Rod Dreher endorses the notion that 'code switching' is lying

Rod Dreher* has a lot of anonymous correspondents. But I think this is one super-misguided part of his recent blog post.

My correspondent — let’s call him Henry — argued with the CRT person over power and identity within corporations. Henry has decades of experience with corporate life. His view is that men and women who have reached the top in most corporations have been thoroughly assimilated into corporate culture — and that defines who they are and what they believe. His interlocutor disagreed, and said blacks in corporations retain their black identity and just engage in lots of “code switching.” They tell white people what the white people want to hear. They tell the truth to their black friends.

Henry said that this woman’s view, when understood through communications theory, means that her actual argument is this: that black people lie to white people all the time. Conclusion: the white racists have been right all along. Black people cannot be trusted when they talk to whites.

Understand that we're getting this account of what the corporate trainer said third-hand, so I have some questions about the accuracy of how it's characterized. Nonetheless, Henry's understanding of code switching seems to me to be misinformed.

Code switching, as I understand it -- and hey, I'm not Black, so I've never had to do it -- isn't lying, but rather attempting to communicate in the vernacular of whatever setting you're in. White people don't generally have to code switch because their vernacular tends to be the dominant one. And yes, I suppose it means that the person doing the code switching obscures some part of their "authentic" self to do so, but that doesn't strike me as lying.

Put it this way: If Black people didn't code switch in corporate settings, Dreher would be writing a post complaining about ebonics.

Anyway, here is a good post from last year, "Code-Switching Is Not Trying to Fit in to White Culture, It’s Surviving It."

For African Americans, it is a performative expression that has not only helped some of us thrive in mainstream culture—it has helped many of us simply survive.

Dr. Dione Mahaffey, an Atlanta-based business psychologist and coach, says the very notion of code-switching is draining, but asserts that the practice has been most beneficial as she progressed in her career.

“It’s exhausting, but I wouldn’t go as far to call it inauthentic, because it’s an authentic part of the Black American experience,” Mahaffey says. “Code-switching does not employ an inauthentic version of self, rather, it calls upon certain aspects of our identity in place of others, depending on the space or circumstance. It’s exhausting because we can actually feel the difference.”

Anyway: It's frustrating to see Dreher take a common practice and interpret in the worst possible way for the Black people who practice it. (Typical, though.) For all his smarts, Dreher shows little evidence of considering what the world must look like through the eyes of Black people, or even having read much. He's incurious, which makes him stupid. He could do better. He chooses not to.

* The man gets my goat for some reason. I'll try not to make this a Rod Dreher shitposting blog.