Dog whistle

The term critical race theory has become a dog whistle for the elimination of teaching the history of racism.

In politics, the term dog whistle refers to coded language which is phrased to seem innocuous, but will be interpreted by its intended nefarious meaning by those with similar views. The term's meaning refers to a real-life dog whistle which can be heard by dogs but not humans; in a similar manner, in-group members will understand the coded language by its nefarious purpose, but others will not. The term gained popularity in the 1980s, but the concept, which has similarities to doublespeak, is as old and language itself.

Dog whistles are typically employed in political discourse so a politician can get a rather nefarious message across to their base without stating it clearly and facing backlash from undecided voters. Part of what makes dog whistles useful is that the speaker has plausible deniability. When they're accused of using a dog whistle to refer to its coded meaning, they can simply respond by saying they meant it to be understood by its literal innocuous meaning. However, because using a dog whistle requires speaking disingenuously, it can also backfire later on. For example, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham frequently used the phrase "states' rights" as a dog whistle for the criminalization of abortion. Then, shortly after the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, he tried to pass a law which would ban abortion at the federal level regardless of a state's laws. This caused him to receive a lot of criticism, even from his own party, that he had been lying when he said he cared about states' rights.

Examples

In 1981, Republican strategist Lee Atwater inadvertently explained how his party uses the term "states' rights" as a dog whistle for white supremacy:

You start out in 1954 by saying, "N*gger, n*gger, n*gger." By 1968, you can't say "n*gger" – that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like "forced busing," "states' rights," and all that stuff. You're getting so abstract now, you're talking about cutting taxes. And all these things you're talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is: blacks get hurt worse than whites. And subconsciously maybe that is part of it. I'm not saying that. But I'm saying that if it is getting that abstract, and that coded, that we are doing away with the racial problem one way or the other. You follow me – because obviously sitting around saying, "We want to cut this", is much more abstract than even the busing thing, and a hell of a lot more abstract than "N*gger, n*gger."

Here are several more examples:

• "America first" to refer to white nationalism.
• "Big government" to refer to elimination of social safety nets and corporate regulations.
• "Critical race theory" to refer to the elimination of teaching the history of racism.
• "Family values" to refer to straight white Christian Conservatives.
• "Illegal immigrants" to refer to people of color.
• "International bankers" to refer to Jews.
• "Job creators" to refer to the wealthy.
• "Law and order" to refer to police brutality, especially against the poor.
• "Makers and takers" to refer to rich people as makers and poor people as takers.
• "Personal responsibility" to refer to the elimination of social safety nets.
• "Radical Islamic terrorist" to refer to Muslims or anyone from the Middle East.
• "Real Americans" to refer to white Christian Conservatives.
• "School of choice" to refer to the elimination of public schools.
• "Shariah law" to refer to Muslims or anyone from the Middle East.
• "Special interest groups" to refer to Jews.
• "States' rights" to refer to white supremacy initially, now also for the criminalization of abortion and elimination of gun control.
• "Tax cuts" to refer to the elimination of social safety nets.
• "Those people" to refer to people of color.

Many dog whistles are variations on civil rights slogans, with the implication being on bigotry rather than equality.

• "All lives matter" to refer to white supremacy.
• "Blue lives matter" to refer to white supremacy.
• "It's ok to be white" to refer to white supremacy.
• "Straight pride" to refer to LGBT bigotry.
• "White lives matter" to refer to white supremacy.

Links