OK, I'll say it... we are too sensitive

It is certainly popular to illogically judge people from different era’s applying today’s moral code.

A moral relativist would say that our values today can't be compared with the values from another era. What was right for them was right for them. What is right for us is right for us.

The philosopher Miranda Fricker is not a moral relativist, but she thinks the test for blameworthiness is whether the person could have known any different. "The proper standards by which to judge people are the best standards that were available to them at the time".

It's unfair to blame people for failing to be moral pioneers, she says. "The attitude of blame presupposes that the person was in a position to have done better."
https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-23772194
 


I live outside Philadelphia. Kate Smith’s statue was covered and tied with rope on Friday. By Easter morning it was GONE....only a rust stain left on the pavement.
 
I don't know, I say good riddance. Did you read the titles of those songs? They're horrendous, and I don't think a person would be either uneducated or self-absorbed to be offended by them. There were good people back then that weren't racist, and just because some were accepting of that type of music doesn't mean it was okay.
 
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I don't know, I say good riddance. Did you read the titles of some of those songs? They're horrendous, and I don't think a person would be either uneducated or self-absorbed to be offended by them. There were good people back then that weren't racist, and just because some were accepting of that type of music doesn't mean it was okay.
They're horrendous based on today's standards. Should "Huckleberry Finn" be banned because it uses the n-word repeatedly? Should Mark Twain statues be taken down because he wrote that?
 
I don't know, I say good riddance. Did you read the titles of some of those songs? They're horrendous, and I don't think a person would be either uneducated or self-absorbed to be offended by them. There were good people back then that weren't racist, and just because some were accepting of that type of music doesn't mean it was okay.

Right, but these songs are irrelevant to her rendition of the National Anthem. By this logic, we should reconsider having people like Christina Aguilera sing the National Anthem because she sings songs about sex and tempting men in this "Me Too" era. Where should the line be drawn? In this case in the OP, I'm finding it to be a stretch.
 
They're horrendous based on today's standards. Should "Huckleberry Finn" be banned because it uses the n-word repeatedly? Should Mark Twain statues be taken down because he wrote that?

There is a huge difference between a classic like Huckleberry Finn which was teaching about the wrongness of racism, and songs like: "That's Why Darkies Were Born".
 
Being a racist was just as immoral then as it is now.
I think it’s important not to erase history. Of course those lyrics are absolutely shocking today, and for us, it’s unbelievable that they weren’t considered shocking 80 years ago. Times have changed, and thank goodness. Interracial marriage was legalized in 1967, I remember being shocked when I learned it had once been illegal (and I was born that year). My kids were shocked as well.

My grandmother used to say racist things without realizing it (she lived in a very multicultural city, she’d be 110 if still alive), like “a black family moved in next door, but they’re nice.” We tried to explain why that was a racist comment. She lived in an area not thrilled with Irish immigrants, so grew up as a minority.
 
Right, but these songs are irrelevant to her rendition of the National Anthem. By this logic, we should reconsider having people like Christina Aguilera sing the National Anthem because she sings songs about sex and tempting men in this "Me Too" era. Where should the line be drawn? In this case in the OP, I'm finding it to be a stretch.

To you, perhaps, it is irrelevant.

You can not equate "tempting men/the 'Me Too' movement" with racism.
 
I think it’s important not to erase history. Of course those lyrics are absolutely shocking today, and for us, it’s unbelievable that they weren’t considered shocking 80 years ago. Times have changed, and thank goodness. Interracial marriage was legalized in 1967, I remember being shocked when I learned it had once been illegal (and I was born that year). My kids were shocked as well.

My grandmother used to say racist things without realizing it (she lived in a very multicultural city, she’d be 110 if still alive), like “a black family moved in next door, but they’re nice.” We tried to explain why that was a racist comment. She lived in an area not thrilled with Irish immigrants, so grew up as a minority.

The thing is that they WERE shocking to many. Not everyone back then was racist, many knew better, which is all the more reason that it is a part of history that does not need to be accepted or approved of.
 
My grandmother used to say racist things without realizing it (she lived in a very multicultural city, she’d be 110 if still alive), like “a black family moved in next door, but they’re nice.” We tried to explain why that was a racist comment. She lived in an area not thrilled with Irish immigrants, so grew up as a minority.

That sounds just like my Grandma. She had a neighbor who was black who brought in their garbage can for them when my Grandfather was sick/dying and it was like she was just shocked that a black person could be so nice/thoughtful.
 
Being a racist was just as immoral then as it is now.
Was it?

I don’t think the majority of Americans saw it as wrong 80 years ago.

I don’t think it reached the tipping point and became morally wrong until the mid 1950’s.
 
I don't know, I say good riddance. Did you read the titles of some of those songs? They're horrendous, and I don't think a person would be either uneducated or self-absorbed to be offended by them. There were good people back then that weren't racist, and just because some were accepting of that type of music doesn't mean it was okay.

and this is exactly what I mean. You are judging the song titles from the 1930's which use terminology from that era against todays standards of terminology.

Just because a word in 2019 is deemed racist, does not mean that same term in 1930's was considered racist.

Language is fluid, words and meanings change with the generations.

Look how much the world has changed in the last 25 years, with the digital age.
 
...she thinks the test for blameworthiness is whether the person could have known any different. "The proper standards by which to judge people are the best standards that were available to them at the time".

It's unfair to blame people for failing to be moral pioneers, she says. "The attitude of blame presupposes that the person was in a position to have done better."


This makes sense to me, and in general, I do think we're too sensitive. Blaming people in history for not knowing what we know now is like blaming a five-year-old for not knowing algebra.

That said, 80 years ago was 1939, so almost as much time had passed between the Emancipation Proclamation and then as between then and now. I'm pretty sure there were already people who knew better, as far as "best standards available" goes.

But I'm still not sure we should take away something this particular woman did many years later because of what she did before she knew better. It's highly likely that by the time she sang for the Flyers, she was appalled at her earlier playlists as well.
 

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