Eeyorism, Synesthesia and Critical Race Theory
A toxic mix of faulty reasoning and myopic thinking always leads to faulty conclusions and negative outcomes.
I don’t know if there is a term for what causes a group of people to believe something that has happened to them is unique even though that same thing has happened to another group, often a larger group – and sometimes a vastly larger group.
Poverty is an example - black leadership treats poverty as uniquely a black problem when the reality is that there are roughly three times as many whites below the poverty line as blacks. Another is the perception that violent interactions with police is also uniquely a black issue even as data shows whites are almost twice as likely to be involved.
For now, at least until someone smarter than me lets me know the proper term, I’ll just call it “Eeyorism” - after A.A. Milne’s Eeyore, a character in the Winnie the Pooh tales that exhibits generally positive characteristics, but is introverted and melancholy nonetheless.
This syndrome, this eeyorism, is typified in the sarcastic take on the New York Times writing about Armageddon under this headline:
World Set to End Tomorrow at Midnight: Minority Women and Children Hardest Hit
Eeyorism is also exhibited when something bad happens without regard to group membership – like a disease or a natural disaster that impacts the general population – and yet somehow, somewhere, some subgroup decides they were uniquely damaged or disadvantaged.
It seems strongly correlated with minorities, and especially with minorities of certain races. It is sort of an identarian take where simply bearing the same color skin makes one uniquely disadvantaged regardless of the individual circumstances.
It is also exhibited in people who can’t seemingly accept the good things that happen to them, often finding ways to define those things as uniquely negative or finding ways to feel guilty about something with which they personally had nothing to do.
Eeyorism is often combined with a cultural form of synesthesia.
Synesthesia is a word with Greek roots. It translates to “perceive together.”
It is a condition presenting when you hear music, but you see shapes. Or you hear a word or a name and instantly see a color. Synesthesia is a fancy name for when you experience one of your senses through another. For example, you might hear the name "Alex" and see green. Or you might read the word "street" and taste citrus fruit.
There is a specific type that causes people to see white supremacy no matter what the inputs are.
Take the Tyre Nichols tragedy in Memphis.
Mr. Nichols was beaten to death by 5 black police officers, all members of a special anti-crime squad.
Memphis:
Has a 65% black population.
Has a 52% black police force.
Has a black Chief of Police.
Had a black mayor for the last 23 out of 31 years.
66.7% (6 of 9) of the Executive Command Staff are black.
62% (8 of 13) of the City Council are black.
Has not had a Republican mayor since 1967.
Even though Memphis police are investigating possible rumors connecting Nichols to the ex-girlfriend or ex-wife of former Memphis cop Demetrius Haley (as of February 5th is unconfirmed), one of the officers who participated in the beating, both black and white pundits (left wing and social justice warriors) have decided the root cause of the incident was - you guessed it – WHITE SUPREMACY.
In my opinion, Critical Race Theory is where Eeyorism and synesthesia intersect.
CRT began when Derrick Bell, a Harvard educated lawyer and law professor, and others began examining a century of legislation and Supreme Court decisions, searching for reason why blacks in America have not progressed as quickly as the protection and favoritism of legislation and decisions would imply.
Bell’s conclusion?
The issues black Americans face were singularly caused by white racism.
Bell chose to dismiss and ignore causations like:
The preponderance of fatherless families in the black communities,
Children growing up in criminal and gang territories,
The lack of personal responsibility,
Dependence upon the welfare state,
Living in high unemployment areas,
A generational perception of persecution and inferiority,
That black Americans were not unique in suffering conditions like crime, poverty and discrimination, but
Most of all, Bell ignored the success of certain black Americans and the success of other minorities (Asian, Indian, black African immigrants).
That’s a lot to dismiss to settle on the conclusion that the ONLY reason for the lack of expected success of blacks is white racism.
It seems that when the black and white progressive intelligentsia and the compliant media see or hear of any issue involving black Americans, their eeyorism causes them to believe that incident is unique only to black Americans and their cultural synesthesia causes them to see only one color – white.
The only problem is that none of that can be supported by the facts.
Now Michael, why are you confusing Opinion with Facts. Don't you know that it's opinions that matter, and only those opinions that are the Right Opinions. And if you do not have the Right Opinions then by definition you are racist!
In a men's study group at our church the black pastor was amazed that the "Hillbilly Elegy" white folks existed. He has an MS degree.