Comments Posted By Lit3Bolt
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That's right. Black people COULD make themselves not poor, not live in inner city ghettos, not have broken families, not resent white people after institutionalized slavery, lynching, and segregation. If they WANTED to. But clearly, they don't. Therefore, black people deserve what they get, for they have made their own bed. Racism ended in the 1960s. White people have just been minding their own business until all this angry black rhetoric came out of nowhere.
Guys, honestly, what is this message board full of? White resentment. You hate the fact that PC culture has your hands and mouths tied, you hate the greased path incompetent blacks get to office and jobs.
But seriously, other than that, how does "black racism" affect you? Not one bit. Everything is right there in Obama's speech, in context, but context gets in the way of your own pious screed about "how DARE someone hate American and our beloved white people! Black people have every advantage over whites, because they can call us racist, and we can't." Except that you just did. You're so full of glee that you can gasp and point and turn the tables at Wright and Obama.
Read Mike Huckabee's comments on Obama's speech. Seriously, guys, this goes on in black churches everyday for years and years, but you're just milking it now for political advantage.
Also, if you want to talk about politcal correctness, look in the mirror regarding "patriotism" and "flag pins" and "loving your country."
You've set up so many strawmen I get the feeling I'm in a version of The Wizard of Oz.
ed.
Comment Posted By Lit3Bolt On 20.03.2008 @ 10:07
OBAMA'S SPEECH A CALL FOR A VICTIMHOOD COALITION
Uhhhh, didn't Obama address this very reaction in his speech? You're displaying the "white resentment," and also resentment at being lumped together with the racist elements of American society which admittedly still exist.
The statement in full:
In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don’t feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience – as far as they’re concerned, no one’s handed them anything, they’ve built it from scratch. They’ve worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they’re told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.
(So far, so good.)
Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren’t always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. (I was just a kid, so I woudn't know. It does seem like hyperbole though.) Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. (True. I do remember Willie Horton.) Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism. (The first half I don't know what he's referring to, but I definitely know examples for the second.)
Ok, so you've done nothing racist in your life but I agree the white resentment IS there from being sneered at for being lower than dirt, just by being part of "The Man" when you're nowhere close to "The Man" and if you were, you woulnd't be where you are now! You'd be in the Hamptons drinking Scotch and bourbon while watching polo matches.
Look, it's hard, really hard, to get the nuance (well, it was for me). Blacks complaining about racism in a shotgun style approach, lashing out anyone for "acting white" as if they're selling out... I mean, Feminists do the same thing which drives me wild as well. But you have to take a step back and realize it's not about YOU specifically, and being defensive doesn't help that perception. This is why race is never brought up, certainly not in a political context. So kudos for Obama for trying to tackle it, something everyone really doesn't want to talk about. So before you start harrumphing and snorting about Obama lecturing America about race, while you shouldn't feel guilty about what your ancestors did, you shouldn't feel exactly proud either. You could almost do the same thing with religion, or feminism, the genocide of the Native Americans, the Japanese concentration camps, etc. You can smugly point out the worst elements of each and accuse them of reverse racism against WASPy men, but really that's not helping anyone. It just makes you feel better about yourself and makes certain that nothing will change, as Obama said. And any statement that we're "beyond racism" is so facile that it's not even worth addressing.
I'm sorry, this isn't really very clear. But the main thing is it isn't about YOU. YOU don't necessarily have to change your behavior or feel guilty or insulted. Getting defensive reinforces the perception that you have something to feel defensive about. So, you don't have turn the issue around, trot out your black friends, claim Willie Horton never existed and lash out against AA and welfare and all the bad/unhelpful things in the African American community. Obama said specifically against them:
For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances – for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans -- the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives – by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.
Just as much as he called out the white community, he called out his own black community too. Now, we can debate how much he did so, and whether he's trying to have his cake and eat it too, but the fact he even said one damning thing about the black community shows how ballsy he is. I have never heard Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton say anything similar.
Sorry this comment is kind of muddled. But I'm not trying to be an ass, I'm just thinking you might've fallen into a trap I've done before with my feminist girlfriends and black friends. =P
Comment Posted By Lit3Bolt On 19.03.2008 @ 01:49
