“This was a new maneuver in modern American political rhetoric. Even in the South, most Americans had repudiated explicit racism. Now, crude appeals to bias had to be replaced by phrases that obliquely brought racial images to mind. People often describe these phrases as racial dog whistles, which send a signal that's only audible to one part of the audience. But their racial connections are usually pretty obvious to everyone. You don't need a Captain Midnight decoder ring to know that "welfare queens" or "inner-city culture" are references to minorities, no more than to know that "Park Avenue" is a reference to the rich.”
But the racial—indeed racist—images that pop into his head upon hearing certain words is not evidence that the speaker intended him to think that way. “Welfare queen” might just allude to people on welfare, no matter their color. In fact, Nurnberg’s admission that he thinks “racial images” when he hears the phrase “welfare queen” says a great deal more about his own racism than that of the speaker’s. — NOS4A2
The important thing is that they leave you room to deny the associations to yourself and to others. And they provide the opportunity for a kind of rhetorical jiu-jitsu in response, where you turn the charge of racism against your critics. Somebody taxes you with racism for a remark about bands of youths in hoodies, and you indignantly point out that Mark Zuckerberg wears a hoodie too — and they're the one with race on the brain.
So we should ask: If dog-whistle politics is a thing, why is it the accuser’s ears are always ringing? — NOS4A2
For example, whenever Nixon used the phrase “law and order”, he was implicitly and secretly signalling to white racists that he would protect them from black folk and other minorities. — NOS4A2
For this to be true, some poeple must have told all supremacist whites, that "law and order" is a wonk-wonk nudge- nudge. Without explicitly agreeing on this, or explicitly discolosing this to white supremacists, the meaning would never be transmitted. — god must be atheist
If Nixon's code was indeed a code, it would have been leaked. But it was not. — god must be atheist
If it hadn't leaked, how would we be talking about it? — Echarmion
If that is how language works, how do children learn the meaning of words? — Echarmion
Coded language only works if there is preagreement on the code. Although I was a child once, I would never have guessed that "law and order" means "Relax, White Supremacists.". — god must be atheist
Clearly, the coded language "works" for them, so there must be a way to establish the code besides express verbal agreement. — Echarmion
It's a different matter when we're talking about political officials who should know better as part of their job, but I have a first-hand anecdote about people using things that were very intentionally created as dog-whistles without realizing they were doing so. You know the triple-parentheses thing that racists do around the names of Jewish people, like "(((Zuckerberg)))" and such? I ran across someone on a gaming discord using it, and when I confronted him about it and cited a website describing its usage and origins, he was aghast because he had just seen other gamers using it and thought it was basically a form of emphasis like *asterisks* or /slashes/ or something. Had no idea he was making himself look like a racist and thanked me for informing him.
So what is the way to establish the code translation? Please tell us. — god must be atheist
I apologize, I'm not following that. Are you saying that those people lied? How do you know? Did you talk to them? — 3017amen
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