The deep irony of DiAngelo’s work is that she demands exquisite sensitivity from everyone in all social interactions, but her own gross insensitivity is displayed on virtually every page.

For many people, 2020 was a nightmare that refused to end. For Robin DiAngelo, it was a very good year. In the aftermath of the George Floyd riots, her book White Fragility, surged to the top of the bestseller list. It sold more than 100,000 copies, making her a wealthy woman. This summer, DiAngelo released her newest work, Nice Racism. The most interesting feature of this book can be summarized in three words: It didn’t sell.
On the face of it, there is nothing extraordinary in the collapse of a mediocre book. Bad books drop from the printing press into obscurity every day. Normally, though, the author’s previous work is not still listed by the New York Times. How did DiAngelo’s bright moment pass so quickly? What does this mean for the ongoing debate over Critical Race Theory?
DiAngelo’s work has already received intense criticism from writers across the political spectrum. They found it condescending, hypocritical, or just racist. These charges are probably fair, though it can be difficult to judge, because DiAngelo’s meandering narrative does not readily cohere into a cohesive argument. To a certain extent, this is probably intentional. DiAngelo (under the influence of deconstructionists like Michael Foucault) has a fraught relationship with rational discourse, which she tends to see as an instrument of oppression. She describes herself as an expert in “discourse analysis,” which in her own words is, “a method for identifying how language positions speakers in relation to social others in recognition that language is sociopolitical, not simply a neutral transmitter of a person’s core ideas or self.”
The goal of discourse analysis, in other words, is to look past the truth claims that people make, and instead assess tone, terminology, and the broader social and political context. Who speaks the most, and with whom do they agree or disagree? How do people’s claims and arguments reflect and affect their own social status, and that of their interlocutors?
Within reasonable limits, this sort of analysis can sometimes yield helpful insights. Nearly everyone has the occasional Foucauldian moment, when they notice the nefarious potentialities of narrative. For DiAngelo though, “discourse analysis” seems to have swamped all other forms. She isn’t really in the business of making arguments, or responding to other people’s. On one level, Nice Racism is clearly a follow-up to White Fragility, which was one of the most hotly discussed (and heavily critiqued) books of 2020. But DiAngelo offers almost nothing by way of direct rebuttals, or responses of any kind to identifiable public writers. A few stray paragraphs are devoted to a flyby dismissal of John McWhorter, one of her most eloquent critics, but for the most part she devotes page after weary page to shadow-boxing anonymous detractors, whom we meet through DiAngelo’s anecdotes. She seems to find ignorant, insensitive people around every corner: on airplanes, in taxi rides, and of course, in the diversity seminars that she facilitates for a living. Unsurprisingly, these faceless interlocutors are easily vanquished. One hardly needs reasoned discourse to defeat such opponents.
An Insensitive Subject
As a reviewer, it is difficult to know what to say about such a book. Even when I disagree intensely with a book’s content, I normally try to do the author the courtesy of engaging his argument directly. This book, though, just doesn’t quite rise to the level of argument. Beyond that, the author herself seems to have objections to reasoned discourse. Also, there is the issue of redundancy. I could repeat the critiques of McWhorter, Jonathan Haidt, and others who have already written articulate responses to DiAngelo’s views. Since they remain on the table unanswered, this doesn’t feel particularly worthwhile. It really is not possible to advance the dialectic, because that isn’t a game that DiAngelo plays.
With no argument worthy of the name, readers may find themselves looking back at the author herself. By the end of the book, I was indeed overwhelmed with both pity and revulsion for this wretched-seeming woman. Everywhere she goes, people seem to be shouting, crying, or storming away in disgust. The problem is not limited to her fellow whites! DiAngelo also tells stories about offending or alienating BIPOC friends and associates. One cannot but notice that there is a common denominator across all of these unhappy anecdotes. It’s not white fragility.
The deep irony of DiAngelo’s work is that she demands exquisite sensitivity from everyone in all social interactions, but her own gross insensitivity is displayed on virtually every page. She brags constantly about her “expertise” and deep insight, but this façade falls immediately whenever she starts talking about real human beings. She is astonishingly deaf to the nuances of human relationships and human feeling. She cannot understand the complexities of human motivation. A writer like Chris Arnade brings unseen people to life before our eyes; she seems to reduce everyone to a cardboard cutout. She shows no interest in understanding or learning from the people she encounters, or even in finding more effective ways to persuade them. It’s easy to understand why she is constantly offending people. Her entire perspective on the world just feels bleak and dehumanizing.
Examples are legion, but I will content myself with one. In one chapter, DiAngelo rails against white women who speak in her seminars about their marriages to black men. This, in her view, is extremely insensitive. “There is a long and painful history,” she sniffs, “surrounding white women in relationship to Black men.”
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The Library of the LORD, of course, aims to humble us in the dust; but the Torah’s grand design, once we have recognized our fault, is to elevate the heart, and then recreate and convert, through faith, with a justifying, sin-forsaking, sight of mercy in Christ. Revelation both General, Special and Final? In light of Old and New Creation facts, how can you, brothers and sisters, keep the Gospel to yourself?

How can you keep the truth of Scripture to yourself? This, I reckon, was in the forefront of his thoughts, as the Apostle quotes Psalm 19: initially it referred to General Revelation in Nature – this for Paul becomes theological warrant, and biblical impetus, as he cites this song, to blaze out the truth of Christ.
How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? 15 And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!” ..17 So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ. 18 But I ask, have they not heard? Indeed they have, for “Their voice has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world” – Romans 10:14-18.
After all, he must have thought, are the Holy Scriptures not a far superior mode of revelation than solar radiation that illuminates Creation? The Instruction of Yahweh is light-giving, pure and clear; it is worth investing in infinitely more than gold; it is sweet to taste-buds, and God’s own Spirit-utilized power-tool to do the Redeemer’s work; God’s truth, simply put, is the ultimate, exquisite, delight to rejoice the heart.
The law of the LORD is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple; 8 the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes; 9 the fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever; the rules of the LORD are true, and righteous altogether. 10 More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb – Psalm 19:7-10.
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Written by K. Scott Oliphint |
Thursday, March 9, 2023
As Christian apologetics seeks for connections between Christianity and those who would oppose it, so also can persuasion engage in confrontation between opposing views. The two topics, then, far from being mutually exclusive, sharpen each other as iron sharpens iron. As a matter of fact, as we will see, these two topics substantially and significantly overlap, or at least they should.

Almost immediately after my conversion to Christ, I was eager to tell people what had happened to me so they might have the same experience. I became a volunteer leader in an evangelistic ministry, and it was not long before I had the opportunity to communicate to others the joy and reality of my own conversion. I wanted both to commend and defend the Christian faith. One occasion from those early days sticks out in my memory—a conversation with a man who had become a good friend.
I remember my almost desperate desire that this man be converted. I wanted to tell him all I had learned and to defend its truth if needed. I sat down with him one day and began to explain the gospel to him. I talked about God as our Creator. I explained how sin had entered our world through Adam. I gave him examples of sin’s effects in almost every aspect of the world today.
Then I recounted to him the story of Christmas and told him the good news of the cross of Christ, his resurrection, and ascension. I then told him that, like the Philippian jailer, all that was required on our part was to believe in Christ and we would be saved. I flooded him with as much information as I could muster.
As a young and inexperienced Christian, I was greatly encouraged that throughout the discussion, he was nodding in agreement with everything I said. I was ready to defend it all, but he had no real objections. It all seemed to be so seamless and easy. I don’t recall that he had even a single question for me.
When I had said everything I knew to say, I asked him if he was ready to make a commitment and to believe in Christ. He answered with a single word: “No.”
I was stunned. I asked him, given what I had said, why he wasn’t ready to make a commitment. His response still rings in my ears: “Nothing you have said indicates that I need this. I can’t see the need for a commitment.” His response devastated me, though I tried not to show it.
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