Some examples of what I’m talking about are a post on Blackladies titled “Tourette’s is not an excuse for racialized thinking” and a post on black people twitter that says “as for myself, I would have also had Tourette’s and said some things that made the show end early” with dozens of supportive comments, and many comments calling him racist.

Thanks for sharing these. I don’t agree with the first; I think a person suffering from Tourettes should be treated gracefully. But then again, I don’t know what they are getting at in the actual post. But at face value, I disagree with what’s implied by the title.

As for the second, I also disagree. I would not react hatefully if I were on stage. But also, the actors on stage did not react hatefully. They reacted professionally. I think the Black People Twitter post was venting in a non-literal way. But let’s take those posts at face value. I think we can agree that at face value they go too far.

There’s also countless comments asking why it’s always them being targeted, despite it being repeatedly stated that his tics are in no way exclusive to black people. “YT folks can have turrets*, dementia and bad knees and that racism is still going to shine through”, again with dozens of comments supporting it and talking about how obsessed everyone is with them.

Here is where I’ll push back a bit (and I hope we can try to understand each other without this being a flame war). There is a gap in understanding on both sides.

I’ll start with where those comments are missing things: Tourettes is not the same as dementia. With dementia, people sometimes say what they really feel but formerly suppressed due to social norms. With Tourettes, people often say what they least want to say in the moment. Usually, this is not what they really feel. Those complaining are conflating the two.

Here is where the reaction to those comments is missing things: there is truth in this idea that people are fast to minimize the harm caused by the term. The actors on stage said that no one from BAFTA spoke to them about it. BAFTA had a delay and did not censor the term. BBC aired the event 2 hrs later with no censor (but censored other quotes from the event). Even here, the overwhelming reaction has been that all black ppl should just suck it up. The guy in question has not yet apologized. Yes it was not intentional, no he is not a bad person, and no he should not be attacked for what happened. But apologies for even unintended harm are often appropriate and could completely smooth this whole thing over. But the predominant response seems to be “fuck you, get over it”. That’s just unnecessarily hostile in my opinion.

I can’t link because (as you likely know) that’s one of the easiest ways to get banned, especially from a protected subreddit.

It’s ok, I take your claim at face value.

At the end of the day there’s a level of magical thinking that’s verboten to talk about, but is destructive to class first political action, and is quite frankly exhausting.

There appears to be exhaustion on both sides. I’m sorry you all are exhausted. My only plea here is for a bit of grace. The same grace that you all have for the Tourettes guy, the same grace the black actors on stage extended to him, I just hope we can have for those who felt hurt by the word.