn't make Steve Bannon a racist but clearly his proposals seek to strip non-whites from participating in democracy. It's a serious danger in my opinion. 

I see the Republicans at large trying to suppress the vote, but not Bannon.  In the Oxford Union talk he explained that he would prefer to supplant chain immigration in favor of skills based immigration. 

Quote

Democracy seeks a level of fairness within a society by allowing people the right to cast a vote for what they want. Democracy is an attempt at promoting fairness. Democracy doesn't ensure the best outcome. Sometime the most popular ideas are the worst ideas. Democracy isn't about ensuring the best possible outcome. That is impossible. Perhaps Steve Bannon has some really good ideas. Perhaps some of his ideas are better than the ones his critics have. I don't think it matters those ideas pull society away from fairness. I am not willing to sacrifice the voices of others to some political end I prefer. Steve Bannon is. 

 

His ideas seem to promote a reprioritization away from immigration and towards existing citizens. Some people interpret that as a limitation of participation, but if existing citizens are the ones who have been shut out and left behind, its actually the reverse; Bannon's approach signifies a re-engagement with those who have been disenfranchised. 

Edited December 1, 2018 by Alex_Krycek

[iNow]

7 minutes ago, Alex_Krycek said:

Bannon's approach signifies a re-engagement with those who have been disenfranchised. 

Perhaps you’re using a nonstandard definition of disenfranchisement, but I fail to see how or with which populations specifically this could possibly apply.

As this failure almost certainly resides with me, may I ask you to kindly please expand on this point and explain which populations have been disenfranchised that you feel Steve Bannon has now reengaged?

Edited December 1, 2018 by iNow

[Alex_Krycek]

7 hours ago, iNow said:

Perhaps you’re using a nonstandard definition of disenfranchisement, but I fail to see how or with which populations specifically this could possibly apply.

As this failure almost certainly resides with me, may I ask you to kindly please expand on this point and explain which populations have been disenfranchised that you feel Steve Bannon has now reengaged?

Bannon is reengaging with the poor / lower middle class segments of society who have seen their jobs shipped overseas and entire regions (such as the Rust belt) decimated.  The perception is that most Democrats are corrupt  (which they are)  and don't care about these people.  This economic insecurity was on of the main reasons why blue collar workers voted for Trump.  Blue collar workers feel they've been sold out by a corrupt elite (Clinton) who is apathetic to their plight.  It's a hidden world of poverty and desperation that those who are living comfortably don't see, where people must choose between paying the electricity bill and putting food on the table.  This excerpt sums it up:

But in the late ’90s—the beginning of the crisis period that Case and Deaton identify—the number of manufacturing jobs in the U.S. dropped dramatically. Intensified by free-trade deals such as NAFTA [SUPPORTED BY CLINTON], the hollowing-out of American industry then was much greater, in terms of the absolute number of jobs lost, than what the country experienced during its first wave of deindustrialization.    Article here.

For many people, the changes brought on by globalization has crushed any chance at a future.  This segment of society has no healthcare, no access to quality education, and no prospect of a good job - things they once had when manufacturing was vibrant and robust.  Note that in Bannon's speech to the Union he said one of his main goals was to recapture manufacturing jobs and bring them back to the US.  Hence the "Make America Great Again" mantra. 

 

 

[Raider5678]

For a self-proclaimed liberal, you sure are pretty conservative compared to the majority of people on here.

[iNow]

8 hours ago, Alex_Krycek said:

Bannon is reengaging with the poor / lower middle class segments of society who have seen their jobs shipped overseas and entire regions

Okay, thanks. Like I said, you appear to be using a nonstandard definition of disenfranchisement. I agree they were disengaged, but they were never disenfranchised.

To be clear on my pedantry:

 

dis·en·fran·chise

/ˌdisənˈfran(t)SHīz/

verb

past tense: disenfranchised; past participle: disenfranchised

1. deprive (someone) of the right to vote.

   "the law disenfranchised some 3,000 voters on the basis of a residence qualification"

* not having the right to vote, or a similar right, or having had that right taken away

 

You know who was disenfranchised, though? Women and black people, hence the sensitivity to misogyny and racism...

Edited December 1, 2018 by iNow

[John Cuthber]

50 minutes ago, iNow said:

To be clear on my pedantry:

This isn't "pedantry", this is "not causing confusion by using the wrong words".
Some Republicans' actions have disenfranchised a (thankfully) relatively small number of people from predominantly poor, non-white areas.
But that's not the same thing.

[J.C.MacSwell]

1 hour ago, iNow said:

Okay, thanks. Like I said, you appear to be using a nonstandard definition of disenfranchisement. I agree they were disengaged, but they were never disenfranchised.

To be clear on my pedantry:

 

dis·en·fran·chise

/ˌdisənˈfran(t)SHīz/

verb

past tense: disenfranchised; past participle: disenfranchised

1. deprive (someone) of the right to vote.

   "the law disenfranchised some 3,000 voters on the basis of a residence qualification"

* not having the right to vote, or a similar right, or having had that right taken away

 

You know who was disenfranchised, though? Women and black people, hence the sensitivity to misogyny and racism...

He was using the term correctly. It seems more and more common for the term to have the context of voter disenfranchisement, but the term is much broader than that.

I was surprised when you brought it up, but after you did it made me realize how much it tends to get used in political discussion with voter disenfranchisement to be the assumed meaning.

Edited December 1, 2018 by J.C.MacSwell