They're taking down hacking videos in the name of anti-racism? I don't know about that...

YouTube doesn't have a defined policy because they say if they do, the racists will abide by it while finding ways to still be racist that don't violate the policy. By not having a defined policy, they can declare anything racist. It's not that they're declaring hacking videos to be racist, it's that they're using the perceived threat of racists using the letter of the law to continue to post racist content as a way of not needing to justify their deletion of anything on any topic without explanation. If racism didn't exist, YouTube would want to invent it to justify their policy of not having a defined content policy.

> YouTube & co could not have been more lucky that an entire segment of the culture came up with the perfect catch-all term to enable them to walk back their horrible business blunders.

I don't think they were lucky at all. There's always a "ism" assholes can hide behind to justify their actions, whether it's Racism, Terrorism, Communism, Nazism... etc. As well as the timeless "Think of the Children" shtick.

Racism is a particularly effective vehicle today, as it deals with conditions common in a globalized society. It has the added bonus of being seen to transcend ideology (in many of the same ways Nazism did in America during WWII). This makes the effects of its invocation extremely fluid and potent throughout the culture.

It's becoming painstakingly difficult to be actively against all of the overwhelming misinformation leveled one's way, because anti-racism's tenants are so easily generalized.