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Jeff Gaynor wrote (Tango-L):

"[OK, I'm at a University and feel strongly that scholarship is both
craft & calling. Bad work should not be excused.]"

OK, fair enough. Let's take look at your arguments.

"Political Correctness" is just revival tent moralizing made
respectable enough for yuppies and mostly the supporters of the more
extreme ends of these movements do so on strictly moral grounds, which
in their estimate excuses any other shortcomings."

In one sentence you have used a stereotyping ad hominem: "yuppies",
and an unsupported attribution of the poor quality to discredit the
opponent. Do you base the attribution on suspicion, a hunch, a gut
feeling or on "good scholarship"?

"There have been several books written (such as Black Athena) that try
hard (and with often astonishingly poor scholarship) to support
various claims. The recent "Tango, An Art History of Love" is pretty
much in this vein too: The author, an art historian, knows virtually
zilch about dance or music but writes a corrective tome demonstrating
that Tango is almost wholly African and broadly hints at systematic
oppression to hide the fact"

You didn't present any evidence, instead you make an ad populum
argument:

"(ok, you Argentines tell me if you're a bunch of racists since that's
what he called you.)"

1. Did the author call all Argentineans en toto racists?
2. Do you have any rigourous evidence to contrary? Do you expect the
racists (there are racists in all and any cultures (see below)) to
openly admit they are racists in the post-Hitler times and on the open
mailing list? If you do not expect this open admission, what purpose
does this ad populum argument serve?
3. A good movie made in Argentina and showing casual racism in
Argentina is 'La Cienaga' (2001) by Lucrecia Martel.

"Just because the claim is at least partially valid does not excuse
slovenly scholarship, the introduction of identity politics and
ideology."

Indeed. Is "yuppie" an identity disease?

Racism is evolutionary advantageous (from the selfish gene
perspective), primitive instinct. One of the functions of neocortex is
to be aware, to control, and to subvert the primitive instincts. At
least some "yuppies" among us have learned how to do just that. It's
called "civility".

--
Oleh Kovalchuke
http://tangospring.com