Is lynching a racist term?

[NotHardUp1]

The president was obviously being melodramatic and narcissistic, but why would his use of lynching be considered racist?

I fully understand the black population's umbrage at the diminishing of the gravity of the term, and that is a valid objection.

But America has certainly seen others lynched by mobs, including rapists, child abusers, and most notably, Joseph Smith.

Murder by mob is what the term essentially means. It doesn't carry a racial meaning except that it becomes as associated because blacks have been the most recent victims, as well as the most numerous.

 

[KaraBulut]

Ah, yes... that white people's lynching memorial...
https://museumandmemorial.eji.org/memorial

And that photography exhibit about the lynching of white people.... forgot about that...

 

[eddielee]

As a word no. Anyone can be lynched. In America, it depends on the context and the way it's used. If I say someone should be lynched, it evokes strong memories of the lynching of African Americans and therefore can be considered offensive. There are no hard and fast rules, just opinions, and I'm sure we will see many on this thread.

 

[eddielee]

I saw a program with Dr Henry Louis Gates, in which he toured a memorial to those who were victims of lynching. Just the tremendous numbers are overwhelming and heart wrenching. How is it possible to be so cruel?

 

[peeonme]

It depends upon the context in which the word is used.

 

[TX-Beau]

The technical definition of porch monkey is a chimpanzee who sits on the stoop, but we all know what it actually means.

Lynching in the U.S. is the legacy of using torture and murder to suppress the civil rights of Black people, usually in the South.

The Orange Horror using that term - especially considering who he is - is particularly foul.

 

[Cormac135]

Whenever i hear the word i always think of black people being hung from trees by an angry mob or the Klan.

Yes i do consider it a racist term.

 

[Alistair]

The technical definition of porch monkey is a chimpanzee who sits on the stoop, but we all know what it actually means.

Lynching in the U.S. is the legacy of using torture and murder to suppress the civil rights of Black people, usually in the South.

The Orange Horror using that term - especially considering who he is - is particularly foul.

I couldn't agree more. In the 70's you'd hear someone complain that we still needed public lynchings. They were never talking about white folks.

 

[rareboy]

Lynching is such a racially loaded term because of its history in the US that it should never be used to describe a constitutional process of investigating a President.

That Miz Lindsey Pittipat Graham, a southern gentleman also then supported the term being used underscored how inappropriate the use of the term is.

 

[KaraBulut]

...That Miz Lindsey Pittipat Graham, a southern gentleman also then supported the term being used underscored how inappropriate the use of the term is.

And perhaps not a wise thing to do when you are polling only 7 points ahead of your black, Democratic opponent in the 2020 Senatorial race.

 

[Sausy]

I'm going to be fair and say that Joe Biden and other Democratic officials, black and white, used the term to describe the Republican impeachment effort against Bill Clinton...Biden has now at least apologized saying it wasn't the right way to describe it. It was wrong then to be used by some Democrats and it's just as wrong to be used by Trump and Graham. Lynching was an ugly part of our even recent history, and though there were some others lynched by mobs the most prominent and most disgusting was its use against several thousand African-Americans which was tactically designed to terrorize and silence the black community. Politically inconvenient scenarios, however unfair it might seem to some, are hardly equal to acts of sheer horror, hate and terror that was done through the lynching of so many people designed primarily to put blacks in their place and make them know who the boss man is.

 

[rareboy]

The term was no better when Biden used it in 1998 in an interview.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/joe-b...F2kTJZTAsf0DeZN5vGSOrYTZQax926CUUGStuAX55a95E

The only difference I guess, is that the person being impeached did not use the term to paint himself as the victim of a mob.

But as Sausy notes, Biden has apparently expressed some regret. Given the loaded history of the term, it should not be thrown carelessly around by privileged old white guys. They may think that it is part of the American Wild West mythos...but in reality it was part of the brutal, racist repression for the first 150 years of American history.

 

[KaraBulut]

The term was no better when Biden used it in 1998 in an interview...

And he should have known better after it was misused in his presence in 1991.

 

[Pierresro]

The president was obviously being melodramatic and narcissistic, but why would his use of lynching be considered racist?

I fully understand the black population's umbrage at the diminishing of the gravity of the term, and that is a valid objection.

But America has certainly seen others lynched by mobs, including rapists, child abusers, and most notably, Joseph Smith.

Murder by mob is what the term essentially means. It doesn't carry a racial meaning except that it becomes as associated because blacks have been the most recent victims, as well as the most numerous.

The verb comes from the phrase "Lynch Law", a term for a punishment without trial. Two Americans during this era are generally credited for coining the phrase: Charles Lynch (1736–1796) and William Lynch, who both lived in Virginia in the 1780s. Regardless the piece of shit in the white house has to be and will be removed.!

 

[zoltanspawn]

It seems to me opening post has already included some reasons why it is a racist term.

By diminishing the gravity of the term, the history of black people's suffering is diminished, and that is a kind of bias.

The racial meaning of the term is associated with blacks because they are the most recent and most numerous victims. (Though I think TX-Beau has stated it more clearly.) There's no reason for that bit to be omitted from the word's character, and that usage is abundantly recorded by dictionaries.

To me, the conclusion that the term signifies racism inevitably follows.

Perhaps the argument that is being advanced is that the primary, literal meaning does not refer to a racial bias?

That may be. But why advance that argument? Why ignore the established connotations of the word?

 

[TX-Beau]

...By diminishing the gravity of the term, the history of black people's suffering is diminished, and that is a kind of bias...

I hear all the damn time from some of my (ahem) paler relatives - especially in spirit - how White people get shot by Cops and no one says a damn thing! YEAH!

But of course you've nailed the motive - to explicitly diminish the complaint involved and trivialize, and therefore dismiss the racism. Like it never existed. Racism? Where? Criminals get shot by cops all the time...

 

[Dystopian]

"Lynching" connotes hanging by mob action without legal sanction. For POTUS to term the current Constitutional process being carried out in the House of Representatives as a "lynching" is as hyperoblic and ludicrous as anything else that he says or tweets. It is an unfortunate and grossly erroneous application of the term. Sadly, it has an historic association with the atrocities committed against African Americans. Personally, I was introduced to the term through TV Westerns as a kid. I think it is a reach to turn this back on Trump as any more than what it is. This kind of attack can't make him look any more tasteless and inappropriate than he has proven himself over the last 5O or more years. It is however, a flashpoint for his base, making him even more of a sympathetic victim to in their eyes... Frankly, this is the kind of distraction POTUS thrives on, leading us from High Crimes and Misdemeanors and violations of the Constitution to no greater purpose.

 

[NotHardUp1]

In addition to the racial offense, the rank reversal of meaning is so typical of doublespeak and propaganda.

At its core, the term means the bypassing of the law, or due process. And, it was most often prosecuted against the poorest who had no protections. In this cited instance, we have the (allegedly) billionaire president of the US, complaining that the very due process of the Constitution of said country is somehow a bypass of the very same laws laid down by that document.

Of course, the actual meaning of lynching isn't relevant, nor the connotative meanings, as it was, as all Trump distractions, a dog whistle to his base, who won't be looking at the actual or connotative meanings. It was and is a call to "sick 'em!"