.@ScottAdamsSays offered a challenge on twitter to explain "systemic racism" and offer an example. As is usual with Adams everything is sort of a hypnotist's trick, which I talked about in my video, but I wanted to put a point to it on Twitter. (thread) 1/16
In his "systemic racism" challenge there are two fudgy words: "systemic" and "racism". Let's deal with the difficulty of the word "racism" first. @slatestarcodex "Against Murderism" is a great place to start. slatestarcodex.com/2017/06/21/aga…
Racism has 3 common senses: 1. defined by motivation (motivational racism), 2. defined by belief (propositional racism) 3. defined by consequences (consequential racism). The big trick done by CRT is to see consequential racism and accuse systems of motivational racism.
The big defense against this is to expose the rhetorical slight of hand showing that you can't necessarily blame any human being for the consequentialist outcome. Materialists believe systems don't have intentionality of their own.
If you listen to @ScottAdamsSays try out @Timcast 's idea you'll note that Adams have a very narrow definition of "systemic racism" as being human being intentional and non-color blind. That's his trick.
An example @ScottAdamsSays is looking for is easy to find, and it's "anti-racist" and it's affirmative action practices. They are non-color blind human-intentional systems today. But do they address racism? Which racism?
Now let's look at "systemic". @ScottAdamsSays has built a career exposing the unintended counter-productive consequence of systems. It is practically the thesis of Dilbert. 
But materialists (by definition) believe "agency is limited to human beings. There are no purposive agents above nor apart from human beings. This is a corollary of Darwinianism which asserted "blind (natural) selection." See The Metaphysical Club
For a materialist (and some physicalists), how do we explain (human) intentionality and the consciousness it is dependent upon? Usually some process of "emergence" where non-conscious components evolve UP and achieve consciousness.
Systemic agency, I assert, can be imagined by a materialist to be such a thing. The sum of its parts achieve a sort of agency apart from its founders that can be mind-numbingly frustrating, evil and often lampoonable as @scottadams illustrates with Dilbert
Often these systems include human beings and they a lot of their agency from these agents that materialists recognize. Markets are such a thing. Markets create "an invisible hand" as Adam Smith called it.
Now it is easy to see how markets can create inequalities that CRT will see as racists (defined by consequences). Cultural elements of the majority population will achieve market share while comparative elements of the minority may not. Viola... "systemic racism"
It's not a product of the legal system which is @ScottAdamsSays criteria but a product of the agentic market.
Two additional points. Critical Race Theory is helpful in identifying agentic systemic biases. That's not a difficult thing to do. Addressing agentic systemic outcomes? Far harder and most attempts at redress have their own agentic systemic inequalities
Ancient systems that talked about "spirits", or the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 6 had language better suited to this with "principalities and powers in the heavenly realms" which maps very well onto our language of these powers.
Secular people today are praying in the streets to gods they can't name trying to address them. 16/16
@threadreaderapp unroll please
