Black people don’t like Kanye West

Shawn writes:

I am curious to know what you mean by the "far left." I come across this phrase many times but I don't know what it is referring to. Even the terms "left" and "right" are now antiquated. They are not descriptive terms but are used more as insults or putdowns. 

As for the comment “Black people don’t like Kanye West” coming from one person, that is anecdotal evidence at best and one cannot make any conclusion based on such flimsy evidence (although many people do). I suspect as any performer would, West has his fans and detractors. 

noblenutria@gmail.com writes:
[To Shawn]

There is a sort of objective non insult definition of far left.  Read the Wikipedia article. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/F. . .

Shawn writes:

Thanks for that. It is not all that helpful, especially when it says: "The definition of the far-left varies in the literature and there is not a general agreement on what it entails or consensus on the core characteristics that constitute the far-left, other than being to the left of the political left." 

Having studied political theories in university, I do realize how vague and imprecise some of these labels can be and I personally like to avoid them. 

noblenutria@gmail.com writes:

Thanks for the thorough answer.  I can use this in more strange conversations with my far left friend.  

NineInchNut writes:
[To noblenutria@gmail.com]

Please clarify your claim, ‘this is one more strange conversation with my far left friend’. Who is strange, you or friend? Whoever is strange, please describe strangeness, standards and principles that you are using. Thank you.

Ekadh Singh writes:
[To noblenutria@gmail.com]

Calling somebody far left is an Ad Homiem FYI

noblenutria@gmail.com writes:
[To Ekadh Singh]

They call themselves far left

noblenutria@gmail.com writes:

It is strange because I am talking to someone with such a radically different worldview: one not based on critical thinking but on critical theory.  

GoblinCookie writes:

Whether what a person thinks is defined by their race is simply a factual matter.  Even if factually speaking all (human) races inherently think identically, they are still treated differently by society so they may differ in their thinking due to differences in treatment by others. 

Racism is not about treating a person according to their collective, because a person should often be treated according to their collective, as to not do is deeply stupid because in many contexts we cannot have complete information about an individual we have just met but we can determine their allegiances.  Races  however are not Collective Entities, they are Classifications which is something completely different.   

Racism is clearly not the same thing as 'not being stupid'.  Ignoring collective allegiances and reserving judgement until you know all about the individual's traits (or are they simply deceiving you?) is a fine way to get yourself killed. 

noblenutria@gmail.com writes:

Thanks

That sounds like a sweeping generalization fallacy.  Most black people don’t like Kanye West.  Therefore this individual black person does not like Kanye West.  The division fallacy is almost the same.  

TrappedPrior (RotE) writes:
[To noblenutria@gmail.com]

GoblinCookie is making a distinction between black people (the birth classification) and black people (the political entity), not saying that "most black people like Kanye West, therefore this (specific) black person doesn't like him".

noblenutria@gmail.com writes:

Is entity/classification fallacy a named fallacy?  Is it in logically fallacious, wikipedia, or rational wiki?

Thanks

-Jacob

GoblinCookie writes:
[To noblenutria@gmail.com]

Is entity/classification fallacy a named fallacy?  Is it in logically fallacious, wikipedia, or rational wiki?

Thanks

-Jacob 

I don't think so, I appear to have discovered it myself rather than having read about it anywhere.  It seems related to fallacy of division and fallacy of composition but it isn't actually either of them.  I seems to be a fallacy that is quite common in society and very much key to ethno-nationalism and racism, but shows up in other contexts as well. 

The reason it isn't those, is because it is not drawing incorrect conclusions about the whole based upon it's parts or the reverse, the part is really not really part of the imagined whole at all.  It is instead confusing entities with classifications, so a classification is identified and then a unity is imagined between all individuals that share the same category.

So Racism talks about concepts like Race War.  Logically however races cannot have wars because wars are waged by actual entities not by abstract classifications which races area.  The same thing applies to concepts like Ethnic Conflict, ethnicities do not conflict as such, organizations that are made of members of an ethnicity conflict with other organizations, the fact these happen (perhaps coincidentally) to be made of members of a different ethnicity does not mean the ethnicities are themselves in conflict. 

A reverse of this is used to oppose concepts like multiculturalism.  Since the existing organisation is confused with the ethnic classification of it's present members, adding new members with a different ethnic classification *must* automatically weaken the unity of the organisation as a whole, since the two are confused. 

TrappedPrior (RotE) writes:
[To GoblinCookie]

Reification?

Seems like it could fit. But the page doesn't really speak about classifications from what I remember.

GoblinCookie writes:
[To Rationalissimus of the Elenchus]

 
[To GoblinCookie]Reification?

Seems like it could fit. But the page doesn't really speak about classifications from what I remember.

 

The idea that classifications are merely subjective ideas with no objective existence is philosophically controversial.  A lot of philosophy (Plato for instance) treats classifications pretty much as the true objective reality.

The other issue is that classifications also have relationships to each-other that mirror those of groups.  So lions eat antelopes is a conflict between classifications, but this is not the same as two prides of lions or herds of antelopes conflicting.  Generally speaking the former implies the latter by not the reverse, if lions are in conflict with antelopes, all groups of both are in conflict but if two prides of lions fight they are both still equally leonine. 

A large part of Classifications-Are-Entities (or whatever it is already called?) is the projection of unity to disparate groups because they share the same classification.  Different groups doing the same thing independently are imagined to be acting in concert as one group. 

Another expression of this is the refusal to accept parallel evolution.  If two things evolved similarly, it is taken as evidence the two things were in contact and one must have got the 'idea' from the other.