Some people may interpret the Black Lives Matter slogan as implying that racial injustice is greater than other forms of injustice. Those who experience other forms of injustice are encouraged to resent or even resist the Black Lives Matter slogan. Thus campaigners against different forms of injustice are divided rather than united.
No doubt this effect is most welcome to those who don't want any of these campaigns against injustice to succeed.
Ten years ago on this blog I discussed a talk by Amartya Sen on Reducing Global Injustice, in which
Sen expressed his opposition to all kinds of injustice and refused to
single out any one kind of injustice as greater than other kinds -
whether gender or race or ethnocentrism or whatever. He argued that different forms of injustice were simultaneously incomparable and interconnected.
I was and remain convinced by this argument.
But I don't think it follows from this that campaigns against one form of injustice are necessarily wrong, simply because they ignore other forms of injustice. It may be tempting to counter "Black Lives Matter" by saying "But what about disadvantaged white lives" - but this whataboutery plays into the hands of those who would deny the existence of racial injustice altogether.
I believe that those who suffer a particular form of injustice should be free to campaign against this form of injustice, without being obliged to simultaneously campaign against all other forms of injustice. Of course there may always be risks in such campaigns: risks of being misunderstood, risks of being deliberately misrepresented, risks of being divided from those who ought to be on the same side, risks of what Mark Fisher called snarky resentment
, even risks of physical attack. But if the recommended alternative is to keep one's head down and suffer in silence, many will think that the fight against injustice justifies taking these risks.
Mark Fisher, Exiting the Vampire Castle (OpenDemocracy, 24 November 2013)
Wikipedia: Whataboutism
Related posts: Global Injustice and Moral Challenge (July 2010)
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