AP goes uppercase Black

I mentioned that the NY Times is going uppercase Black. Now The Associated Press

After changing its usage rules last month to capitalize the word “Black” when used in the context of race and culture, The Associated Press on Monday said it would not do the same for “white.”

The AP said white people in general have much less shared history and culture, and don’t have the experience of being discriminated against because of skin color.

Protests following the death of George Floyd, which led to discussions ...

“White doesn’t represent a shared culture and history in the way Black does,” The New York Times said on July 5 in explaining its decision.

They seem to be saying this in a nonsensical way, as a way of signaling that they don't really believe it.

There certainly is a White culture and history. Some books call it "Western Civilization" and some call it "Christendom". Read those history books for great accomplishments, and 95% of them were done by White people. The USA in particular has a distinctive culture and history, and it is almost entirely a story of White people.

See the former Smithsonian exhibit on Whites for examples of White culture.

Yes, I know that Blacks are responsible for some great music and other things.

Meanwhile, they use "Black" to include American Blacks, Africans, and many others. They have far less of a shared culture and history. I cannot think of anything.

The NY Times is moving on. Agnes Callard writes in the NY Times:

Should We Cancel Aristotle?

The Greek philosopher Aristotle did not merely condone slavery, he defended it; he did not merely defend it, but defended it as beneficial to the slave. His view was that some people are, by nature, unable to pursue their own good, and best suited to be “living tools” for use by other people: “The slave is a part of the master, a living but separated part of his bodily frame.”

Aristotle’s anti-liberalism does not stop there. He believed that women were incapable of authoritative decision making. And he decreed that manual laborers, despite being neither slaves nor women, were nonetheless prohibited from citizenship or education in his ideal city. ...

Aristotle thought that the value or worth of a human being — his virtue — was something that he acquired in growing up. It follows that people who can’t (women, slaves) or simply don’t (manual laborers) acquire that virtue have no grounds for demanding equal respect or recognition with those who do.

As I read him, Aristotle not only did not believe in the conception of intrinsic human dignity that grounds our modern commitment to human rights, he has a philosophy that cannot be squared with it.

I believe Aristotle was more White than those inhabiting Greece today.

Besides being hated for being White, Aristotle is hated for being logical and empirical. They would love to replace him with a Black Aristotle, if they can find one. They are planning to put Harriet Tubman on the $20 bill, but she was no Aristotle.

Update: This article and video claim that romantic love is part of White culture, and only invented in 18th century Western Europe.