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Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]

Samizdata quote of the day

I’m amused to see we’ve now reached the “interracial marriage is bad” part of the transition of the illiberal left into 1950s conservatives.

Marcus Walker responding to this.

24 comments to Samizdata quote of the day

  • Lee Moore

    The young lady writing the Independent article – who might be quite attractive if one could eliminate from one’s mind the enormous pile of white male skulls, or possibly severed testicles, she is mentally imagining behind that smile – has surely answered the point :

    But that’s the thing about sexual racism: it’s subtle, it’s about the way the attraction is framed.

    It’s (a) “subtle” and (b) “requires framing.” Which obviously means that you are not supposed to be applying bourgeois technicalties like consistency and reason to her arguments.

    Incidentally this sort of thing is old news. Haven’t the la lutta types been railing against cross race adoptions for decades ?

  • Deep Lurker

    By the same token, homosexuality is a gender-fetish, with male homosexuality being a sign of evil misogyny and lesbianism a sign of evil misandry. And heterosexuality too, because kafka-trap. Women who are sexually attracted to men are self-hating misogynists, of course.

    More generally, it’s interesting to see what the illiberal left has made transgressive. E.g. “1950s household” is now a recognized thing in the BDSM community.

  • Alex DeWynter

    I don’t find Sunak all that attractive, but no doubt that’s also due to racism, too.

  • Ferox

    Among a certain “woke” set, it’s always been racist for a white person to find a non-white person either (a) attractive, because they are colonizing; or (b) unattractive, because they are reinforcing racist beauty norms.

    And for non-white to find whites attractive is self-hating.

    That has been true since at least the early 80s, and probably even before that. I know I have seen diatribes from black women about white women being with black men since the early 80s.

  • I’m with the responder to Marcus who said that comparing to a 1950s conservative was way too kind to the indy-writer (and unkind to the 1950s tory) and the proper comparison was to a lefty progressive of interwar vintage. (I guess the indy-writer agrees with Iago about the origin of Desdemona’s feelings for Othello.)

  • NickM

    Whilst Rishi Sunak is not exactly all that if you look at him, in the context of previous Chancellors he’s Brad Pitt. Isn’t it that simple?

  • Kevin

    I suspect if a right wing journalist has the hots for Diane Abbott they’d get a pass.

  • NickM

    Kevin,
    As long as it was a pass to a rest home for the utterly deranged…

  • Stonyground

    Isn’t it the case that, for men at least, physical attraction is sort of hard wired and not really volitional? Even if I did subscribe to racially based identity politics, who I find attractive isn’t really a concious decision. I’m a straight white male and I tend to find women attractive regardless of race. When it comes to personalities and relationships things become complex, but to me at any rate, physical attraction is really straightforward.

  • JohnK

    The British advertising industry has not seen this memo. Virtually every TV advert with a family in it seems to have a black dad and white mum and their interracial kids. I get it that the ad execs don’t want to seem “racist” by dint of having a white mum and dad in their adverts, but it is getting beyond a woke joke.

    The ad industry was better when they were all off their heads on coke. It’s not a job for sober people or adults.

  • Paul Marks

    People should become husband and wife when they love each other – skin colour should have nothing to do with it.

    No doubt Central Office would consider the above deeply “racist” as it denies the importance of Frankfurt School of Marxism Identity Politics (which is sacred to “educated” people).

    Still as Edmund Burke (whom Central Office would also hate and despise) put it in reply to a lady who had written to him in complaint about what she considered his obsession with Indian matters.

    “They have none of your lilies and roses in their faces, but they are made in the image of God – just as much as you are”.

    As for children – again skin colour is not relevant. There may be an advantage in light coloured skin in getting Vitamin D from sunlight, and there may be an advantage in having darker skin in order to avoid sun burn and possible skin cancer. But there are ways round these things.

    Sometimes marriage is blessed with children and sometimes (tragically) a husband or wife proves to be infertile – but what skin colour the children are is a silly thing to be obsessed by.

  • Snorri Godhi

    Ferox:

    I know I have seen diatribes from black women about white women being with black men since the early 80s.

    I suspect that that has little to do with identity politics and pretty much everything to do with more Black men marrying White women than White men marrying Black women — especially in the 80s, i suppose. It is not entirely irrational for Black women to worry about fewer prospective husbands.

    Similarly, when you read a racist rant from a White man about White women with Black boyfriends, consider that the man probably does not disapprove because he is a racist: rather, he is a racist because he disapproves. His racism is probably a rationalization of his fear of reduced prospects.

    Having said that, i also suspect that some White women are attracted by dark-skinned men because they feel like misfits in their own culture, and hope to find another culture in which they fit better. Such a relationship is not likely to last. This is not my original idea btw: I got it from a British taxi driver in Copenhagen, who suggested it in a newsgroup (when there were no blogs yet). He said that he had had many dark-skinned ex-boyfriends in tears at the back of his cab.

  • Ferox

    Snorri: Human motivations are always complex and difficult to unravel, even from group to group – much less from individual to individual.

    My comment wasn’t about the reasons for cross-racial attractions so much as it was about the one-dimensional, absurdly simplistic analysis which regards white racism (which such analysts generally claim is the only kind of racism) as the sole cause of such attractions.

    When all you have in your toolbox is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a nail.

  • NickM

    For shame JohnK, for shame!!! There are plenty of homosexual white couples in ads as you well know!!!

  • ragingnick

    sorry but the idea that the left view interracial marriage as ‘bad’ is easily disproved the moment you turn on the telly.
    The entertainment, media and advertising industries (all of which have been captured by Frankfurt school ideology) relentlessly push depictions of interracial couples.

  • JohnK

    NickM:

    You are right, I don’t know what came over me.

  • mila s

    I’m with the responder to Marcus who said that comparing to a 1950s conservative was way too kind to the indy-writer (and unkind to the 1950s tory)

    would a comparison to a 1960s tory be fairer?

  • I suspect that that has little to do with identity politics and pretty much everything to do with more Black men marrying White women than White men marrying Black women (Snorri Godhi, April 10, 2020 at 12:24 pm)

    FWIW, I believe the statistics for the modern anglosphere show rather the reverse effect, so this would not obviously be a factual fear for these these black women allegedly to have. (Of course, they could be imagining the white women were getting the cream – if I may thus express it 🙂 – of the available black men.)

    As Marcus Walker’s comment indicated, the indy article is an especially obvious example of how the PC not only switch racism accusations on for us and off for themselves but also spin logic to the point of being so far gone they’re coming back. One can also discuss issues related to the nominal topic of the indy article – but I feel sure the article’s author would call it racist if any of us did so, whatever conclusions we drew.

  • Mark

    As a matter of interest how many mixed marriages/couples are there – even in the third world (aka London).

    The number I know of I can count the fingers of one stump.

    As for the general portrayal in media/advertisng etc. Its beyond surreal these days. I’m sure that its this sheer yawning gap between the media fantasy and the reality that drives these professional race grifters mad. And it does os because they know it.

  • There are huge numbers of mixed marriages in London, and I know several myself.

  • Pat

    Consider a world in which inter-racial marriage was common. So common that many of those who eventually settled on a partner of their own race had previously considered the possibility, and likely had friends of other races.
    And consider the offspring of such unions.
    How do you persuade them that their parters, in laws, parents, grandparents and likely a lot of their friends are evil and malicious?
    That would be very difficult, so the race baiters seek to prevent it- their power, influence and jobs are at stake!

  • APL

    PdH: “There are huge numbers of mixed marriages in London, and I know several myself.”

    There may be one or two among the Masai too

    Ten years ago, so I wonder how the life suited Colette?

  • Zerren Yeoville

    Previous commenters have noticed the prevalence of mixed-race couples in television and print advertising, despite the relative paucity of such relationships across the UK as a whole … but why are they invariably shown as a white woman with a non-white man, and hardly ever the reverse?

  • CaptDMO

    OTish. In the US
    We have NOW seen the transition of the illiberal left into the 1950’s conservatives….
    as “unexpectedly”, progressive socialists decide they want a firearm, and are shocked…SHOCKED, that they can’t actually just walk into a store, slap down their credit card, and walk out with one…”easier than buying a book”!