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I appreciate the anecdote, because I think it's happened to all of us. I had a similar interaction with someone who balked at my usage of the word "homeless" (I live in a city, so it's come up once or twice), insisting that I should instead call them "unhoused".
I think the important point in your anecdote is saying "it's unsettling and angering to be called out for doing/saying something racist when you in fact are not racist". My stance on this issue is that everyone's a little bit *-ist. Instead of concluding "people can do and say racist things while not being racist", I think a more helpful conclusion would be "people do and say racist shit all the time without meaning it because we have a lot of racism built into our brains".
I agree with you on the othering, however. I dislike when people try and put racists, sexists, etc. in a timeout corner, mostly because it seems to be with the aim of declaring themselves A Good Person rather than actually affecting any social change. I think it's more helpful to say "hey, look, we're all born with a lot of baggage from our environments and parents, and we don't get to choose how our brains are molded".
Yeah I completely agree. Implicit bias is a universal human trait, and I've consciously tried to be aware of the times it rears its ugly head. That's why I was so caught off guard, because I'm usually on the lookout for stuff like that. My best friend is a director at a media company, and he's spent nearly 2 years carefully documenting his interactions with a black, female subordinate of his. She's generally a really bad employee, a poor worker, antagonistic to colleagues, and all around a sour human being, but he can't discipline her the way he disciplines his other employees because she and her sister (who works under another director) readily claim that they're being discriminated against, no matter how innocuous the interaction or how mundane the offense. They've had to fire white, cis male employees with better track records because they're afraid that if they fire her she'll take them to court. He's a lifelong Republican who registered as a Democrat after 2016 and voted straight-ticket Dem this election, but he regularly confides in me that he's deeply frustrated with the way he has to interact with these sisters. He has to constantly look over his shoulder, he has to treat her with kit gloves, and he has to document every word he speaks to her so there's a detailed record of their conversations. I'm not saying she's not actively discriminated against in her daily life because I'm sure she 100% is, but I'm also not saying she's not taking advantage of this cultural moment to re-construct the power dynamic with the white male supervisor below her, no matter the needs of the business. This is why blue collar Trump supporters so routinely crow about people "playing the race card", because some people actually do.
We're not in a healthy place as a society, and extremists/activists on both sides are really bad at self-reflection.
That's anecdotal, but it does display the frustrations that people have with what they perceive as injust wokeness.
I think it's important to mention that shitty people are everywhere and in all shapes and colors; these two may just stand out because he does feel like he has to walk on eggshells around them.
What I will say is that I think it's a mistake to assume that people who are minorities or other discriminated classes are also progressive by nature. In a perfect world, your race and gender would have nothing to do with what political ideology you subscribe to, but we live in a far from perfect world.
I'm not sure where I made that assumption?
I didn't say you did, but I can see how you got there.