Thread by @Hail__To_You

@V8POW Robin DiAngelo is an #ethnomasochist nobody who got a frivolous PhD in "multicultural studies" at age 47, and is known for her "notable idea" of White Fragility,

but she is (was) so obscure that her wiki was near deletion in both 2018 and 2019:

#RobinDiAngelo #WhiteFragility

@V8POW On #WhiteFragility:

The WHITE FRAGILITY concept / phrase / meme / endzone-dance / soft-blood-libel.

2011: coined;
2010s: made rounds on academic-left-fringe;
2020: broke through with George Floyd riots.

Using Ngram and Google Trends data and more. Story in 21 parts (thread).

@V8POW (1.) The term "White Fragility" was independently 'coined'/used many times, and makes sporadic appearances in the 1990s/2000s in NGram but with all kinds of meanings.

One from 2004 refers to the 1994 OJ Simpson ex-wife murder but not related to the late 2010s/2020 meaning:

@V8POW (2.) The term #WhiteFragility, in current form, traces to a short 2011 academic journal article appearing in the International Journal of Critical Pedagogy Vol 3-3.

The article was by Robin DiAngelo, a 2004 PhD in Multiculturalism and obscure person on the academic-left circuit.

@V8POW (3.) In the article, DiAngelo "explicates the dynamics of White Fragility," capitalizing the term, meaning it is specific concept she is introducing. The term seems a riff on "White Privilege;" privilege appears 23 times in her article; fragility itself only 28.

#WhitePrivilege

@V8POW (4.) Having been introduced as a capitalized, academic-esque term in late 2011, the term White Fragility gets no real traction (going on Google Trends now) for several years. (It's unlikely the International Journal of Critical Pedagogy has many readers.) But its day would come.

@V8POW (5.) May 2012: DiAngelo publishes a book, “What Does it Mean to Be White: Developing White Racial Literacy,” which seems to have contained the term #WhiteFragility. I'm not sure but it may be based on her short journal article published about six months earlier (see above)...

@V8POW (6.) The first time #WhiteFragility shows upward movement in Google Trends is March/April 2015, during one of the Obama-era race-grievance-politics cycles.

The rise is associated with the Baltimore race riots of that year (when the mayor famously gave rioters "space to destroy")

@V8POW (7.) Here is an example of the term White Fragility making the rounds in March 2015 specifically, a blogpost appearing on GovLoop, "the premier social network connecting over 300,000 federal, state, and local government innovators":

@V8POW (8.) After its spring 2015 rise, White Fragility then settled into a new steady-state for 12 months.

It then has another round of upward movement starting in July 2016, this time associated with the 2010s-era-peak of Black Lives Matter and the BLM massacres of police that month.

@V8POW (9.) The peak of the term "White Fragility" *before* the book by that name came out (mid-2018) is Aug-Nov 2016.

This is of course associated chronologically with the heated Trump-Hillary race, and with the entry of the term "#AltRight" into discourse (Aug. 2016 Hillary speech).

@V8POW (10.) After the mid-2016 rise (see point 8), "White Fragility" settles down into a new/higher equilibrium for the next 2 years.

It is by then 'established' on the racial-theory academic-Left fringe (the "Tim Wise"-wing of US discourse), occasionally heard but not yet mainstream.

@V8POW (11.) Meanwhile Trump is elected. A drawn-out moral panic sets in.

Soon it's June 2018 and DiAngelo publishes a follow-up to her 2012 whiteness-studies book. The new one is "White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism." The biggest turning point yet..

@V8POW (12.) In June/July 2018, with the publication of the book "White Fragility" (the concept/term right there in the title), the term shoves its way up to a new/highest-yet equilibrium. The new level, reached by Aug. 2018, holds to late May 2020, just before the George Floyd riots...

@V8POW (13.) Zooming in on the Google Trends graph for recent weeks only (May and early June 2020), we see #WhiteFragility breaks out of obscurity on exactly May 27 2020. It peaks June 2-3 on Google Trends.

There is zero doubt this is tied directly to the George Floyd riot cycle...

@V8POW (14.) The term "White Fragility" remains high as of June 9 (the most recent data as of this writing).

It is no flash in the pan. It holds high for two weeks (over 35 on the arbitrary Google Trends scale from May 30 probably lasting at 35+ to at least June 15 on current trend).

@V8POW (15.) The explosion of the term "White Fragility" peaks directly after the height of the George Floyd riots.

This follows the general pattern (points 6 & 8).

(See also the breakout of the #SystemicRacism term associated with the Ferguson Riots in 2014:)

https://twitter.com/Hail__To_You/status/1271539753914073088

@V8POW (16.) While the big "White Fragility" jump (starting May 27 2020) is associated with the riots/racism-moral-panic, it didn't come out of nowhere.

The gains of March 2015 (see point 6) to April 2020 are worth a look: By what vector did the term/concept set itself up for takeoff?

@V8POW (17.) Google Trends shows us where the biggest gains for this term were *before* May 2020 (pre George Floyd riots).

Here is an image with the top 20 metro areas. Madison, Wisconsin is the top in the USA.

Unsurprisingly, these are all either college towns or big-blue-cities...

@V8POW (18.) Places showing the *least* interest in "White Fragility," of 169 metros measured, are:

162 Little Rock AR
163 Charleston WV
164 West Palm Beach FL
165 Augusta GA
166 Huntsville AL
167 Wilkes Barre-Scranton PA
168 San Antonio TX
169 Harlingen-Weslaco-Brownsville-McAllen TX

@V8POW (19.) Some conclusions: "White Fragility" as a term/concept did not originate with nonwhites, but thru a fringe-academia-->college-town-->big-blue white-liberal-area-->mainstream "pipeline."

The top-interest places (see 17) are some of the highest educated/SES whites in the USA.

@V8POW (20.) But saying "it's the academics" is missing a key piece.

The process was boosted by energy from "below," incl. criminal riots/violence at several key junctures, observable in the data.

Thus: A portrait of the "High-Low Coalition" in action.
That's #WhiteFragility. (End)

@V8POW (See also, a similar thread tracing the origin and rise of the term "Systemic Racism"):

https://twitter.com/Hail__To_You/status/1271294408353132544

@V8POW There is a 1-million-view Youtube lecture by this White Fragility Theory woman, Robin DiAngelo (#RobinDiAngelo).

Posted July 3, 2018 (see points 11 & 12). The first words from the woman introducing her (0:07-0:30) are worth recording and commenting on...

@V8POW At @UW.

Misha Stone, introducing DiAngelo, says:

"Before we begin, I'd like to acknowledge we are gathered together on the ancestral land of the Coast Salish people." [Long applause] "Let us honor their elders past and present. We thank them for their stewardship of this land."

@V8POW @UW When DiAngelo finally gets to speak, she says (2:25): "I DO want to reiterate that this talk IS happening on the ancestral territories of indigenous peoples."

Why are they saying these things? This seems to immediately imply whites are morally illegitimate, tipping their hand.

@V8POW @UW If you read DiAngelo's 2011 article on White Fragility, or listen to hear early-July 2018 talk on her book #WhiteFragility, you'll see she is a cult trainer.

@V8POW @UW Just one example of many, from the Youtube [14:00]:

"If you are white, and you have not devoted *years* of sustained study, struggle, and focus on this topic [racism], your opinions are necessarily *very* limited." (-- #RobinDiAngelo)

Cult trainers talk this way.

@V8POW @UW DiAngelo reveals that in her mid-30s, in the early 1990s (she was b.1956), she became a "Diversity Trainer." She served as one for years.

Several times, including a long introductory section of the 2011 article, she lingers on how bad white men who resented these trainings are.

@V8POW @UW Robin DiAngelo was on the Diversity and (anti-)'Whiteness' Studies track a long time:

She graduated with a BA in History and Sociology from Seattle University, June 1991 (she was student commencement speaker), at age 34. What was she doing the previous 15 years of her life, IDK.

@V8POW Following her BA in 1991, DiAngelo took up her job as a diversity trainer. She lingers on the margins of academia in Seattle for years.

She next takes an MA in Education from the Univ. of Washington, in 1995, and is soon thereafter on the PhD track (grad. 2004), also at @UW....

@V8POW @UW ...Robin DiAngelo's 2004 PhD is formally listed as being in:

"Critical Multicultural Education; Whiteness Studies"

About this time, #WhitenessStudies was first emerging, and was being mocked by conservatives. It's easy to see who's laughing last and who holds cultural power...

@V8POW @UW Reading/listening to DiAngelo, it's clear she developed her #WhiteFragility theory/term as early as the 1990s during her years as Diversity Trainer.

If find she put it into print earlier than the 2011 paper, namely in 2006, just before she appointed professor at @WestfieldState

@V8POW Here:

DiAngelo, R. 2006. "'I’m leaving!': White fragility in racial dialogue." In B. McMahon & D. Armstrong (Eds.), Inclusion in Urban Educational Environments: Addressing Issues of Diversity, Equity, and Social Justice (pp.213-240). Centre for Leadership and Diversity at @UofT.

@V8POW @UofT DiAngelo's first printed use of #WhiteFragility may be this obscure 2006 book. She didn't yet have the confidence to capitalize it,but did by 2011.

Notice the title: "Addressing Issues of Diversity." This scolding phrase, "addressing issues," was not current yet then but is now.

@V8POW Worth noting that by June/July 2018 when DiAngelo's book was launched, the term/concept #WhiteFragility had made serious gains with the important people (even if it was obscure and would remain so 23 more months):

It "debuted on the NYT Bestseller List."

https://twitter.com/Hail__To_You/status/1271642785649692673