Stuff White People Don't Like

1. Being reminded that racism exists and they benefit from it.

2. Black people daring to be angry about it.


Let's take a look at what Senator Obama's pastor said that has the mainstream media in pearl-clutching frenzy, shall we?

“We bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon, and we never batted an eye,” Wright said. “We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and black South Africans, and now we are indignant because the stuff we have done overseas is now brought right back to our own front yards. America’s chickens are coming home to roost.”

OMG he's blaming America for 9/11! Except, not really, if you made it through 4th grade reading comprehension. He's saying when we do things like drop nuclear bombs on civilians, support an oppressive racist regime, and are willing to prop up every totalitarian leader in the middle east who promises us access to oil - we probably don't have the right to get all hysterically self-righteous and "this is the worst thing that has ever happened to anyone in the history of the world" about it when someone uses repellant tactics on us. Blaming Amercia for 9/11? Oh that would be GOP stalwarts like Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, McCain's new BFFs Chuck Hagee and Rod Parsley, and of course, they guy who has a bi-weekly phone call with the President of the United States and advocates beating your kids and dogs with wooden spoons - James Dobson! (That darn America is also responsible for Hurricane Katrina as well according to most of the above.)

Of course, they're not blaming America because of it's foreign policy or human rights abuses, heavens no! If only America had kept gays in the closet and women in the kitchen, we'd all be fine! And lets save some blame for the ACLU and all those other nasty organizations that think people should be able to exercise their constitutional rights even when they're not doing what rich white "Christian" men want them to - the horror!

Look, I get why people are offended whenever there's any suggestion America is to blame for the September 11th attacks, terrorism by definition is never a justified resonse and that's fair. What I don't get is why it's so much more offensive to suggest that America might want to look at how some of its policies and actions might contribute to global violence than to suggest that two guys making out and a woman taking the pill have brought God's vengance on us all. I find the idea of seizing on a national tragedy as an opportunity to whip up the hatred that fills your bank account and makes you a power player in the GOP a lot more offensive, but then, I'm not a member of the mainstream media.

And if the issue is really how candidates are affected by religious figures in their lives, then aren't McCain's connections a lot more of a problem? I realize McCain isn't interested in peace in the middle east, but on the off chance that endless war is not in the best interests of the country, isn't it a problem that a potential President hangs out with a guy who says Christianity exists in order to wipe out Islam and all Muslims, and a guy who supports Israel so that it will start a war that will wipe the country and the Jews off the face of the earth so Jesus can come back? This does not seem like an ideal way to approach international relations, but again, I do not have my own show on CNN.


“The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing ‘God Bless America.’ No, no, no, God damn America, that’s in the Bible for killing innocent people. God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme.”

Still not seeing the offensiveness. Oh wait, he's saying America is RACIST and that black people resent it and he sounds kind of angry about it! I mean, how dare Reverend Wright shatter the illusion that we live in a post-racial America and that a legacy of slavery and opression as long as the history of this county has been forgiven and washed away in the benevolent glow of tolerance. It's certainly not like our schools are still segregated, our drug laws are written to ensure that poor and black people are disproportionatley punished, or that people are dragged to death behind pickup trucks for the color of their skin. Wait, maybe this will work better if I rephrase the Reverend's words, or better yet, let's have Thomas Jefferson do it;

"I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is Just."

There.

"Barack knows what it means living in a country and a culture that is controlled by rich white people. Hillary would never know that. Hillary ain’t never been called a n*gger. Hillary has never had a people defined as a non-person.”

And here's where he loses me. Do I think anyone white can ever really know what it's like to be black in America? Nope, not a chance. But Bill Clinton grew up poor, and Hillary wasn't exactly hanging out in the family compound either; they get the class stuff. What I actually find offensive is the idea that Hillary Clinton doesn't know what it's like to be defined as a non-person. In case no one noticed, she's a woman. And women get that. Racism and sexism are different, but the experience of being "othered" and defined as not quite as human as white men is something they have in common. (Also, I might add, the establishment regards any display of their anger as illegitimate and something to be supressed at all costs.)

Here's what really bothers me about this whole thing (in addition to the racism and the toxicity of the national media, of course). Rev. Wrights' sermons, whatever you think about specific statements or tone, have at their core something deeply American and central to the civil rights movement; the idea that this country is capable of becoming more equal and more just, and that our project is to live up to our own principles and laws, not to tear them down. Pat Robertson, Chuck Hagee, et. al, on the other hand, are committed to changing those principals, whether it's destroying the separation of church and state or stripping women of the right to make their own medical decisions, in the service of returning to a glorious American past that exists only in their fantasies.

I can't pretend that I don't enjoy all the ways in which I am privileged by my race, by my class, and by my sexual preference, and I can't pretend that losing those privileges doesn't scare me. I can't even pretend that watching some of those clips of Rev. Wright's sermons didn't make me defensive and hostile. But it doesn't make me forget which America I want to live in.

ETA: Jeremiah Wright was 24 the first time he had the right to vote. He had already spent 5 years in the U.S. Military.