Red-Baiting and Racism: Socialism as the New Black Bogeyman
Throughout the first six months of his administration, President Obama--perhaps one of the most politically cautious leaders in contemporary history--has been routinely portrayed as a radical by his opponents on the far-right. In particular, persons who have apparently never actually studied Marxism (or if they did, managed to somehow find therein support for such things as bailing out banks and elite corporations) contend that Obama is indeed a socialist. Reducing all government action other than warmaking to part of a larger socialist conspiracy, the right contends that health care reform is socialist, capping greenhouse gas emissions is socialist, even providing incentives for driving fuel efficient cars is socialist. That the right insists upon Obama's radical-left credentials, even as they push an Obama=Hitler meme (something they apparently think is fair, since, after all the Nazis were National Socialists, albeit the kind who routinely murdered the genuine article) only speaks to the special brand of crazy currently in vogue among the nation's reactionary forces.
As real socialists laugh at these clumsily made broadsides, and as scholars of actual socialist theory try and explain the absurdity of the analogies being drawn by conservative commentators, a key point seems to have been missed, and it is this point that best explains what the red-baiting is actually about.
It is not, and please make note of it, about socialism. Or capitalism. Or economics at all, per se. After all, President Bush was among the most profligate government spenders in recent memory, yet few ever referred to him in terms as derisive as those being hurled at Obama. Even when President Clinton proposed health care reform, those who opposed his efforts, though vociferous in their critique, rarely trotted out the dreaded s-word as part of their arsenal. They prattled on about "big government," yes, but not socialism as such. Likewise, when Ronald Reagan helped craft the huge FICA tax hike in 1983, in a bipartisan attempt to save Social Security, few stalwart conservatives thought to call America's cowboy-in-chief a closet communist. And many of the loudest voices at the recent town hall meetings--so many of which have been commandeered by angry minions ginned up by talk radio--are elderly folk whose own health care is government-provided, and whose first homes were purchased several decades ago with FHA and VA loans, underwritten by the government, for that matter. Many of them no doubt reaped the benefits of the GI Bill, either directly or indirectly through their own parents.
It is not, in other words, a simple belief in smaller government or lower taxes that animates the near-hysterical cries from the right about wanting "their country back," from those who have presumably hijacked it: you know, those known lefties like Tim Geithner and Rahm Emanuel. No, what differentiates Obama from any of the other big spenders who have previously occupied the White House is principally one thing--his color. And it is his color that makes the bandying about of the "socialist" label especially effective and dangerous as a linguistic trope. Indeed, I would suggest that at the present moment, socialism is little more than racist code for the longstanding white fear that black folks will steal from them, and covet everything they have. The fact that the fear may now be of a black president, and not just some random black burglar hardly changes the fact that it is fear nonetheless: a deep, abiding suspicion that African American folk can't wait to take whitey's stuff, as payback, as reparations, as a way to balance the historic scales of injustice that have so long tilted in our favor. In short, the current round of red-baiting is based on implicit (and perhaps even explicit) appeals to white racial resentment. It is Mau-Mauing in the truest sense of the term, and especially since Obama's father was from the former colonial Kenya! Unless this is understood, left-progressive responses to the tactic will likely fall flat. After all, pointing out the absurdity of calling Obama a socialist, given his real policy agenda, will mean little if the people issuing the charge were never using the term in the literal sense, but rather, as a symbol for something else entirely.
To begin with, and this is something often under-appreciated by the white left, to the right and its leadership (if not necessarily its foot-soldiers), the battle between capitalism and communism/socialism has long been seen as a racialized conflict. First, of course, is the generally non-white hue of those who have raised the socialist or communist banner from a position of national leadership. Most such places and persons have been of color: China, Vietnam, North Korea, Cuba, assorted places in Latin America from time to time, or the Caribbean, or in Africa. With the exception of the former Soviet Union and its immediate Eastern European satellites--which are understood as having had state socialism foisted upon them, rather than having it freely chosen through their own revolutions from below--Marxism in practice has been a pretty much exclusively non-white venture.
And even the Russians were seen through racialized lenses by some of America's most vociferous cold warriors. To wit, consider what General Edward Rowney, who would become President Reagan's chief arms negotiator with the Soviets, told Manning Marable in the late 1970s, and which Marable then recounted in his book, The Great Wells of Democracy:
"One day I asked Rowney about the prospects for peace, and he replied that meaningful negotiations with the Russian Communists were impossible. 'The Russians,' Rowney explained, never experienced the Renaissance, or took part in Western civilization or culture. I pressed the point, asking whether his real problem with Russia was its adherence to communism. Rowney snapped, 'Communism has nothing to do with it!' He looked thoughtful for a moment and then said simply, 'The real problem with Russians is that they are Asiatics'."
In the present day, the only remaining socialists in governance on the planet are of color: in places like Cuba or Venezuela, perhaps China (though to a more truncated extent, given their embrace of the market in recent decades) and, on the lunatic Stalinist fringe, North Korea. These are the last remaining standard-bearers, in leadership positions, who would actually use the term socialist to describe themselves. Given the color-coding of socialism in the 21st century, at the level of governance, to use the label to describe President Obama and his administration, has the effect of tying him to these "other" socialists in power. Although he has nearly nothing in common with them politically or in terms of his policy prescriptions, he is a man of color, so the connection is made, mentally, even if it carries no intellectual or factual truth.
Secondly, and even more to the point, we must remember what "socialism" is, especially in the eyes of its critics: it is, to them, a code for redistribution. Of course, some forms of socialism are more redistributive than others, and even late-stage capitalism tends to engage in some forms of very mild redistribution (as with the income tax code). But if you were to ask most who grow apoplectic at the mere mention of the word "socialism" for the first synonym that came to their mind, redistribution is likely the one they would choose. Surely it would be among their top two or three.
Now, given the almost instinctual connection made between socialism and redistribution, imagine what many white folks would naturally assume when told that this man, this black man, this black man with an African daddy, was a socialist. Even if those using the term didn't intend it to push racial buttons (and that is a decidedly large "if"), the fact remains that for many, it would almost certainly prompt any number of racial fears and insecurities: as in, the black guy is going to take from those who work and give to those who don't. And naturally, we all know (or at least our ill-informed prejudices tell us) who's in the first group and who's in the second one. Thus, the joke making the rounds on the internet, and likely in your workplace, about Obama planning on taxing aspirin "because it's white and it works." Or the guy with the sign at the April teabagger rally, which read, Obama's Plan: White Slavery. Or others who have carried overtly racist signs to frame their message: signs suggesting that Obama hopes to provide care for all brown-skinned illegal immigrants, while simultaneously murdering the white elderly, or that cast the President in decidely simian imagery, and refer to him, crudely but clearly as a monkey. Or Glenn Beck's paranoid screed from late July, which sought to link health care reform, and virtually every single piece of Obama's political agenda to some kind of backdoor reparations scheme. This, coupled with Beck's even more unhinged claim to have discovered a communist/black nationalist conspiracy in the administration's Green Jobs Initiative. All because the initiative is headed up by author and activist Van Jones: a guy whose recent book explains how to save capitalism through eco-friendly efforts at development and job creation. So even there, it isn't about socialism, so much as the fact that Jones is black, and was once (for a couple of months) a nationalist, and has a goatee, and looks determined (read: mean) in some of his more contemplative press photos.
Fact is, the longstanding association in white minds between social program spending and racial redistribution has been well-established, by scholars such as Martin Gilens, Kenneth Neubeck, Noel Cazenave, and Jill Quadagno, among others. Indeed, it was only the willingness of past presidents like FDR to all but cut blacks out of income support programs that convinced white lawmakers and the public to sign on to any form of American welfare system in the first place: a willingness that waned as soon as people of color finally gained access to these programs beginning in the 50s and 60s. But even as strong as the social program/black folks association has been in the past, it has, until now, never had a black face to put with the effort. With a man of color in the position of president, it becomes far more convincing to those given to fear black predation already. It isn't just that the government will tax you, white people. It's that the black guy will. And for people like him. At your expense.
Much as the white right blew a gasket at the thought of bailing out homeowners with sub-prime and exploding mortgages a few months back (and if you listened to the rhetoric on the radio it was hard to miss the racial animosity that undergirded much of the conservative hostility to the idea, since they seemed to think only persons of color would be helped by such a plan), they now too often view Obama's moves to more comprehensive health care as simply another way to take from those whites who have "played by the rules" and give to those folks of color who haven't. Even as millions of whites would stand to benefit from health care reform--and all whites, as with people of color would enjoy greater choices with the very public option that has drawn the most fire--the imagery of the recipients has remained black and brown, as with all social programs; and the imagery of the persons who would be taxed for the effort has remained hard-working white folks.
By allowing the right to throw around terms like socialist to describe the President and socialism to describe his incredibly watered-down, generally big business friendly approach to health care, while not recognizing the memetic purpose of such arguments is to ensure that the right will succeed in their demonization campaign. To respond by pointing out how the plan really isn't socialist, or how Obama really isn't a socialist misses the point, which was never, in the end, about economic systems or philosophies: none of which the folks on the right raising the most hell show any signs of understanding anyway. This noise is about race. It is about "othering" a President who is seen as a symbol of white dispossession: dispossession of white hegemony, white entitlement, white expectation, and white power, unquestioned and unchallenged from the darker skinned other. This is what animates the every move of the angry masses, individual exceptions notwithstanding. Unless the left begins pushing back, and insisting that yes, the old days are gone, white hegemony is dead, and deserved its demise, and that we will all be better off for it, the chorus of white backlash will only grow louder. So too will it grow more effective at dividing and conquering the working people who would benefit--all of them--from a new direction.
Tim Wise is the author of four books on race and racism. His latest is Between Barack and a Hard Place: Racism and White Denial in the Age of Obama. (City Lights: 2009).
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About Tim
Tim Wise is among the most prominent anti-racist writers and activists in the U.S., and has been called, "One of the most brilliant, articulate and courageous critics of white privilege in the nation," by best-selling author and professor Michael...
Connections
Can the police enter one's home without probable cause to do so?
You wrote that there might exist "fear ... of a black president, and not just some random black burglar hardly changes the fact that it is fear nonetheless: a deep, abiding suspicion that African American folk can't wait to take whitey's stuff, as payback, as reparations, as a way to balance the historic scales of injustice that [some people of color might believe has for] "so long [been] tilted [against them], but I wasn't exactly sure if your mention of "burglar" was an allusion to Crowley-Gates or just my desire to talk about Crowley-Gates.
At any rate, I wanted to mention that someone on TheRoot (@ocean) that seemed to me to view the world through the lens of race made, in pertinent part, the following comment:
"I feel sorry for prof. gates, he is an educated, world traveled man and he was still treated like a common black thug by the cops. Obama where is your backbone? If the so called first black president does not use his authority to stand up for injustice who will? I do not think [Obama] is a bad person but he disappointed me by backing down on this one."
The following is how I replied to the poster's comment which may be of interest to this blog:
I fail to see how the president 'backed down' on anything when Obama opined that the Cambridge Police, specifically Sergeant Crowley, "acted stupidly" in arresting Professor Gates for disorderly conduct back on July 16, 2009. As someone that taught constitutional law, Obama knew that he was standing on firm ground when he indicated on July 22, 2009, that he would feel this way about such an arrest when "there was already proof that they were in their own home"!
Let me put it to you this way: You indicate your belief that the president 'backed down,' but Obama knows that without probable cause to make an arrest the officer (Sergeant Crowley) had no legal basis to do so, and the president, who had already heard about Professor Gates' arrest by Cambridge Police, without his knowing all of the facts of the arrest at that time, gave what he characterized as being "a pretty straightforward commentary" on the incident.
As someone that "[didn't] know all the extenuating circumstances," what the president opined was that "you probably don't need to handcuff a guy, a middle-aged man, who uses a cane, who's in his own home." The president did understand that this police officer -- Crowley -- was responding to a 9-1-1 call about a possible break-in indicates that the officer didn't see such a crime taking place himself so there weren't any exigent circumstances present, and it also stood to reason that there would be probable cause for this officer to believe, after Gates had identified himself and proved to the officer by providing his Harvard ID and his driver's license that he was a Harvard professor and lived at that address, for Gates to be arrested for burglarizing his own home, so even though the president admitted that he "[didn't] know all the facts" of the case, it was reasonable for him to conclude that a legal arrest should not proceed without probable cause for believing a real crime had taken place.
Cambridge Police Commissioner, Robert C. Haas, who came out in solidarity for Sergeant Crowley along with Steve Killion, president of the Cambridge police Superior Officers Association, and Sergeant Dennis O'Connor as well, during a press conference at the Hotel Marlowe in Cambridge, Massachusetts back on July 24, 2009, some three days before the 9-1-1 tapes that were released on July 27, 2009, were available to them, were just as "guilty" as President Obama in voicing their opinions about the incident without any of them knowing all of the facts themselves.
I will add here though that for Haas or anyone connected to law enforcement to emphasize that the race of Ronny Watson, the former black police commissioner, somehow proves that Sergeant Crowley might not be an anti-black or anti-brown racist (because it is implausible to believe that a black police commissioner would have endorsed a white police officer fitness to teach a course on "Racial Profiling" if he had judged Crowley to have been unfit to do so) for a white police commissioner might also have given his or her endorsement of Crowley so this argument is not just invalid and racist on its face, but illogical as this kind of argument speaks to an ignorance that skin color should factor into whether an arrest is proper or improper. The Fourth Amendment is color blind.
Commissioner Robert C. Haas announced that an independent panel will review the confrontation between Professor Gates and Sergeant Crowley, but describes the sergeant as being a "stellar member" of the Cambridge Police Department, who had "tried to de-escalate the situation’" before he arrested Gates last week on the porch of his home, and emphatically opined that the Gates arrest was not a "racially tinged" arrest.
We now understand that the sergeant had asked Gates to produce identification proving that he lived at this particular address, and we also know that when Gates left Crowley at his front door to retrieve his Harvard ID and his driver's license, Crowley just walked into the man's home without Gates' permission, and followed Gates to his kitchen from where Gates retrieved these two items I just mentioned from his wallet, and what Crowley did constituted a violation of one of Gates' civil liberties guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution.
"Maybe you do not know, but are you not aware that should a police officer go to someone's home without an arrest warrant or a search warrant in hand that he or she cannot enter the home without permission to arrest anyone that might, in fact, be in your house, even if the police officer should think (because someone else told the officer that he or she saw the person enter your home) unless the officer has probable cause?" As far as legal precedents are concerned, judges do not routinely ignore settled case law that is viewed as stare decisis and just ignore the Constitution.
Compare Dorman v. United States, 140 U.S. App. D.C. 313, 318-319, 435 F.2d 385, 390-391 (1970) (en banc) (warrant required, absent exigent circumstances, for entry into a suspect's home for purpose of arrest), with People v. Eddington, 23 Mich. App. 210, 178 N. W. 2d 686 (1970), aff'd, 387 Mich. 551, 198 N. W. 2d 297 (1972) (only probable cause to arrest needed to enter suspect's home if there is a reasonable belief that he is there). Also, compare England v. State, 488 P.2d 1347 (Okla. Crim. 1971) (search warrant needed to enter residence of third party to arrest suspect), with United States v. Brown, 151 U.S. App. D.C. 365, 369, 467 F.2d 419, 423 (1972) (only an arrest warrant, plus reasonable belief that the suspect is present, necessary to support entry onto third party's premises).
Do you know why the very first thing that Sergeant Crowley said to Professor Gates when speaking to the professor from the other side of the front door was "step outside on the porch" is probably because Crowley had already intended to arrest Gates as a burglary suspect as soon as he had stepped outside of his home, since he knew that he couldn't arrest Gates inside of his home? While Crowley's making such an arrest would be a case of lazy policing on his part, it might arguably be a case of Crowley liking Gates as a burglar if it is true that he had predetermined that Gates fit the racial profile of a burglar that existed in Crowley's own mind.
How can we know this? Because for reasons that only Crowley knows, Crowley believed that "two black males with backpacks" had illegally entered this home. How do we know this? Because Crowley stated in his police report that this was what he believed and because Crowley also stated in this same police report that the 9-1-1 caller had reiterated to him when speaking with her on the scene that she had seen "two black men with backpacks." The 9-1-1 caller (Whalen) never really spoke to Sergeant Crowley, and said that she had at no time ever told him that she had seen "two black men with backpacks" enter the Gates home.
Now lazy policing is not the same as racial profiling someone and forming suspicions about them based on an individual's race, which is why the president said that "separate and apart from this incident ... there is a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately." What Obama means is that it is a fact that blacks and Hispanics are inconvenienced by an arrest by a police officer that wants to speak with them in an intimidating environment like a police station in disproportionate numbers than are whites.
Now what the president did not say on July 22, 2009, is that he believed that Sergeant Crowley racially profiled Professor Gates and arrested him for disorderly conduct because he thought that Crowley was a racist. The point to be made here though is that no matter what Gates might have said about the incident -- and right or wrong, Gates is definitely entitled to voice his own opinion about what occurred at his home on July 16, 2009 -- lazy policing by a police officer in arresting or detaining someone when investigating whether the arrested person might have committed a crime does not necessarily mean that racial profiling has actually occurred.
Here is a case where a black citizen is stopped or "seized" and deprived of his liberty by law enforcement by being arrested when the police officer in this case -- Crowley -- didn't have probable cause to do so, for what was Sergeant Crowley doing standing in Professor Gates' home in the first place if he wasn't invited to do so by Gates?
Ms. Whalen reported having “two larger men” and seen "two suitcases," but said nothing at all about her having seen "two black men with backpacks," so the president felt that Gates' arrest may have been a part of that "long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately." And it now turns out that he was right, for there should have been no arrest, so the fact that Professor Gates or "any of us would be pretty angry" over any police officer entering our home without a warrant and without probable cause hasn't anything to do with Crowley being a white police officer or with Crowley being a racist, but with the possibility that Gates had been racially profiled by Crowley so that he thought it to be okay to use his police powers represented by his badge to just step all over Gates' civil liberties and enter Gates' home, trampling Gates' Fourth Amendment rights to be "secure in [his person and house] ... against unreasonable searches and seizures."
The Fourth Amendment states: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
Among the civil liberties that American citizens enjoy, are (1) the right to free speech and expression, (2) the right to worship or the right not to worship, and the right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures without probable cause. The 14th Amendment added the Equal Protection Clause that made applicable these same civil liberties already accorded by the federal government to all citizens to state and local governments as well, and so despite his not knowing all of the facts, Obama had every reason to know back on July 22, 2009, and before the 9-1-1 tape was officially released, that Cambridge Police had "acted stupidly" in arresting his friend Gates for disorderly conduct.
For you to refer to President Obama as a "so called first black president" is insulting when you know that he is, in fact, the first black person elected to the US presidency, and for you to suggest that he "does not use his authority to stand up for injustice" when despite his not knowing "what role race played in [the arrest]," if at all(!), the president went on to say "Number 1, any of us would be pretty angry, Number 2, ... the Cambridge Police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when ... there was already proof that they were in their own home, and Number 3, ... "separate and apart from this incident ... there is a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately."
What would you have had, to quote you here, the "so called first black president" to have done when although he is the Chief Law Enforcement Officer in this country, the president didn't know all of the facts at the time he spoke and wasn't himself running an investigation from the White House of the matter, was he? Wouldn't the president's conducting any investigation at all of the matter really be a function of the Justice Department?
First!
...I hope, given the delay.
This is a vital element of the discussion, and one I hadn't even considered, yet another good reminder of how whiteness . I had always found the irony of a German philosopher being embraced by brown and black people the world over
That having been said, there's a few points I'd make. For one thing, you seem to reconstruct (though you of course know better) the myth that it was only Bolsheviks and happy Russians in 1917. Rather, there were all sorts of left initiatives, and very broad-reaching hate of the Tsarists. The Bolsheviks did impose their concept of socialism onto the society, one warped even from their own ideas just a few years ago, but there were soviets and Mensheviks and all sorts of alternative views.
As far as Obama goes: He's getting the socialism attack more than other Presidents for more reasons than his race. He IS more progressive than Bush II, and Clinton, and Reagan, and Bush I. That's a sad state about how far right the American political system has come, but in any case, just like only Nixon could go to China, Bush and Reagan could get away with even progressive social programs since their regressive credentials were so well-established. Not so with Obama.
Similarly, we're in a massive depression, so the capitalists are on edge, trying to defend themselves by launching preemptive attacks.
Further, massive government spending for the benefit of the rich is always acceptable. The core hypocrisy of the media and of the elite classes has to be factored out of the equation too whenever we look at their delusional utterances.
But I agree wholly as to your conclusion: We have to yell from the rooftops that white privilege is dead, even when it isn't, in order to continue to keep people from settling into complacence and ending the admirable moves we've been making.
Health care reform, and white rage?
I was so hoping you would speak on this Mr. Wise as I was eager to get your opinion, what with the coverage of the health care reform debate. I have seen a lot of white anger.
Why is it that in almost every town hall setting all across America I see a climate of rage in a sea of whiteness? It gets to the very core of white privilege when it is tied and woven into the fabric of patriotism. I noticed the same climate of outrage during the affirmative action debate. Whites, relatives of whites; and friends of whites who had experienced reverse discrimination were up in arms and protested in large numbers to overturn affirmative action in many states. Some whites got a small taste of what it was like to be passed over because of your color, and they did not like it. Something blacks have had to live with for hundreds of years.
I see white fury spill out when some believe their constitutional rights are being violated and they fly their rage under the auspices of patriotism and the American flag. Blacks look on this and see the same seeds that spark mob-rule racism in this country. Whites become aggressive and speak out in large numbers, turning the democratic process on its ear and in doing so they believe they are holding true to the principles of democracy. Some Whites feel they are losing control of the country when they cry about the constitution and democracy; they turn into angry Mobs bent on getting their voices heard.
It has a racist taint to it, for I have never seen a white president so challenged on his policies like this black president. Whites it seems do not want their destiny to be decided by a black man. When integration was being debated in the south, whites flew the confederate flag- turning out in large numbers to oppose integration. Each person that stood up during Republican Specter’s town hall meeting had a prepared speech, talking points- notes from the constitution and an agenda. White anger- accentuated by white fear. No matter how inept one might believe George Bush was- and no matter how many rights he may have openly signed away, we never saw such dissent; we never saw such outrage with any other president I have lived to see, and I’m 52.
To me some whites are enraged because a black man has their very destiny in his hand; its just not the way its supposed to be. This country has had 43 consecutive white presidents, through thick and thin, no matter the agenda- no matter how contrary to the American way they may have been. They were white men and whites trusted them implicitly. We are used to a white foreman- a white football coach- a white manager- a white Officer/CEO at the heads of our leading institutions. There are whites now who regret very deeply that they voted for this black man; and now may be entertaining the notion of a Great White Hope.
A teaching Moment?
Has anyone noticed?
I saw many a white person being loud and belligerent and threatening in these public town halls over the past few days. Some pushing and shoving too; so much so that several meetings were canceled because of safety concerns.
I wonder how many of these citizens were arrested on the spot for their “loud and tumultuous” behavior. Certainly many were being louder and more abusive than Professor Gates had been on his own porch, and clearly there were security/police officers on the premises.
But when whites shout out of turn and interrupt these meetings (in a public place mind you) they are merely exercising their constitutional rights to free speech. They are being patriotic, representing everything that is supposedly right with democracy. They demand to be heard- and no police officer or politician is going to tell them otherwise. Professor Gates it seems (in the eyes of many whites) was in the wrong for doing the exact same thing.
Town Hall Meetings:
I love the author's comments...
http://blackpoliticsontheweb.com/2009/08/10/do-the-white-thing-the-rise-...
"Remember Emmett Till was not murdered because of racism but because he virtually raped a white woman by whistling at her and Martin Luther King was not attacked by bigots for standing up for black people but for being a “Commie sympathizer.”
See, nothing racist about that at all.
The good thing about America is that you can have racism without having a racist.
Therefore, racism exists merely as a philosophical concept and not a socio-political reality made manifest by small minded paranoid people with talk shows.
Finding a racist is like capturing Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster. Although there are people who have documented proof that they exist, to find one and put him on display is a different story.
So, the town hall militias see themselves as merely upholding that oft overlooked part of the Constitution that gives them the right to overthrow the government.
It must be noted that there is a double standard when it comes to the public expression of white rage as opposed to black rage. I just can’t imagine a couple of hundred black “militants” banging on the door at the next city council meeting without the city’s finest coming out in full riot gear, bustin’ heads and giving them some electric shock therapy courtesy of a taser.
Should African Americans be alarmed that there are “lynch mobs” of angry white folks organizing in the backrooms of country clubs across America, plotting, as we speak, diabolical ways to take back their country.
Ya darn tootin’."
Just like the Boston cop who called Professor Gates a "banana-eating jungle monkey". In his defense he said, "It was a poor choice of words. I did not mean to offend anyone," he told the station. "I am not a racist, I never have been, never will be. I treat people with dignity and respect every time," he added.
Or the 65 year old, Mayor Dean Grose, who emailed images of Obama, calling him the magic Negro- over-looking a lawn full of watermelons. He too denied that his actions were hateful or racial. Deny- deny, deny; even if your actions and/or words suggest otherwise- simply deny.
Even if the actions/ intent of whites at these town hall meetings are tainted by the racial politics of fear and dissent, it is up to you to prove they are being racist; for they would never admit to such a thing. Its simply a matter of preserving our constitutional rights they will say. The hollering- the shouting, the pushing and the shoving and even the death threats. Things police officers would arrest most black men for.
We certainly are not motivated by fear of a black president, they claim. Certainly not racial..oh mercy no! Heaven forbid! All of these white people doing what they themselves condemned the esteemed Professor Gates for doing. Getting very loud and very tumultuous (oh the hypocrisy.)
Hope I didn't offend...
former lurker says hello
I've only just come upon your literature, speeches and debates, Tim, and it has truly coalesced with this article. Reviewing footage from the town halls, I feel like I'm watching an episode of the twilight zone. Worst still, this is happening in real life. People's ability to vote and protests deliberately against their own interests (ie: "keep the government away from my medicare!!!") will forever baffle me. But it is disheartening to know that pro-corporatist (i struggle to call it "capitalist") groups can so easily translate their elitist mentality to another group (middle and lower class white populations) simply by using race. What is miraculous, is that the loudest protesters don't realize how much damage these "capitalists" are doing to their way of life and are ok with the idea that if i'm getting screwed, someone else (usually dark skinned) better be screwed harder. Pundits could ignore what is obvious to us now, because no one is saying derogotory things outright. I am starting to see people make the connection, albeit in very liberal circles and blogs. Finally, I hate that socialist ideology has become demonized in the American political debate. In the same way that Presidents must always be Christian, Presidents must always be "free-market" capitalists. You know you are living in an oligarchy when...