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A review by plethora
Woke Racism: How a New Religion Has Betrayed Black America by John McWhorter
dark
tense
slow-paced
0.5
This entire book reads like a Burn Book about the best-selling thought leaders in this space. The author makes no point other than “stop listening to the left, they’re being ridiculous”, and claims a better way to address racism in america would be to 1. End the war on drugs (great start), 2. Teach people to read with a different method (okay I’m with you) and 3. Make it socially acceptable to not go to college . That’s it, Full stop.
I approached this book with an open mind. I was surprised again and again at the lengths to which the author went to mischaracterize the movements and the discussions this book claimed to dissect. Is it a dissection if you’re filling a pinata with candy and then pulling out the pieces one by one saying how ridiculous the appendix looks?
The audiobook, read by the author, perfectly demonstrates the bad-faith arguments he is making. The mocking tone used when (incorrectly) paraphrasing these other thought leaders’ works is outdone only by the lack of logic the author uses throughout this work.
The entire comparison between the antiracism movement and a religion is laughable (I outwardly laughed at multiple occasions). Drawing comparisons between kneeling in religious ceremony and kneeling at 2020 protests with no mention Kaepernick, and comparing three best-sellers as a holy trinity of sorts is concerning. Using examples of people saying they don’t feel safe, and then mocking the idea of them not be physically safe, is willfully obtuse on the part of the author.
At once point he states how ridiculous it is for a student of his to have felt oppressed by their experiences with racism because the student wasn’t enough of a visible minority to him. Therefore oppression was in no way appropriate to characterize her life experiences. Remind me how teaching someone presumably a few times a week makes you the authority on their life experience up to that point?
Who hurt this author?
It’s very concerning to think a man like this is teaching with these approaches. But then again, he’ll probably claim mentioning so is a witch hunt.
I approached this book with an open mind. I was surprised again and again at the lengths to which the author went to mischaracterize the movements and the discussions this book claimed to dissect. Is it a dissection if you’re filling a pinata with candy and then pulling out the pieces one by one saying how ridiculous the appendix looks?
The audiobook, read by the author, perfectly demonstrates the bad-faith arguments he is making. The mocking tone used when (incorrectly) paraphrasing these other thought leaders’ works is outdone only by the lack of logic the author uses throughout this work.
The entire comparison between the antiracism movement and a religion is laughable (I outwardly laughed at multiple occasions). Drawing comparisons between kneeling in religious ceremony and kneeling at 2020 protests with no mention Kaepernick, and comparing three best-sellers as a holy trinity of sorts is concerning. Using examples of people saying they don’t feel safe, and then mocking the idea of them not be physically safe, is willfully obtuse on the part of the author.
At once point he states how ridiculous it is for a student of his to have felt oppressed by their experiences with racism because the student wasn’t enough of a visible minority to him. Therefore oppression was in no way appropriate to characterize her life experiences. Remind me how teaching someone presumably a few times a week makes you the authority on their life experience up to that point?
Who hurt this author?
It’s very concerning to think a man like this is teaching with these approaches. But then again, he’ll probably claim mentioning so is a witch hunt.