Elite Capture: Philosopher Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò on How the Powerful Took Over Identity Politics 

My thoughts exactly. TY

Bingo

You are a thinker and exactly right! How do we celebrate HJ when Black people do not have safe drinking water? What year is this again?

@Forrest How do people walk and chew bubble gum at the same time? Who's gonna stop what they're doing until something unrelated is fixed? People with a unrealistic view outside of reality...that's who would do something so unproductive.

Cut the BS.

That guy was on a panel hosted by a CIA front 3 days ago. So yeah, CIA anti capitalism and Black Power.

And can you explain why you’re still conducting an interview from your bedroom/ bathroom?

❤ How do the priming patterns not jump out at everyone? I'm always confused about how people can't see. I like what he says about one obstacle being how we communicate. Habermas and his ideal speech situations come to mind. Might be a local community 3rd space goal to create spaces for ideal political speech. Physically is better in my mind, local, but could be online...

Oh my gosh... This almost feels like real conversation...

I also agree with him that we need to focus on building parallel societal structures, because without that you just get another narc that comes along and steers everyone into ruin for personal gain. These 3rd places to provide for actual dialogue could literally be the starting points of these parallel structures in America. Maybe?

The less centralized these groups are the better, local, focused on ideal speech toward concrete local goals.

no politics, but class politics!

The very fact that they deny the importance of class in politics proves that these bourgeois cosplayers are not left wing.

Yet Amy, more and more , has become mired and enthralled by Identity politics . She swooned over O'Bama's inauguration. She is fooled by third wave , bougie antiracism which is so evacuated of a class analysis.

I noticed that 5:20PM on 9/11

Notice in high school local media report ABC NBC reported the same story and ABC had left out a critical point that changed the whole story and I was like they both were at the same news conference why did you leave out this critical point in order to shift the narrative

This. Why should we trust elite institutions to put forward ideological narratives when there existence depends on pandering to wealthy donors who have an imperative to keep us divided. If you think they're just trying to immortalize their name on the side of the building your deluded. What threatens them more? Inclusion, or intersectionalism. We have a left looking to compelling speech and censoring criticism and critical thinking like it's a good idea. These same tools will be used against all of us.

Racism, sexism, and every other ism is just the media and the wealthy not wanting to talk about the real ism, classism.

he ain't our brother

As an African American, he is my brother..

@@tuckerbugeater yes he is

@@tuckerbugeater STFU 🙄😏

@Deborah Tucker That term is being removed. It's been used as a tool of identity politics.

BLM is a fraud anyway, the founder uses most of that money to get diamond teeth and a mega mansion and none of that money ever goes to help low income people. Ppl are so dumb

@@sew_gal7340 ...please be clear in your charge of fraud; the Org itself, individual leader/s or member/s, or the entire movement using the phrase BLM? These are not all one in the same (also edited my post to clarify).

@@Krazie-Ivan I'm talking about the founders , you can find more info on this if you looked it up, it was a big thing last year.

@@sew_gal7340 ...read & heard about it via NPR & AP, but also saw very right-wing people attempt to blow it out of proportion in-effort to detract from the movement with disingenuous half-truths, assumptions, & blame-shift. It's disappointing of an/few individual/s to make poor decisions like this, for sure, & i think the funds should be used to help people in a more concise way. But that could be said & handled w/o divisively using it to dismiss the issue of structural & systemic racism, *if* someone's motives aren't being applied so obviously. Strawman & whataboutism aren't good-faith debate tactics. Just as not all cops are bad... a singular poor decision does not change the righteousness of the broader BLM cause.

@@Krazie-Ivan That's fine, i dont subscribe to either side,.... i just care about the truth. i think blm is just a distraction for politicians to gain points and have something to harp about then do absolutely nothing to help lower income families (who matter). Having a perspective outside of your echo chamber helps a lot to discern the facts from the nonsense, its one of the only reasons why i watch democracy now for a left perspective and most other independent news source for conservative points of view. i feel its important to see both sides (just my opinion)

could you elaborate on the semiotics? I'm intrigued! thanks!

@@bishaldey5339 Yes. Very superficially...the symbology of the letter i. What i as a letter entails linguistically.

🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

Indeed, making society more and more unequal, where now you have jobs recruiting people from a certain 'gender' or 'ethnicity' ONLY (with everyone else excluded REGARDLESS of skills, knowledge, and expertise). Is this 'measure' really going to make society more 'equal' ... It is mind-blowing that the largest 'minority' in society (and growing) that is, older individuals, receive no recognition, media attention, and are basically the very last in the pecking order. How about having a frank conversation about ageism or MERITOCRACY? Thank you for reading; apologies that I will have no time to respond/reply.

Agreed, and I think those authors do a better job at looking at history, this isn't a new phenomenon

Associate Professor is the rank one gets with tenure. The level before tenure is Assistant Professor. The final rank is just Professor.

@@arsphoenix1822 Thank you.

Thanks. Was unaware of rev left radio. I have a bunch of podcasts to catch up with.

@@bpalpha you’re in for a great time!!! There’s some real gems out there!!!

Great pod

What exactly do you mean? Can you be more specific?

@@LowestofheDead I guess it's more of an impression than anything, so it's difficult to say exactly what I mean. I clicked on this interview out of curiosity. I wanted to see if the interview format might clear his position up a little. Unfortunately, Taiwo seemed nervous and I don't think he managed to clarify anything. So I can only speak about the talk he gave at the university. But his position, it seems, is that the elite trying to diversify elite spaces prevents actual work on the ground by creating the illusion of progress. Partly, I'm just not sure if that's true. Elite spaces are insular, and they tend to focus on themselves rather than tackling issues like global poverty (i.e. the most marginalized). Real work is done outside of elite spaces. Focusing on elite spaces, as Taiwo does, just enables more distraction, creates more capture. Or rather, he just adds to elite babble. Not surprising since he is an elite himself. Anyway, have you read his book? Is it interesting?

bingo, he is also raking in foundation money...

@@tbr7921 What foundation money, if you don't mind my asking? I just assumed his position is typical point-counterpoint of academic babbling.

A lot of word salad from professor

The Divide has become viral and cybernetic, people have become tempted to do it on their own, with some neopuritan "holier than thou" attitude, that is eventually supremacist itself.

This sounds really interesting but I don't understand any of it. It sounds like you're saying this: "It's good that Olufemi Taiwo talks about how the media affects our political conversations. The media can give us knee-jerk reactions to conversations like we're trained animals. We should avoid these systems of power completely, instead of just asking them to stop like Saul Alinsky did via protest."

Not redundant at all. 🤣

@@RJL612 That's right, it would take a major shift. Here is the solution: Any number of states in our union have a "VOTER INITIATIVE" process which allows voters to put a law on the books themselves! We use this process in all 26 states that have it; at the state level. When it works we move for a Constitutional Amendment. We can do it if we show efficacy.

The House of Representative...?

Our government is already bloated with checks & balances, what you really want is a third party that's powerful enough to check the other 2

As a democratic republic we elect representatives based on what they promise to support. We do not have a straight democracy where majority rules.

that's right, socialists have been critiquing identity politics for years. But so have the right...I'm not sure how that squares with the view that this is ultimately all about capitalists co-opting the movement, when the right supposedly represents the rich and business interests. They've actually been pushing hard against "woke culture" and the kind of divisive identity politics on display for a long time now, to the denigration of mainstream media news outlets whilst being completely ignored by democracy now. The simplest explanation is always the best explanation, because it involves the least amount of variables and hypotheticals. We don't need to invent any kind of claim involving co-option. identity politics was always just a bad idea, and critical race theory was an even worse extension of that. And in a blind effort to appear noble and supporting of twitter trends, or perhaps out of a genuine desire to do good, corporations blindly followed what people on twitter and leftist professors claimed was the path forward for racial equality, supported now by equally blind members in government and education as well. But the diversity training seminars and focus on white privilege ultimately ended up guilt tripping and harming too many innocent people, and now we are realizing what a horribly, racially divisive mistake it was. At this point I don't care too much if the right wins, just because they are the only ones actually fighting to shut down this toxic movement

@@radscorpion8 The right are the only ones fighting against identity politics? BULLSHIT. The right (from an American sense) LOVES identity politics- that is- White identity politics. If you pay any attention to the right wing media pipeline be it from their corporate arms of Fox News or OAN or the copy-paste angry white guy online a la Tim Pool, The Quartering, Crowder, etc. the overarching theme of their rhetoric is "White people need to band together against the "other" (blacks, immigrants, etc.) in order to stay alive and in control." Their anti-IDP rhetoric only applies to people who aren't White. Not a single one of them will ever call for racial solidarity against capital. The right doesn't give a single fuck about class struggle either. The only time they ever push back against corporations is when they "go woke," but will clap like barking seals when those same corporations call in the police to beat up workers trying to unionize. To put it bluntly, the right is too stupid to understand that corporate "wokeness" is nothing more than moral lip service. Companies will say nice things about "diversity" and "inclusion" and then do nothing to take those initiatives. The right only looks at the WORDS and not the direct ACTIONS taken by the companies. They'll wine about how every company is being pro-environment and completely miss the fact that the energy industry only invested 1% of all its income in renewable energy. They spent more money advertising how green they were than actually doing it because doing so would cost more money than they'd ever want to spend. Don't mistake this rant as me saying that the Dems or pop-liberals are any better or something like that. The Democrats are a center-right neo-liberal party that only cares about making money with the Republicans. They both bicker on the Washington floor in front of the cameras, but then laugh and toast together behind closed doors when their Wall Street investment money flows into their grimy pockets.

Hello beautiful how are you doing

Right, this isn't a new phenomenon as the prof would suggest

It is Philosophy. Have you ever heard of Political/ Socio-Political Philosophy? His issues are under that. For some reason your understanding of Philosophy is stuck with the Ancient Greeks and Existentialism when it's beyond that.

Some blks sold their people and participated in human atrocities. There is no redemption for a failed business deal.

@@sandrasteele976 Who taught you that, the conqueror? 🧐😯😛

@@sandrasteele976 Black Africans we’re already colonized by Europeans before the first Enslaved African left the continent. I bet you were never taught that. 😯🤭

@@sandrasteele976 Because you all are to Evil, Arrogant, and Prideful (Proverbs 8:13) to REPENT you are meeting Gods raft. Check your birthrates. 🙏🏿👏🏾

@@sandrasteele976 Have you learned how to get rid of European body lice yet? 😳😯