Brainwashed in Denver

Twentieth century totalitarian Communism required rigorous thought reform. That is, brainwashing. Cadres and even everyday people were implored to engage in sessions of public self-criticism, the better to cleanse their minds of counterrevolutionary thoughts and feelings.

Comrade Lenin opened the box in 1920:

Frankly admitting a mistake, ascertaining the reasons for it, analysing the circumstances which gave rise to it, and thoroughly discussing the means of correcting it—that is the earmark of a serious party.

Lenin added this in 1922:

Revolutionaries "grew conceited, failed to see where their strength lay, and feared to speak of their weaknesses. But we shall not perish, for we do not fear to speak of our weaknesses and shall learn to overcome them".

Chairman Mao prescribed the “conscientious practice” of self-criticism. He says that”

…dust will accumulate if a room is not cleaned regularly, our faces will get dirty if they are not washed regularly. Our comrades' minds and our Party's work may also collect dust, and also need sweeping and washing.

You might have thought that this practice would have expired with Communism. You would have been wrong. Nowadays, idiot liberal Democratic women in Denver, CO are attending self-criticism dinners, at the cost of $2,500 a person, to learn to police their thought, to ferret out the least smidgen of racism and to admit it to their fellow idiot liberal Democratic women.

This, we read, in The Guardian:

 Freshly made pasta is drying on the wooden bannisters lining the hall of a beautiful home in Denver, Colorado. Fox-hunting photos decorate the walls in a room full of books. A fire is burning. And downstairs, a group of liberal white women have gathered around a long wooden table to admit how racist they are.

“Recently, I have been driving around, seeing a black person, and having an assumption that they are up to no good,” says Alison Gubser. “Immediately after I am like, that’s no good! This is a human, just doing their thing. Why do I think that?”

This is Race to Dinner. A white woman volunteers to host a dinner in her home for seven other white women – often strangers, perhaps acquaintances. (Each dinner costs $2,500, which can be covered by a generous host or divided among guests.) A frank discussion is led by co-founders Regina Jackson, who is black, and Saira Rao, who identifies as Indian American. They started Race to Dinner to challenge liberal white women to accept their racism, however subconscious. “If you did this in a conference room, they’d leave,” Rao says. “But wealthy white women have been taught never to leave the dinner table.”

And also:

It seems unlikely anyone would voluntarily go to a dinner party in which they’d be asked, one by one, “What was a racist thing you did recently?” by two women of color, before appetizers are served. But Jackson and Rao have hardly been able to take a break since they started these dinners in the spring of 2019. So far, 15 dinners have been held in big cities across the US.

The women who sign up for these dinners are not who most would see as racist. They are well-read and well-meaning. They are mostly Democrats. Some have adopted black children, many have partners who are people of color, some have been doing work towards inclusivity and diversity for decades. But they acknowledge they also have unchecked biases. They are there because they “know [they] are part of the problem, and want to be part of the solution,” as host Jess Campbell-Swanson says before dinner starts.

As Shakespeare said: “Lord, what fools these mortals be.”

It’s not just the school system. It’s not just the media. The notion that we ought to be living in a nation where we all think alike, and where onemindedness is achieved by warring against bigotry… one’s own and that of our fellow Americans, has taken root in America’s heartland.

One thing is clear: after they cleanse their souls of the last smidgen of racism, they are coming for you.