The WHITE elephant in the room. . .
Why is it that so many people are so scared to talk about race in this country?
Statistically speaking, it's one of the top four factors that affect income, education level, infant mortality rate and other critical quality (and quantity) of life issues.
There is this myth of equality that I keep hearing from 'good Americans' who "are proud to be in America, where at least (they) know (they're) free." It's an accepted, unassailable part of the deep, structural and blinding prejudice that makes up our society. And it's presence is even more starkly shown by the intense denial mechanisms so many have had to create to allow it to survive.
A group of white high school students, when forced to allow blacks to sit under 'their' tree, responded by hanging nooses from it. If a bunch of skinheads hung a "Wilkommen zu Auschwitz" sign on a tree that they were told Jews would be allowed to sit under, would you tell those Jewish students that it was "just a joke" and to just get over it?
Consider the strategies of Republican operatives to portray Sen. Obama as an Arab and a Muslim. If they did not believe that bigotry and hatred ran rampant through our country, why would they bother? McCain himself felt this when he ran against Bush and was accused of being a white man with a black child. In response to these claims, who said; so what? Or, how is that relevant?
Media stories on the Obama and McCain smears focussed on the whether these smears were true or not, but never examined the more important issue of how they could be smears in the first place in the 21st century. Imagine for a moment that Democratic operatives launched an aggressive campaign that duped voters into believing that McCain was Spanish and a Methodist. After pointing out the obvious facts that he is neither, wouldn't you want a news story to tell you why they would do this? Wouldn't you expect the story itself to be questioning the sanity of the operatives, rather than their facts or morality?
When a older white man thought it was the funniest thing in the world to make an Obama monkey doll and call him "Little Hussein" at a McCain rally, did anyone not get it? Did anyone think, that's weird, why would he do that?
What if an older black man went to an Obama rally with a doll in a white hood and robes with McCain printed on it? What if he danced it around as the crowd around him smiled and laughed approvingly on camera? Would you demand that Obama denounce these kinds of actions?
What if there was a nationally broadcast Democratic pundit radio host that said that Republicans were engaged for the last thirty years in a movement, a religion of hate, hate, hate for this country and its liberal policies, that it was a US Council for World Freedom, anti-constitutional, anti-American educational movement, and that McCain, Hagee and GOP lawyers were right up to their distended jowls in it? Would you demand that Obama denounce this kind of hate-based support? What if instead Obama sent Sen. Biden to appear on this show where Biden also attacked those GOP lawyers?
What if after all of these actions people were shouting out at Obama rallys that McCain and Palin were secessionists, para-military fanatics, and that they should be killed? What if, when directly accused of racism at his rallies and of fostering it, Obama just said those claims weren't true and didn't denounce the racists themselves or state that racism had no place in a political campaign?
Again, my point here is not to discuss the presidential campaign, but to take this opportunity to examine the story that corporate media and the general public won't or can't talk about, the enormous white elephant in the room of our society.
Update
Statistically speaking, it's one of the top four factors that affect income, education level, infant mortality rate and other critical quality (and quantity) of life issues.
There is this myth of equality that I keep hearing from 'good Americans' who "are proud to be in America, where at least (they) know (they're) free." It's an accepted, unassailable part of the deep, structural and blinding prejudice that makes up our society. And it's presence is even more starkly shown by the intense denial mechanisms so many have had to create to allow it to survive.
A group of white high school students, when forced to allow blacks to sit under 'their' tree, responded by hanging nooses from it. If a bunch of skinheads hung a "Wilkommen zu Auschwitz" sign on a tree that they were told Jews would be allowed to sit under, would you tell those Jewish students that it was "just a joke" and to just get over it?
Consider the strategies of Republican operatives to portray Sen. Obama as an Arab and a Muslim. If they did not believe that bigotry and hatred ran rampant through our country, why would they bother? McCain himself felt this when he ran against Bush and was accused of being a white man with a black child. In response to these claims, who said; so what? Or, how is that relevant?
Media stories on the Obama and McCain smears focussed on the whether these smears were true or not, but never examined the more important issue of how they could be smears in the first place in the 21st century. Imagine for a moment that Democratic operatives launched an aggressive campaign that duped voters into believing that McCain was Spanish and a Methodist. After pointing out the obvious facts that he is neither, wouldn't you want a news story to tell you why they would do this? Wouldn't you expect the story itself to be questioning the sanity of the operatives, rather than their facts or morality?
When a older white man thought it was the funniest thing in the world to make an Obama monkey doll and call him "Little Hussein" at a McCain rally, did anyone not get it? Did anyone think, that's weird, why would he do that?
What if an older black man went to an Obama rally with a doll in a white hood and robes with McCain printed on it? What if he danced it around as the crowd around him smiled and laughed approvingly on camera? Would you demand that Obama denounce these kinds of actions?
What if there was a nationally broadcast Democratic pundit radio host that said that Republicans were engaged for the last thirty years in a movement, a religion of hate, hate, hate for this country and its liberal policies, that it was a US Council for World Freedom, anti-constitutional, anti-American educational movement, and that McCain, Hagee and GOP lawyers were right up to their distended jowls in it? Would you demand that Obama denounce this kind of hate-based support? What if instead Obama sent Sen. Biden to appear on this show where Biden also attacked those GOP lawyers?
What if after all of these actions people were shouting out at Obama rallys that McCain and Palin were secessionists, para-military fanatics, and that they should be killed? What if, when directly accused of racism at his rallies and of fostering it, Obama just said those claims weren't true and didn't denounce the racists themselves or state that racism had no place in a political campaign?
Again, my point here is not to discuss the presidential campaign, but to take this opportunity to examine the story that corporate media and the general public won't or can't talk about, the enormous white elephant in the room of our society.
Update
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