Intention Really Does Matter

John Davidson, Coprolalia and Moral Confusion

(Audio version here)

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The recent furore over John Davidson, a disability activist with Tourette’s Syndrome, expressing the ‘n-word’ at the Baftas while two black actors were speaking has highlighted the problem with a key Critical Social Justice claim. This is the belief underlying the concept of ‘microaggressions’ that the intention of someone who has caused offence or hurt is irrelevant and only the impact of their speech or action matters.

Let’s steelman this position. The best case for it is when somebody says something that is clearly rooted in racist, sexist, homophobic or otherwise bigoted beliefs and when challenged on this says “I didn’t mean it like that. Stop being so sensitive.” If somebody says something that assumes a black person to have a criminal record or a woman to be irrational because they are black or a woman, for example, it does not really matter if, before they said this, they were not thinking “I’m going to be racist/sexist in order to cause distress now.” People can still reasonably feel hurt or resentful at the assumption and correctly identify it as a racist or sexist one.

There is a clear difference between not acknowledging that beliefs one holds are bigoted in some way and genuinely not holding bigoted beliefs. It has been common for people to use a lack of conscious intention to be racist as an excuse for racism. As a child in the 80s, I had a neighbour who frequently started sentences with ‘I’m not racist but…’ followed by something racist. “I’m not racist but I don’t want them (black and brown people) living next door to me.” “I’m not racist but I don’t want my kids being friends with them.” In her own mind, ‘racism’ probably meant something like engaging in physical or verbal abuse of a black or brown person, but, in reality, racism means “prejudice on the grounds of race” so she was, in fact racist. In order to address racism, those opposing racism have had to address claims that believing oneself not to be racist means one is not being racist. That is simply factually wrong.

As overtly racist statements declined, critical theorists of race from the postmodern school of thought which later evolved into what we think of as ‘woke’ anti-racism and is exemplified by the work of Robin DiAngelo moved into the realms of detecting racism as “unconscious bias.” Drawing on the work of theorists like Michel Foucault, they argued that we are all unavoidably socialised into holding racist beliefs due to living in a society in which racist discourses (ways of talking about things) have been so dominant as to simply be accepted as normal. Although explicit expressions of racism had become unacceptable in polite society, we are all understood to still unconsciously hold beliefs like “Black people are unintelligent and criminally inclined.” Their deconstructive methods of discourse analysis enabled them to see racism in statements and actions that were not clearly racist. This was moving into dangerous territory. This was mindreading.

When you start with a belief that racism is happening in every situation which involves white people and people of racial minority and it is praiseworthy to be able to detect it, there is much incentive to detect it everywhere. Imagine a scenario in which a black person and a white person enter a store at the same time. If a white retail assistant approaches the white person first to ask if they need any help, she can be accused of prioritising the white person due to her unconscious racist bias. If she approaches the black person first, she can be accused of being suspicious of black people due to her unconscious bias. Both claims are unfalsifiable because the retail assistant is not permitted to be an authority on her own thought processes. The racism is unconscious. She will be perceived as denying her own racism in the same way as somebody who said, “I’m not racist but white people’s time is more important/black people can’t be left unsupervised.” She must own this as an example of her unconscious racist bias and commit to doing better.

The concept of ‘microaggressions’ is deeply tied into this thinking. A racial microaggression is something which is not clearly racist but can be interpreted as such, often in tortuous ways. Examples commonly given include complimenting a black woman’s hairstyle (this is understood to be ‘othering’ black hair and tie into a history of contempt for its texture), complimenting a black person’s eloquence (understood to indicate surprise that black people can be eloquent) and saying “The best person for the job should get it” (understood, oddly, to assume that the best person will be white). Examples like these naturally lead to protestations from people who meant nothing of the kind that they meant nothing of the kind. It is here that we hear the claim that intention doesn’t matter, only impact does most commonly.

Derald Wing Sue is the theorist most known for developing the concept of microaggressions. He attempts to explain this with an example of a time when he and a black colleague on a flight were asked to move to the back to balance out the plane. He complained that asking people of colour to move to the back of a vehicle was a clear microaggression because of the history in which black Americans were required to sit at the back of buses. The air hostess protested that this had not entered her head and she just needed to balance out the plane. Sue argued that it should have entered her head and the fact that it did not was an indication of her white privilege. Black Americans could not help but consider this context and be impacted by it, no matter what her intentions had been. This has been the common refrain. Whether or not a statement or behaviour is intended to have racial significance matters much less than whether the person of racial minority feels it did. If nine people of racial minority think that such an evaluation is unwarranted but one person felt negatively impacted by it, that one person is to be understand as authoritative.

It is common for people arguing that only impact matters, not intention to use the example of one person accidentally injuring another to demonstrate this. The injured person is equally injured whether that was the intention or not. This does not even work on its own terms. Impact certainly matters in such cases, but the reason that intention matters on a more profound level is that intention is a good indicator of a person’s character and beliefs which guide how they behave and treat others routinely. My husband accidentally elbowed me in the face while putting a tee-shirt on before we married. It hurt no more nor less than it would have done had he done it deliberately. Beyond that, it indicated nothing more than that he could occasionally be clumsy. If he had elbowed me in the face deliberately, it would have indicated that he had a violent temper, was willing to do me harm, would be likely to do this again and I should not marry him. This is a significant difference.

The same principle also applies to issues like racism. If somebody says something racist because they hold racist views, this is likely to manifest in a variety of contexts. There is legitimate reason to believe they might not be suitable for a job which gives them any power over people. If they say something that could be interpreted as racist through an ideological lens while intending nothing of the sort, there is no reason to assume this. This matters. Think of the allegedly racist microaggression of complimenting a black person on their eloquence. If a teacher expressed surprise that a black child could speak well, she should probably not be entrusted with children of various races. If that teacher was encouraging a particularly able student who happened to be black, she probably should. To remove that teacher would remove somebody who had spotted that child’s potential and wanted to encourage it from his life. To send the teacher for unconscious bias training would be likely to result in her only feeling confident to encourage white children in future. This is the opposite of helpful.

There is also a significant difference between being physically impacted and being emotionally impacted. The latter is something we have some control over. When Hamlet said, “There is nothing good or bad, but thinking makes it so” he was overstating the issue. We cannot simply choose not to be affected by cruel, malicious or demeaning comments, especially when they come from people in a position of power or whom we care about. We do, however, have the option of reading others charitably and giving the benefit of the doubt. We can also decide against adopting a mentality in which we assume that we will be underestimated, despised or regarded with suspicion, hostility and prejudice and seek to interpret all interactions in ways which confirm this. This does not only benefit the person who could be suspected of harbouring such sentiments but the person who need not assume this. In The Coddling of the American Mind, Lukianoff and Haidt describe this mentality as a form of reverse cognitive behavioural therapy. (CBT). CBT teaches people not to catastrophise and assume that others are judging them poorly or do not like them to help them function better in the world and improve their ability to form healthy relationships. To go through one’s life assuming that one will be regarded negatively is unlikely to facilitate success and good relationships.

The situation with John Davidson, who has dedicated his life to explaining how Tourette’s Syndrome causes some people to say profane or offensive things (coprolalia - literally ‘filth-babbling’) and improving people’s understanding of it has rather thrown the ‘impact over intention’ tribe into turmoil. On the one hand, the racial slur was not at all ambiguous and the actors, Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo, who faltered in their speech, were clearly impacted by it. The term has too much hateful history not to be experienced viscerally by many black individuals, no matter the intention. On the other hand, coprolalia is well-understood as an entirely involuntary tic that causes the sufferer extreme distress. This is the subject of the film based on Davidson’s life that caused him to attend the BAFTAs - I Swear.

It seems that very many people have been highly reluctant to accept that intention does, in fact, matter, and that Mr. Davidson cannot be held responsible for his offensive utterances. Some have attempted to get past this by denying well-established reality and claiming that he could have prevented himself from saying the “n-word.” This simply isn’t true and has been addressed well by Freddie DeBoer. Others have argued that Davidson needs to issue a sincere apology to black people specifically. The problem with requiring someone to apologise for the effects of a disability has been set out incisively by Laura Kennedy.

Others have attempted to argue that Davidson must be racist for this term to have come into his head at all or he would have shouted something random, but coprolalia is specifically the utterance of offensive terms. This simply indicates that he knew the term to be offensive. Interestingly, this problem also arises with Implicit Association Tests which cannot tell whether somebody is associating negative terms more easily with black people because they hold racist views or because they are aware of racist views. It could, in principle, indicate that somebody has dedicated significant time to opposing racist ideas and so is very familiar with them. So, too, could Davidson’s tic causing him to utter this one.

A much more defensible claim is that, if we did not live in a society which included racist ideas, racial slurs would not fit the criteria for coprolalia because they either would not exist or would not be slurs. This is true. If we lived in a society which placed no significance on race and instead had a history of prejudice against people for their hair colour or the size of their feet, different slurs would exist and be expressed instead. This removes the responsibility from Mr. Davidson and places it on society which is appropriate for this kind of activism. Also, because coprolalia causes people to say the most inappropriate and taboo things in any situation, the inclusion of racial epithets in the manifestation of it indicates that the individual regards the term as deeply offensive. It would be unlikely that in times and scenarios where the ‘n-word’ was used commonly and casually as a descriptor and had no ‘shock value’ that it would be a term triggered by the condition. The fact that it was indicates that racism both exists and is widely regarded as morally wrong.

This does not mean that there is not a conflict between intention and impact in this situation. It is factually and ethically wrong as well as nonsensical to say that because the actors were impacted by the slur, Davidson is automatically responsible for this and must admit this, apologise for it and commit to doing better. It is equally wrong to say that because Davidson had no intention to be racist, the actors should not feel impacted by having the ugliest racial slur thrown at them. It means that discussions of intention vs impact can be extremely complicated and context-dependent. Kiyah Willis addressed this well here. This, however, has always the case and this incident is simply a particularly clear-cut and unusual example of that.

We humans seem to have a consistent problem with accepting that reality is frequently messy and that ethical decisions may often be complicated and require addressing on a case-by-case basis. This is particularly the case with ideological activists who are often keen to lay down some kind of simplistic, blanket principle when this simply does not work. They have a particular difficulty with saying, “This behaviour is, as a general rule, wrong. However, some examples of it are more egregiously wrong than others and that matters. Sometimes it is ambiguous whether wrongdoing has occurred and in some cases, it can be unintentional, which also matters.” This is a problem because, without being willing to consider the details of specific incidents on a case-by-case basis, apply consistent principles, employ granularity and nuance and exercise the principle of charity, blanket ethical stances are prone to becoming unethical and undermining their own good intentions.

This has certainly been the case with Critical Social Justice ‘anti-racism.’ It has lacked the necessary ability to evaluate racism, intent and impact in a layered way that allows for individual agency and could be genuinely helpful to reducing racism. Here is one example of what a layered, granular approach could look like:

• Intentional racism by somebody who holds racist views should be recognised as both stupid and unethical. Such speech should not be prosecuted but argued with as the best way to defeat bad ideas. In cases where such views could affect somebody’s ability to do their job or impact colleagues or customers, it is reasonable and ethical to remove them from that job.

• Racist views can sometimes be expressed by somebody who genuinely does not perceive them as racist. Such individuals should be offered the opportunity to better understand the ethics and social expectations around issues of race rather than cancelled for eternity. If they choose not to engage with this once made aware of it, the same norms as for intentional racism should apply.

• Sometimes somebody can hold racist ideas and express them before recognising that this is stupid and wrong and addressing their own prejudice and overcoming it. This person should acknowledge and apologise for the previous attitude and behaviour and commit to not repeating it and be allowed to become a better person and move on. This is good for everybody.

• Sometimes a statement or action can seem to potentially (and reasonably) indicate racism but not be confirmed as such. The individual should be made aware of this potential interpretation so they can choose whether or not they want to convey that impression. Assume they do not hold racist views unless given evidence to the contrary.

• Sometimes people can genuinely perceive something as racist when it was not due to ambiguity or past experiences of racism. They may criticise this on these grounds and the accused individual may feel indignant about this. The way to resolve this is for both parties to have a frank discussion with a charitable attitude. A successful resolution may look like the person who interpreted racism recognising that they were mistaken or the person suspected of racism understanding why it had appeared that way or, ideally, both.

• Sometimes people can be motivated to interpret things as racist when they are not due to their own political or ideological commitments. They must be allowed to hold their own views but not to impose them on other people. They must accept that they may lose the respect of others and be regarded as racist if they assume others to hold unethical views like racism due to the colour of their skin.

Or it could look different! The important thing is that any ethical and practical approach to addressing issues of race must care about both intention and impact, accept that individuals can evaluate, accept or reject racist ideas, that they are the authority on their own beliefs and intentions, allow for errors to be made and for the possibility of change and value the principle of charity and productive dialogue.

Ultimately, the BAFTAs incident illustrates what should have been obvious all along: impact and intention are both morally relevant, and neither can stand alone without producing injustice and incoherence. The negative impact on the actors was real and thoroughly understandable; Davidson’s lack of intention was equally real and morally exonerating. Once we acknowledge that ethical evaluation requires attention to both the experience of speech or action and the motivation for that action, the supposed simplicity of “impact over intention” collapses.

If we want to reduce racism while preserving fairness, humanity and common sense, we cannot rely on blanket stances or unfalsifiable theories. We must be willing to exercise judgement, accept ambiguity, and treat people as ethical, rational agents who are the authority on their own minds and intentions and also responsible for them. Solutions are not going to be found by enforcing simplistic, blanket rules that stress either intention or impact but in cultivating the complex thinking and ethical consistency to navigate both. The BAFTAs incident was a reminder of what principled anti-racism has always required: acceptance of complexity, individuality, nuance, charity, and a willingness to think case by case.