but won't participate.....
I'm a white middle-aged male, a bona-fide socialist, Canadian. While I do advocate for progressive policies, I cannot directly participate in US politics. That's not why I came here.
I came here in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, to try to understand how such a rich, supposedly advanced society could let it's own people drown like rats abandoned by every level of government. I came looking for answers. I had no idea how dysfunctional US politics were (and still are, obviously).
Some years later, we now have the results of studies showing categorically that there were differing levels of response, of aid available, to black vs. white residents affected by the hurricane. And that's before we even try to compare Katrina to, say, Andrew. While I suspected race was the major factor affecting the response to Katrina in New Orleans, we now have statistical proof to show that race is indeed the primary factor affecting access to government assistance, more so even that socioeconomic status (a surprise for me, I expected the reverse). Whether you want to place the blame for this fact on municipal, state or Federal government is beside the point, as far as I'm concerned. Assistance programs are administered locally, in the sense that local officials of some sort ultimately approve or deny claims for assistance, or act as 'gatekeepers'. This is a problem, but honestly it's just one of so many problems involving race in the USA.
What I've come to see during the presidency of Barack Obama is that racism is endemic, in no way confined to the 'South', and is perhaps the defining driver of both foreign and domestic policy. Again, I believed socioeconomic status domestically, and 'first-world' vs. 'third-world' would be the primary driver. But no. No matter what the USA has been involved in in Central or South America in the past, it's nothing compared to the atrocities perpetrated against 'rag-heads' (my apologies to Arabs, Persians, Pashtuns, etc) in the Middle East and environs.
Given the importance of racism in driving policy and politics, I would be astonished if racist overtones did not creep into any and pretty much every discussion on DailyKos about Barack Obama, the country's first non-white President. That much was to be expected. But what happens next? I fully support actions taken in protest of racist commenting, trolling, and perceived racism in community moderation. I'm not willing to write off DailyKos as racist, however, in spite of the acknowledged overwhelmingly white membership. Simply because how true progressives (vs. true Scotsmen) deal with racism: when we're confronted, we tend to be more introspective than conservatives, more willing to acknowledge problematic actions and attitudes (ok, 'somewhat willing' for progressives vs. 'denial and projection and amp it up to 11' for conservatives), and usually willing to effect change when needed, provided it isn't personally too costly. For most of us who do not have a self-identity predicated on racism, it shouldn't be a problem to contain our language, self-moderate and steer as a community towards better awareness and more focused action against legitimate trolls and racists.
In other words, I think the boycott is necessary to effect change, but I think it will work and I want to see first-hand how it plays out. I also think Markos is uncomfortable with his role as community moderator, and will have to delegate that responsibility once more. Hopefully not to a single individual though, as burn-out tends to take people out rather quickly, even on fluff web communities with just a few hundred members.