Maybe it is. I don't know. I think using my definition of racism as being prejudice + power properly conveys the difference between a black person saying prejudiced things, and a white person saying prejudiced things. It simply is different, and using the word racism for both situations really ignores the whole context of power and the impact it has in both situations. That's why I look to define racism the way I do. I suppose you can still use 'racism' for both situations, but then it would lead one to believe that black people saying prejudiced things = white people saying prejudiced things. To me, I don't find this particularly true. But again, that's just my opinion.
The problem is, by embracing the left's intelligentsia's perspective wholesale, you've also embraced their brand of racism. Their perspective is little different than that of their counterpart on the right. Only the target is different. So instead of rejecting racism, you instead became racist, then redefined yourself out of it. In your head, it is not racism because it is justified. That is exactly how the right thinks. They hate Islam because it is inherently violent. They are not against any race, only against certain cultures because of their actions.
Similarly, you've made your own justifications. Racism is not about prejudice, it is about prejudice with the power to do something about it. But what is power? You're using it as a synonym for "being white". Durant cannot have power, despite being a multimillionaire celebrity. Why? Certainly not because he has no power in the relevant context . It is because you've defined power as "being white". No black person can have power, despite their actual objective level of power, because they are not white, and thus not subject to your brand of prejudice. In fact, even the current most powerful person in the US, and probably the world, is powerless in your definition, because he's black.
Power is complicated. I lived in the ghettos of Richmond, Virginia, in an area that tops 50 annual murder per 100000. Those people had no power in larger society. Police is reluctant to respond to calls in the area, businesses won't open shop there, and the residents are stuck in a cycle that makes it near impossible to ever improve their situation. The residents are also very racist against non-blacks (which is due to their situation. Everything has a reason, obviously). A Hispanic woman walking through that neighborhood at night would be in real danger, and she would have no power. The leftist abstracting of the problem serves to distance yourself from the fact that all issues are individual that affect individuals. It does this while pretending to be all about lifting the individual. A white person suffering due to race is as important as a black person suffering the same thing. This isn't a game of numbers, and power is a fickle thing when the individual is so fragile.
And that is my issue with the leftist perspective; by proudly embracing racism (as long as it is not by whites, because apparently white people deserve it), they ensure its survival. It is not about excusing racism in a disadvantaged individual. It is about labeling entire segments of society as "advantaged" and "disadvantaged" regardless of the circumstances of the individual. But things change. And when those things change, and blacks/whoever are no longer on average disadvantaged, and someone else is, we know one thing for sure, racism will have survived. And why wouldn't it? Both sides embrace it and encourage it, only choosing different targets. And it is sad, because as you well know, race itself is basically a meaningless designation.
One more thought that I want to get through; white people are not special. Everything they'd done has been done by everyone else. You call what Europeans did colonialism? Hah! Arabs invaded half of the known world, completely erased the cultures and history of the invaded, and slapped the word "Arab" on them. There are half a billion Arabs now, out which not even a tenth are actual ethnic Arabs. And I have yet to see anyone on the left cry about Arab colonizing horribleness and justify racism against them. Sure what Europeans did happened at a more recent time with better technology that furthered their reach, but it was neither unique nor exceptional.
There is much MUCH more to talk about regarding this issue. The foolishness of transmitting guilt through genetic lines. The disaster of insisting mainstream American culture is "white culture". The left's evolution into an anti-success ideology that has become hostile to anything successful from Western culture, to civilization in general, to capitalism, to even being human. And a lot more. But I do need to go back to work.
