Share this page!

Shadi Hamid Profile picture
Twitter logo
24 Mar, 4 tweets, 1 min read
Who knows. Maybe “whiteness” doesn’t explain everything. Image
It's been hard to watch otherwise smart liberals twist themselves into knots trying to figure out how to apply absurd and arbitrary constructions around race to current events
Critical race theory, or whatever you want to call this silliness, is objectionable for a number of reasons, but at a very basic level it makes people sound ridiculous
Lol. Josh Marshall claiming Arabs are white is not the Twitter twist I was expecting. I suppose that's the risk of becoming a glorified reply guy Image

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
　

Keep Current with Shadi Hamid

Shadi Hamid Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @shadihamid

Shadi Hamid Profile picture
21 Mar
Yes, I know people like this. And I worry about them. Who would have thought, irrationality and science going hand in hand? COVID absolutism is its own kind of fanaticism. If you're going to believe in something (and everyone believes in *something*) this is one of the options
Then there are more normal examples of COVID absolutism. In weeks when daily cases were only *50* in a city of half a million, I knew young people with no health conditions who refused to do outdoor dining without a mask
The misinformation around indoor dining was interesting as well, where people would act like it was the most dangerous thing imaginable. To my knowledge, very few (if any?) DC restaurants closed down in recent months due to tracers finding indoor transmission as the source
Read 6 tweets
Shadi Hamid Profile picture
19 Mar
Over the last two decades, America witnessed its sharpest decline in church membership in recorded history. Secularists hoped that religious decline would make for a more rational politics. That didn't happen. Be careful what you wish for.

theatlantic.com/magazine/archi…
In my work on pluralism and living with deep difference, I keep returning to the Dutch theologian Abraham Kuyper. He argued that all strongly held ideologies were effectively faith-based, and that no human being could survive long without a "pivot."
If deeply felt conviction is sublimated religion, then this has major implications. In my @TheAtlantic article, I cite the political theorist @SWGoldman who calls this "the law of the conservation of religion"

theatlantic.com/magazine/archi…
Read 5 tweets
Shadi Hamid Profile picture
14 Mar
Thrilled to announce a new feature as part of the growing @WCrowdsLive family. We've launched The Democracy Essays, curated by political philosopher @sckimbriel and TNR staff writer @OsitaNwanevu. They have free rein.

Read their introduction here: wisdomofcrowds.live/introducing-th…
Here's @sckimbriel first essay for @WCrowdsLive—"What is Democracy For?" It's fascinating and incisive like few things I've seen online and gives a taste of some of the questions they'll be exploring. wisdomofcrowds.live/what-is-democr…
One of our preoccupations at @WCrowdsLive has been the question of democracy as a means to other things we hold dear or an end unto itself. This is our attempt to explore these questions in a more systematic and exploratory way.
Read 9 tweets
Shadi Hamid Profile picture
13 Mar
In the second half of this @WCrowdsLive episode, I test out a new argument on the relationship between democracy, accountability, free will, and the problem of evil

Listen here: wisdomofcrowds.live/islam-keto-and…
The first part of the episode is a bit lighter where I explain why keto is "the Islam of diets." It's seemingly strict on the outside, but if you're willing to buy into the basic structure, you end up having "freedom within constraint"

podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/isl…
And then in a very special bonus episode for subscribers, I interview @dmarusic on his past life as a punk rock drummer touring America in a dilapidated bus.

wisdomofcrowds.live/on-tour-with-s…
Read 4 tweets
Shadi Hamid Profile picture
8 Mar
The Markle interview is a landmark post-Trump moment. Hard to imagine it dominating our national or social media attention to such an extent if Trump was still president.
The more I think about it, the more I think it's pretty remarkable. Not thinking about Trump or being asked to think about him frees up an incredible amount of mental and emotional space. Sometimes the space is empty. I've noticed more and more people saying that they're bored.
Clubhouse is another embodiment of the new era. Trump barely comes up in conversation. Instead, people spend hours talking about foreign policy or go whale moaning—things which had declined in importance in the preceding 4 years.
Read 6 tweets
Shadi Hamid Profile picture
6 Mar
With the benefit of hindsight, I ask @adesnik who had a "less bad" foreign policy—Trump or Obama? Listen to his answer here:

Full episode: wisdomofcrowds.live/was-trumps-for…
Whether Trump or Obama was worse on the Middle East isn't a question with an obvious answer. My view is that Trump's was worse in intent but Obama's was worse in effect, mostly because Obama had to respond to the Arab Spring where Trump didn't.
If Trump was in charge during Arab Spring, he would have been terrible. He likely would have doubled down on dictators, but perhaps that would've still been better than what Obama did, which was the worst of both worlds, telling Arabs he was with them and then betraying them.
Read 7 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!

This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!

Like this author's thread?

Get emails when @shadihamid has new unrolls!

Check out other threads from @shadihamid!

Read all threads by @shadihamid