Tag Archives: racism

Deja Vu All Over Again

For reasons only sociologists will understand, Americans have chosen this particular time to revisit issues about the status of women that I thought we’d settled decades ago.

There are a lot of parallels with racism. We elected a black President, but–faced with that stark evidence of progress–the not-inconsiderable numbers of remaining bigots crawled out from under their rocks. So this President “isn’t American” “wasn’t really born here” “is Muslim”  and must be defeated at all costs, even if that means opposing measures that are demonstrably good for the country.

Here in Indiana, gubernatorial candidates have each selected a woman running-mate. At the federal level, our Secretary of State is a woman; when the Democrats controlled the House of Representatives, a woman (gasp!) was Speaker. Everywhere you look, there’s evidence that women really have “come a long way, baby”–a long way from the days I still remember. When I went to law school, women couldn’t even have credit ratings separate from those of their husbands, there were still cultural barriers to women entering the workforce, and young women had few if any role models if they wanted to be anything other than wives and mothers.

Equal pay for equal work? Forget about it!

Family planning? Well, there was the rhythm method and condoms….

What really set women free, what really opened opportunity and set us out on a road to equality was an invention called the Pill. When women had access to reliable contraception, when we could control our reproduction, the world changed.

But just as the election of a black President horrified the throwbacks still clinging to white privilege, women’s steady progress has infuriated the throwbacks clinging to male privilege. (Not that the two categories are mutually exclusive.) There is no other explanation for the eruption of legislation aimed at rolling back the clock. That legislation has attacked women’s rights on multiple fronts (including, unbelievably, equal pay laws), but it is no accident that most of the assault has aimed at our ability to control our reproduction. That ability is the foundation of our equality, and the old men who resent that equality know it.

In this morning’s New York Times, Maureen Dowd takes on the Bishops of her own Catholic Church over their claims that HHS regulations requiring health insurers to provide birth control violates their religious liberty. The column is well worth reading, but her final sentence really sums it up:   “And the lawsuit reminds the rest [of us] that what the bishops portray as an attack on religion by the president is really an attack on women by the bishops.”

Jefferson was right: liberty requires eternal vigilance. Those of us who thought the fight for women’s rights had been won had better go dig out our battle gear.

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Resolving Any Doubts……

Does anyone seriously doubt the persistence of racism in America? Or the influence of that racism on our politics?

Phyllis Schlafly–never a subtle communicator–responded to news that minority births in the US had outnumbered Caucasian ones by explaining that this is a calamity because “those people” don’t “share our values.”  

I devoutly hope they don’t share hers.

A lone statement by a woman who has long been loony-tunes, of course, wouldn’t confirm the persistence of anything. But Schlafly is hardly alone.

Just in the last week, we’ve learned about the gazillionaire from Chicago who was planning to bankroll a SuperPac ad campaign focused upon President Obama’s links to his former Pastor, the not-so-reverend Jeremiah Wright. According to information about the plan leaked to the media, the ads had a decidedly racist cast.

And we mustn’t forget the news that Arizona’s Attorney General is debating whether to place the President’s name on that state’s November ballot, since the AG “isn’t sure” Obama was born in the United States.

The question of Obama’s place of birth is another one of those dog whistles. Most of us hear “place of birth,” but the intended audience hears “doesn’t look like us.” He’s “other.” Not a “real American.”

Look–it is absolutely possible to disagree with Barack Obama on specific policy issues. It is absolutely possible to argue that he has mishandled some governmental function. But most of the crap that gets thrown at this President has absolutely nothing to do with the normal give and take of policy or political disputes. “He’s trying to change America!” “He’s a socialist!” “He’s an elitist!”–all boil down to variants of “he’s black.”

And black people, you know, “don’t share our values.”

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The New “N” Word

I learn a lot from my friends on Facebook.

Yesterday, a couple of people linked to a Slate Magazine report of a poll of Republican electorates in Mississippi and Alabama. The results were eye-opening, in more respects than one: by considerable margins, GOP voters in both states rejected evolution (66% in Mississippi, 60% in Alabama), and believed that President Obama is a Muslim (in Mississippi, only 12% said he was Christian, while 52% said Muslim and 36% were unsure; in Alabama, 14% said Christian, 45% Muslim and 41% unsure).

My first reactions were predictable. 1) A country that rejects science is a country in decline; 2) People who insist that Obama is a Muslim are probably are many of the same people who criticize him for attending a church where Rev. Wright was pastor–i.e., intentionally ignorant people; and 3) So what if he were Muslim? Being Muslim shouldn’t be any more out of the American mainstream than being Mormon or Jewish or Unitarian.

But of course, this isn’t about the comparative merits of different theologies. This is about pathology. It’s about the hate that dare not speak its name.

Another friend’s post hit that proverbial nail on its head. “Muslim” he wrote “is the new “N” word.”

We’ve come far enough in America to make the use of the original “N” word unacceptable, even among people who harbor very racist beliefs. We come far enough to actually elect a black President, and by a pretty substantial margin. That’s progress, and I don’t mean to diminish its significance.

But to dismiss the immediate and irrational response to that election and this President–to insist that every criticism of Obama is grounded in policy differences–is to ignore the elephant in the room.

The “birthers” and their ilk–the folks who insist that the President was born in Kenya, or that he is an adherent of a religion they have also demonized–are intent on labeling Obama as alien, as Other. But they don’t want to admit to themselves–or betray to others–the true source of that Otherness, or the real reason for their animus: the color of his skin.

At least they are true to their own beliefs: they haven’t evolved.

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It’s the Obama, Stupid

Over at Political Animal, Steve Benen joined the discussion over Tim Pawlenty’s recent remark that “Any doofus can go to Washington.” (There has been a good deal of mirth in the wake of that remark, actually–since one interpretation is that Pawlenty himself is something of a “doofus.” ) But viewed in context, Pawlenty seemed to be complaining about the lack of bold action from both Congress and the Administration.

Benen noted the disconnect between Pawlenty’s complaint and the Tea Party’s dark view of President Obama.

“But what I found especially interesting about this line was Pawlenty trying to label President Obama as someone who wants to “maintain the status quo.” For a while now, it was a given in Republican circles that Obama was a wild-eyed radical trying to undo the entire American experiment, turning everything we hold dear upside down. The president, we were told, was responsible for pursuing too much change, too quickly. It led conservatives to stand athwart history, yelling, “Stop.”

And yet, Pawlenty apparently doesn’t see it that way. Obama, we’re told, isn’t radical enough when it comes to change.”

I usually agree with Benen’s analyses, but on this one, he misses the obvious. A substantial percentage of Americans–mostly Republicans–have a blind, irrational hatred of Barack Obama–and unlike the well-documented detestation of George W. Bush, that hatred is not a product of anything the President has or hasn’t done. Those who see an equivalency are quite simply wrong–Bush had sky-high favorability ratings the first couple of years of his first term and didn’t really hit bottom until after he was re-elected. In other words, as we got to know him, many of us came to loathe him. But it wasn’t immediate, and it wasn’t rooted in who he was. It was a reaction to what he did.

The animosity to Obama was immediate–even before he assumed office. And it is hard to believe that most of the animus–the accusations of “otherness,” the reluctance to believe he wrote his own books and excelled at Harvard and the like–aren’t a product of his skin color.

If Barack Obama suddenly walked on water, cured lepers with a touch, and had a halo, these people would accuse him of being an extraterrestrial invader.

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When Will We Ever Learn?

I wasn’t one of those people who believed the election of Barack Obama was a sign we’d entered a “post-racial” society. But I also failed to appreciate the extent of racism that still festers in this country. The unremitting attacks on Obama personally–attacks utterly unconnected to any policy disputes and clearly motivated by outrage over his very existence–have shocked me.

Donald Trump’s racially-motivated slurs don’t just reflect his own long-standing bigotry (in the 1970s, the Department of Justice sued him for refusing to rent to African-Americans); they also are tacit recognition that a large percentage of the remaining hard-core GOP base is racist. Periodically, leaked emails and “jokes” from Republican officeholders and party officials confirm our worst suspicions: the Obama family portrayed as monkeys, the White House shown in the middle of a watermelon patch. Pretty disgusting stuff.

As if we needed added confirmation, yesterday the Tulsa World reported that during a debate on a bill to eliminate Affirmative Action in state government, Oklahoma State Senator Sally Kern testified in favor of the bill, saying : “We have a high percentage of blacks in prison, and that’s tragic, but are they in prison just because they are black or because they don’t want to study as hard in school?  I’ve taught school and I saw a lot of people of color who didn’t study hard because they said the government would take care of them.”

As appalling as her testimony was, the thought of this woman teaching is arguably more frightening. But of course, she is still teaching, and so are all of the people who pretend that their attacks on the President–their insistence that he is not a “real” citizen, their denial of his academic achievements–are just political differences of opinion. Those of us who enable them by refusing to call these attacks what they are, are also teaching. And the lesson is an ugly one.

What was the refrain from that old song from South Pacific? You’ve got to be taught to hate.