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White Man Down!
That’ll get redundant real fast as Republican candidates start dropping out, but former Virginia Governor Jim Gilmore has become the first man to drop out of the GOP Presidential race.
9 Responses to “White Man Down!”
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I know this is mostly hopeless, but was it absolutely necessary to reference his race? I suppose this was an attempt at humor, but this constant obsession with people’s skin color can’t be healthy, really.
You know my opinions on this: I think our constant avoidance with people’s race (I’m significantly less concerned with skin color, which has far less moral significance than race–see Lawrence Blum, “I’m Not a Racist But…”: The Moral Quandary of Race (Ithaca: Cornell UP, 2002), 83-84 for why that distinction is important) is what is unhealthy for our society.
The GOP field this year consists of 100% all White men. I mean, they couldn’t even find an Alan Keyes this year to diversify the third tier. The Democratic pool is only 1/3 White male at the top tier (Edwards, Clinton, Obama) and only 1/2 White male at the top two tiers (add Dodd, Richardson, and Biden). Republicans have never seen a serious Black candidacy for presidency (or the VP nod), Democrats’ had their first in the 1980s with Jesse Jackson’s “Rainbow/PUSH coalition” (say what you will about Rev. Jackson, but that was a serious, top-level campaign). Every Democrat attended the NAACP forum this year; every Republican save Tom Tancredo missed it. To put it mildly, the GOP still has problems with race, one of which is that its leadership and membership still looks like Burning Tree Country Club’s.
I think that when a relatively large and marginalized social class in America a) sees zero representation among the top levels of one of our two political parties and b) considers that party to be actively hostile to their interests, that’s a data point worth noticing. Certainly point “a” lends credence to accusation “b.”
David,
I agree with your reasoning in regard to the GOP candidates being a white man’s club, but I question the wisdom of stating your case in such a confrontational and controversial manner
A case could be made for the argument that the
candidates from both parties are the products of privilege Obama is the only one, that I can think of off hand, who has had to depend on his own abilities to reach his present status, without the boost that a well situated family can give, and , of course, it’s significant that he is a Democrat.
It is apalling that the special problems that the descendants of slaves face are being, not only ignored but denied outright in some circles. As a strategy, though, I wonder if isn’t time for all of societies underprivileged to join forces Descendents of Native Americans, for example, don’t fare well in political representation either, for example. Poor whiles have high hurdles blocking their way, as well.
These groups are not the same, and the challenges they face are different in type as well as degree. There is strength in numbers, however, and uniting at some level, without erasing the differences, to find common cause begins to look to me, like a good strategy. Emphasizing race without acknowledging what the underprivileged all have in cpmmon, runs the risk of promoting rivalriy for attention among them rather than cooperation to work for common goals.
As a nation, we are tipping away from the upward mobility model to one of inherited class. That, in itself causes a gulf between Washington and large sectors of the nation of all skin colors and races. It makes it too easy for politicians to give lip service without truly understanding the troubles and needs of those they claim to represent.
Lynx, I agree with you. Obsessing about race is not really healthy.
David, I’ve asked before, so I’ll try one more time: Can you name some country where explicit racial categorizing and race based social policies has produced a tolerant, open democratic society? The winning localities please? Would you be willing to live there? So far, I can’t come up with any place. Instead I keep finding problems with racial / ethnic group-think and racial and ethnic categorizations leading to situations like Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia.
Domajot, I agree with your post, though I obviously disagree with David’s basic premise. If you want to make a case in a thoughtful, objective manner, you may get thoughtful, objective responses. If you make a confrontational charge, don’t be surprised if you get heat in response. Your points are very well taken – there are a lot of people who are not getting ahead, and race and ethnicity is not necessarily the issue, thouygh in some cases it may be. D. P. Moynahan and others have noted – long ago, I might add – the cultural issues that have been self-inflicted wounds to black American culture. Similar problems exist in many American Indian cultures. A refusal to assimilate to some extent into the larger culture results in marginalization. And yet many Asians, who have been met in the USA with indifference at best, and overt racism at worst, have prospered. So cultural values and work ethic has something to do with success, I think.
What the Republicans (and the Democrats) should be doing is looking for qualified candidates who can perform if elected. The color of their skin, like their sexual organs, really has nothing to do with the candidate’s quality as a person suited for office Administrative work is, after all, conducted with the brain. Consequently those criteria should have no part in the selection and election process. So far, I find all the top level candidates rather disappointing. I much prefer Bill Richardson to Barak Obama, but both are probably competent to run teh nation. they certainly have as much experience, and arguably better track records, than the incumbent in the White House. McCain is unelectable, Rudy doesn’t really thrill me, though I’d vote for him over Clinton, Edwards, or any of the race / gender conscious crowd endorsed by the liberal Democrats.
Orson-
“cultural issues that have been self-inflicted wounds to black American culture.”
This kind of statement makes my blood boil.
My comment was speaking to strategy.
Yours is basically one of blaming the victim., in the order of blaiming a victim of rape for not being able to sleep at night or being afraid to socialize or otherwise not just shaking it off and going on to lead a healthy and productive life as if nothing had happened.
The descendents of slaves have been ‘raped’ for generations, and you preach a smug sermon about self-inflicted wounds! No wonder some victims turn away in disgust and anger! The audacity and arrogance are stunning.
Orson: First, I’d note that there is a performative contradiction in your argument: you critique racial categorization and race-based social policies, but then you turn around and start talking about unique ailments and flaws with the Black community and within the Native American community. Why can race only be legitimately enlisted to demonize and denigrate, but not to remedy and elevate? If it is true that Black people have unique cultural issues that prevent them from effectively succeeding in American society, then that’s more reason for race-conscious procedures, not less–we’d need to target our remedies at their specific problems, rather than assume one-size-fits-all. Meanwhile, I’d argue the same argument fairly has to be applied to White people, returning to William J. Wilson’s 1860 essay entitled “What shall we do with White people,” forwarding as its fundamental question: “Are they fit for self government?” You talk about the wounds Black culture has inflicted on itself. What are your thoughts on White culture? Do you think Whites have a “culture”? Or is it invisible? Is it not inconceivable that we have cultural flaws that are in some way responsible for the centuries of imperialism, violence, chaos, subjugation, and destruction we’ve carried out? Are you as open to examining our ailments as theirs? Until you come out with a full scale critical examination of the comparative advantages and disadvantages of Black and White cultures (are there any areas you think Black culture is uniquely advantageous? Any areas you think White culture is uniquely harmful or toxic?), it’s impossible to evaluate what you’re actually saying.
As to whether or not race-consciousness has ever led to better results than its absence, I’d cite power-sharing agreements in post-conflict Sub-Saharan African states as a critical example–simply being “blind” to the presence of ethnic minorities there is a sure-fire way to bring back civil war. These governments often go so far as to have explicit parliamentary quotas, among other race-conscious policies. We established a gender quota system for the Afghani parliament when we rebuilt their democracy. We demanded some measure of equitable power arrangement between Sunni, Shi’ite, and Kurd when rebuilding Iraq–we’re failing at it, but everyone knows that not trying would have led to even faster calamity. Israel is a Jewish state–its identity is quite properly tied to its status as a haven for a particular group, and I have to think it can do what it does without exploiting its Israeli Arab and Bedouin minorities. And we ended up dividing Yugoslavia along roughly ethnic lines, which is a race-conscious behavior, although quite depressing in its necessity (did the former Yugoslavia enact differential treatment of its various ethnic minorities in the first place?). We can also do comparative work: France has tried the radical colorblindness route, and it’s turned out catastrophically for them–their racial situation is, if anything, worse than ours is, and they had less time to muck it up. So yeah, I’d say there is a fair amount of observable cases where it has been better to take race and gender into account than to ignore it–especially in places recovering from devastating social strife along racial lines–a category America definitely falls into.
Dom: I agree with you on the need for cross- and post-racial coalitions. There’s a lot of interesting stuff that has been written about the turn of the century populist movement in the American south, which tried to bring together poor Whites and poor Blacks on the grounds that they were mutually oppressed by the same economic arrangement. The effort failed as it could sufficiently overcome the “wages of whiteness” problem that Du Bois and later David Roediger wrote of. The time is probably due up for another shot at the apple though, and people like Barack Obama and Kenji Yoshino (whose “Covering” book is one of the best I’ve ever read, any subject, bar none) have been leading the war in developing a path to make such a strategy work. But I think both goals have to go in conjunction–racial and economic injustice feed into each other, and neither can truly be addressed without facing the other.
Race is a very sensitive issue and I think it would be best if commenters try very hard to avoid descending into making personal attacks on other commenters just because they disagree with something.
I would prefer not to have to edit or delete comments, but I will have to if personal attacks are made.
I appreciate the concern for civil discourse. I don’t think anybody on this thread has even approached the edit/delete horizon, but obviously if things get out of hand, a neutral editor’s hand might be useful.