The rage we should have: Comments on Myisha Cherry's The Case for Rage

AbstractIn The Case for Rage, Myisha Cherry demonstrates that antiracist rage can be instrumentally valuable, a fitting response to racism, and, therefore, wrong for us to dismiss. That is, on Cherry's account, antiracist anger is useful, fitting, and (in some sense) permissible. In this article, I argue that we should go beyond saying that this antiracist rage is permissible, that the correct thing to say is that people should have antiracist anger, and that anger should be of a (somewhat) specific intensity. I further argue that this antiracist anger must also involve action, because the mere experiencing of Lordean rage is not a sufficient act of “resistance.” I lastly argue that we should countenance more “destructive” forms of antiracist rage as permissible, including what Cherry calls “ressentiment rage.”