Tim Wise's Blog, page 29

Racism, Violence and the Irony of Stereotypes

Sometimes you just know it's going to be a long day.

Especially when the subject line of the first e-mail of the morning reads like this:

"HEY NIGGER LOVING KIKE…"

There are lots of things one can think upon reading such a well-crafted piece of prose. Among them:

1) Ya' know, there really should be a hyphen between the words "nigger" and "loving." If there's one thing I hate more than racism, it's ungrammatical racism.

2) Ya' know, I never would have realized this guy was angry were it not for the use of all capital letters. I sure am glad he didn't think to use the "shift" key.

3) If a spam filter can catch ads for Viagra, porn and phony financial scams from Nigeria or various places in Eastern Europe, why the hell can't it catch shit like this? Or, alternately,

4) Damn, Nazis sure do get up early for people without jobs.

In any event, I can't say that I hadn't expected it. To begin with, I get these pretty regularly. But even more to the point, I had anticipated something like this soon, precisely because of a story that had just broken a day or so earlier; namely, a report that "swarms" of black youth had gone on a hate-filled violence spree at the Wisconsin State Fair, attacking dozens of whites as the latter attempted to exit the event (being held in a Milwaukee suburb) at the end of its opening night.

Whenever news emerges about crime committed by people of color, especially against whites, the troglodytes at Stormfront and American Renaissance find themselves affixed to their keyboards, feverishly sending out e-mails to any and all they can, hyping the event as proof positive that the "darkies are out to get us all," and that their calls for racial separation are the only hope for America.

In this particular case, the overt white supremacists were joined in their collective outrage by mainstream conservative commentators, like radio hosts Neal Boortz and Glenn Beck, the latter of whom railed against the press for covering the ongoing violence in England, while ignoring "black teens attacking white people" in Wisconsin.

For others, including the one who brightened my morning coffee with his own special love missive, the real scandal was how the media had covered a hate crime in Mississippi last week, committed by whites against a black man — in which the former beat and then murdered the latter by running him over with a truck — while altogether ignoring the Wisconsin State Fair melee.

"JUST GOES TO SHOW HOW THE JEWS MEDIA SLANTS EVERYTHING," wrote my electronic interlocutor, again with the all-capital letters, signifying a regrettable state of undermedication on his part.

Ah yes, the "Jews Media." One can almost envision the scene in newsroom after newsroom across America: Hebraic men in their kippahs, slurping matzoh ball soup, figuring out how they can play up the murder of a black man, which murder was actually caught on a security camera, while ignoring the beating of white people at the Fair.

"Oy Vey! The Wisconsin State Fair? Who even goes there? Probably just a bunch of cheeseheads, whose families came from Germany. Nazis all of them! Oh well, serves 'em right for that whole Hitler thing. Hey Mort, send a nice rugelach to the blacks in North Milwaukee will ya? They're doin' the Lord's work!"

Yes indeed: only bias and crafty Jewish perfidy could explain why the news would cover a story in which a murder had been caught on film, while not giving as much attention to a number of assaults that were not. Absolutely.

In any event, the e-mail went on to demand that I say something about this hate crime committed by blacks against whites, and predicting that I would never do so, precisely because, in his words:

"PEOPLE LIKE YOU ONLY CARE ABOUT WHITE RACISM. WHEN WHITES ARE THE VICTIMS YOU SAY NOTHING!!! I DARE YOU TO CONDEMN THESE ATTACKS!!!"

Had there only been one exclamation point at the end of the dare, I might have ignored him. But since he placed three such indicators of his seriousness there, I've decided to oblige.

So here's the thing:

Yes, the attacks were horrible; and yes, the perpetrators should be punished for their actions; and yes, their parents probably are pretty shitty when it comes to raising their kids, just as the parents of the white teens in Mississippi who drove over the black man in their pick-up truck, after taking turns beating him, likely are. And to the extent these crimes were motivated by some form of racial bias — as may well have been the case — we can and should see them as racist attacks, every bit as unacceptable as they would have been had the racial identities been reversed.

But now what? Because that's the easy part.

The hard part is what comes next; namely, how do we understand these types of attacks (whether perpetrated by people of color or white folks), in terms of their likely causes; and what can we do, beyond merely punishing those responsible, so as to lessen the likelihood of such things happening in the future?

Sadly, reactionary voices have sought to place the blame for the attacks at the feet of the larger black community, as with two Milwaukee Aldermen, who took the event as evidence of larger black cultural pathology, and blamed a lack of "personal responsibility" among black folks for the violence. Others have claimed that attacks such as these can be blamed on schools that supposedly teach black people to hate whites and see them as oppressors (this being the argument put forward by conservative writer and professor John C. Drew a few days ago), or even on the criticism of the rich and big business — really just "code" for white people, according to Beck — offered up by President Obama.

Such arguments, while typical among those on the right, do nothing to move us forward.

First, there are over 200,000 black people in Milwaukee, a few dozen of whom participated in this violence. To suggest that the crimes indicate something about the larger black population, even of that one city, let alone the nation, is the very definition of statistical illiteracy.

Secondly, to use every criminal act committed by people of color as indicative of a group defect, while viewing white criminals as individuals, representing no one but themselves, is the epitome of racism. So, for instance, no one has suggested that the recent crime spree of the so-called "Dougherty Gang" — led by a 29-year old white woman (and self-described "redneck") along with her two brothers — indicates some broader white cultural defect. For whites, personal responsibility means just that — personal responsibility, as in responsibility that needs to be taken by the actual perpetrators of the deed — while for people of color, far too many expect it to be collective, and demand that the entire group be held accountable for the actions of a few.

Third, to blame the violence on anti-white indoctrination in schools, or arguments about whether the rich are paying their fair share of taxes, takes absurdity to completely new levels. It is doubtful, after all, that the youths who attacked folks at the Wisconsin State Fair are paying very close attention in school to anything (including all the ostensible honky-bashing), or watching Rachel Maddow at night, and thus being imbued with a significant dose of populist sensibilities.

Not to mention, black folks already know plenty about white racism before they learn anything about it in a history class. In a city as racially divided as Milwaukee — a place that for many years was known as the "Selma of the North" — it would take a stunning lack of intelligence not to understand the role that racism has played in determining who lives where, the quality of schools that white kids attend compared to black kids, and the larger economic divide that defines the town and its surrounding suburbs. Indeed, the Mayor of Milwaukee, himself white, acknowledged this history recently, noting that housing and zoning policies — and a long history of opposition by whites to affordable housing in suburbs — has resulted in the city being designated, now, the most segregated in America by the Census Bureau. If a recognition of racism is all it took to cause black people to attack white people, trust me, every suburb in America would be on fire by now.

All that said, it is worth exploring the roots of whatever biases appear to have motivated at least some of the attackers at the Fair. We can begin by listening to the words of one 16 year-old who was recently among the 30-plus young people arrested in the incident. According to the young man, who faces both assault charges and a hate crime enhancer, he and others focused on white people because they were "easy targets." So this was race-based targeting to be sure, but not motivated by hatred, or as payback for historic or contemporary racism against the black community. If anything, the phrase "easy target" speaks to an aspect of this kind of crime — specifically black-on-white crime — that is rarely discussed but needs to be; namely, that the stereotype of whites held by kids like these is one of weakness and passivity, making it easier to attack us or rob us than to do the same to another black person.

Now that is interesting. Because, after all, where would black folks get the idea that whites were weak and passive? Where would they get the idea that attacking a black person might result in them getting their asses kicked, while attacking a white person wouldn't? Where do these racialized images — of black strength and toughness on the one hand, and white weakness on the other — come from?

One guess, and trust me, the answer is not from black people.

Black folks didn't create these racialized images. Black folks didn't create and perpetuate the stereotype that it was their group that was big and bad and dangerous. Nor did black folks create, as a corollary to that first point, the opposite belief: that whites were weak and less likely to defend ourselves. In fact, those beliefs are part and parcel of a larger umbrella of racism directed against black people, but which, in this case, ends up putting white folks at risk too. If the society puts out the message that black folks are violent, and dangerous, and tough, and to be feared, many whites and many blacks will come to accept those messages, and the necessary flipside: that whites are passive and not to be feared. Then, on occasion, opportunistic thugs may take advantage of that notion, targeting whites in situations like this, because being less tough, we are viewed as "easy targets," and not just that, but targets who will likely be scared shitless if approached by angry black people, and thus, not put up much of a fight.

It's ironic, to be sure, that anti-black biases might have a blowback effect such as this; but it's hard to ignore. It's much the same with sexism: if we perpetuate the stereotype that men are "natural breadwinners" and women are "natural nurturers," we not only end up limiting opportunities for women outside the confines of motherhood, we also end up harming men, who come to be viewed as incompetent at parenting, damned near unable to as much as change a diaper, let alone help raise a child into a healthy, productive and compassionate adult. Although the bias was intended to elevate men and subordinate women — and it does that, with a vengeance — it also results in a collateral limitation on mens' lives as parents.

So while the immediate responsibility for these attacks must be placed upon the young people who perpetrated them, the larger problem is one of deeply-ingrained racist stereotypes against people of color, which then create parallel and opposite stereotypes about whites, the latter of which can, in cases such as this, actually increase the likelihood of white injury. To end the latter, we have to attend to the former.

Likewise, to the extent folks of color (especially young black and brown teens) may be inclined to see whites in a negative light, there is an easy solution, which would not only likely dampen such bias, but would also help build antiracist solidarity among young people generally; namely, rather than talking less about racism and its history (as the right would prefer), we should talk more about it, but include the stories of white allies throughout history as well.

After all, if young people of color and young whites learned that there have been, in every generation, whites who stood with black and brown folks and challenged racial injustice, how might youth of all colors respond to one another differently? If white youth learned that there were role models in their community who they could follow in this regard, how might that change the racial attitudes of white people, and their willingness to challenge racism? And if young blacks in places like Milwaukee learned of those persons — as with Father James Groppi, who stood shoulder to shoulder with black leaders in that city to fight racist policies in the 1960s and 70s — how might such knowledge effect their perceptions of their white brothers and sisters?

In other words, teach not just about racism but antiracist resistance, including that engaged by whites, in Milwaukee and across the nation. Doing so would promote allyship, break down stereotypes on all sides, and encourage the kinds of solidarity that troubled and divided cities like Milwaukee need in order to move forward.

Oh, and you also might want to do what the Milwaukee Youth Council (a diverse group of young people from across the city) recently announced they were going to do; namely, convene a community forum where people can come together and offer real solutions to the problem of racial bias, rather than just point fingers at a community about which far too many negative things are already believed.

In the wake of racial violence like we've seen recently in Mississippi and Wisconsin, the answer is to build bridges and get to know each other better — and to take direct aim at the racial stereotypes that ultimately endanger us all — not to condemn entire communities for the ignorant acts of a few.

Rush Limbaugh — Obama is Going to Confiscate Your Land, White People!!!!

Wow, no racist dog-whistle there, Rush! Just another example of how the right plays deliberately to white racial resentment and anxiety…In this case, by suggesting that Obama's "role model" is Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe, and that the "next thing" to be looking out for is "for Obama to take the farms," because "that's what Mugabe did…"

New Books on the Way!!! White Like Me (The Remix) and Dear White America — Pre-Order Now!

Just a note to let folks know that I will have two new books out in the next several months.

First, a revised (and I mean totally revised and remixed) version of White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son, will be released in late August, from Soft Skull/Counterpoint. Even if you read one of the previous two versions of this book, trust me, you need to read this one. This time, the text is presented in a much more straightforward memoir voice, and includes dozens of stories that did not appear in the previous editions. Seriously, pre-order a copy today!

And then, my newest book, Dear White America: Letter to a New Minority (City Lights) is scheduled to be released in January, but will very likely make it out before that. Dear White America examines white racial anxiety and backlash in the face of changing political, cultural, economic and demographic realities, and how that backlash (and the public policy agenda that grows from it) threatens the future of American society, and any hope we have for maintaining a productive and democratic society in decades to come. You can pre-order this one too!

Hey Breitbart — Libel is what you did to Shirley Sherrod and helped do to ACORN, NOT what I did to you…

WITH IMPORTANT UPDATE — SEE BELOW

Andrew Breitbart — aka The Notorious P.I.G. — took time out of his important work tracking down pictures of Anthony Weiner's penis this week, to accuse me of libeling him on Facebook. On June 4, amid Weiner-related tweets and other bits of brilliance (limited to 140 characters because that's the attention span of this alcohol-addled hack), Piggie (or Pig Poppa, take your pick), suggested that I was guilty of libelous claims about him: specifically that I had accused him of burning a cross on the lawn of the Delta Tau Delta fraternity at Tulane (where he was a member) back in 1989.

But in fact, I made no such accusation. I referenced the cross-burning in a Facebook update, in which I jokingly suggested that given Breitbart's own standard of proof and evidence (as in the James O'Keefe ACORN videos, or the Shirley Sherrod case), we should just go ahead and pronounce him guilty of the cross-burning, even though I noted that there was NO evidence of his involvement. In other words, I was lampooning him for his own slipshod techniques of investigation and accusation, not literally alleging that he was to blame. No rational person could have read what I wrote and thought to themselves, "Oh My God, Andrew Breitbart burned a cross at Tulane, and this I know because Tim Wise said so." Even someone like Breitbart, whose synapses have been so utterly atrophied by alcohol (he admits to his boozing in his recently released memoir, so this isn't libelous either), cannot read what I wrote to suggest a literal accusation of Klan-like terrorism on his part.

As you read my original comments, and the threaded ones that came after, it's pretty obvious that everyone on the thread is commenting in the same vein: making fun of him, but not seriously accusing him of anything sinister in terms of the cross-burning. Now, true enough, I said some unkind things, about wanting to see him destroyed (politically of course), and lose credibility to such an extent that he was reduced to begging on the street. Was that nice of me? No, and truthfully, I don't really want to see anyone homeless and starving, as I intemperately suggested; so for the tone of those suggestions, and their content, I actually am sorry. But those things, as mean-spirited as they may well be, are not libelous. The only question, legally, is whether I libeled him re: the cross-burning.

So here are the things I said on facebook, all of which are quite transparently clear in terms of what I am saying:

On May 31, at 5:47 p.m., I wrote in an update:

"Tim Wise wonders if Andrew Breitbart was involved in the cross-burning at Tulane in 1989, in the front yard of HIS fraternity. I know one thing: the official position of his frat was that the event 'might not be racial,' and they went to great lengths to cover up what happened. I think, based on his own standard of evidence that we should just declare him guilty now and be done with it…I want that bastard destroyed. Now."

Two minutes later, one of my Facebook friends wrote:

"What? Andrew Breitbart burned a cross at Tulane in 1989? Psst Pass it on. Two can play this Shirley Sherrod game."

Three minutes later — five minutes after the original update — I noted, responding to the friend's statement:

"‎…exactly Ebony…I have no reason to think he did it, but he was a member of the frat where the cross was burned after a bid was given to a black student for the first time, and he said nothing publicly to condemn the act, so I assume he approved of it. Seems fair. We had a press conference at the time, and he could have come to add his voice to the condemnation but he didn't, so as far as I'm concerned he's as guilty as whoever burned it…"

Now, am I accusing him here? No. I actually say I have no reason to think he did it. But it's true that he said nothing publicly to condemn it at the time, and I am arguing that morally speaking, he is every bit as culpable as whoever actually did the deed. Silence gives consent: it's an old maxim actually. Piggie had every opportunity to say something. I know. I was there. I organized, along with students from the black student organization (African American Congress of Tulane, or ACT), a press conference once the cross-burning became known. Chet Givens, who was the president of the Delta Tau Delta fraternity asked to speak at the press conference and of course we said yes. No other fraternity member said a word publicly, and no more than a few even attended the press conference. Breitbart was not there as I recall, and said nothing, just as I alleged.

And indeed, the cross-burning was covered up for nearly two weeks, by both the administration and the fraternity, the latter of which had no intention of publicly coming forward about the incident, and only did so after reporters at the student paper found out about what had happened. When Givens spoke at the press conference, he certainly condemned the act, but did allow that it wasn't clear if the incident had even been racial, even though it was acknowledged that a bid had, for the first time, been offered to a black student. His statement wasn't great, but he did reluctantly offer it.

(UPDATE: I just went back and found the Tulane newspaper article on the press conference, and apparently I was giving Givens too much credit. He and the Delts were even more pathetic than I remembered. Turns out, Givens said: "The delay (in notifying the university about the cross burning) was because I didn't feel it was racially motivated or a campus issue." The head of security at the time was especially angered by the Delts' delay in notifying them, and actually said their delay hampered the investigation.)

What makes the frat's foot-dragging and failure to go public themselves interesting, is that in his libel-threat tweets, Andrew goes to great lengths to make the point that it was he, The Notorious P.I.G., who actually sponsored the black pledge, whose offer of membership to the Delts appears to have prompted someone to burn the cross in the first place. In other words, a) he has a black friend, whose name he notes in one of the tweets is "Donnell," and b) he was the guy who more than anyone wanted his black friend in the club. Now, this may well be true. But I gotta say, if an act of racial terror and intimidation were perpetrated against my fraternity and specifically, my good black friend, for whom I had fought so valiantly, I would have been the first person to say something about how horrible the incident was. I would have called my own damned press conference, or at least come to the official one and offered my two cents. The fact that he had tried so hard to get his buddy in the frat and then had nothing to say after this racial incident occurred (and it wasn't even important enough to include in his recently-released memoir), suggests to me that he was pretty nonchalant about the whole thing. After all, as he admits in that memoir, he was too busy drinking and nearly failing out of school in those days to have paid much attention to anything important. So I wonder how Andrew feels about his "brothers" (and himself) failing to notify campus police, and thereby hampering the investigation of the hate crime aimed at his friend?

Anyway, after that thread comment above, at 5:52, I didn't say anything else about the cross-burning per se. I did say lots of mean things about wanting his political career to be destroyed, and for him to be penniless, begging and perhaps even dying on the streets. That last part was wrong of me. I don't really feel that way, as much as I dislike Breitbart personally, and detest and despise him politically. But as mean-spirited as it is, and as much as I regret that tone, saying such things is not libelous. It is not an accusation of anything. And it isn't like it's a threat. I didn't say I wanted to kill him in the streets, or wanted anyone else to do so. I want him politically destroyed, is what I said. Intemperate and even cruel? Yes. Regrettable? Yes, sure. Illegal? Absolutely not, as even someone who barely pulled a C average at Tulane should be able to tell.

Documentary Project: Angela Davis and Tim Wise in Conversation – Your Help Needed

On May 13th in Oakland, California, a documentary crew filmed the extraordinary, sold-out conversation between two of the country's leading voices on race and politics. The footage will be used as the core content of an educational documentary that thousands can watch and use as a catalyst for reflection, discussion and activism.

Join the community of producers!

SpeakOut is pleased to invite you, our supporters, to make a mark on social justice by joining our community of producers for the production of this educational documentary. Your investment will be used to:

1. Transform the footage of Angela Davis and Tim Wise in Conversation into a powerful educational tool for high schools, colleges and communities nationwide.

2. Make this unique conversation available to thousands of others around the country who could not be present at the Oakland event.

3. Generate earned income through the sales of the documentary that will support SpeakOut's racial and social justice work.

The documentary production costs are approximately $30,000. All levels of producer circles will be acknowledged by name on both the DVD and liner notes.

Executive Producer Circle – donations of $1000 and up

Producer Circle – donations of $500-$999

Supporter Circle – donations of $50-$499

Click HERE to make your donation online

Or mail your tax-deductible contribution to:

SpeakOut | PO Box 22748 | Oakland CA 94608

Or telephone SpeakOut to make a contribution using a credit card over the phone: (510) 601-0182

Tim Wise on CNN, 5/14/11: Common's White House Invite and the Attack on Hip-Hop

DIscussing the right's attack on hip-hop and Common's invitation to the White House

Killing One Monster, Unleashing Another: Reflections on Revenge and Revelry

There is a particularly trenchant scene in the documentary film, Robert Blecker Wants Me Dead, in which Blecker — who teaches at New York University School of Law and is the nation's most prominent pro-death penalty scholar — travels to Tennessee's Riverbend Prison for the execution of convicted murderer, Daryl Holton. Blecker is adamant that Holton, who murdered his own children, deserves to die for his crime. Yet, when he gets to the prison on the evening of Holton's electrocution, Blecker is disturbed not only by the anti-death penalty forces whom he views as dangerously naive, but also by those who have come to literally cheer the state-sponsored killing. He agrees with their ultimate position, but can't understand why they feel the need to celebrate death, to party as a life is taken. The event is somber, he tries to tell them. Human life is precious, he insists; so precious, in Blecker's mind, that occasionally we must take the lives of killers so as to reinforce that respect for human life. But there is no reason to revel in the death of another, he tries to explain. While I disagree with Blecker on the matter of the death penalty, I felt sympathy for him in that moment, trying to thread the needle between advocacy of killing — any killing — and the retention of the nuance that allows the supporter of such a thing to still preach about the sanctity of life. It was a nice attempt, and heartfelt.

Of course, his pleas for solemnity fall on deaf ears. His ideological compatriots cannot comprehend him. They even misunderstand his position on the ultimate issue, presuming at first that his unwillingness to cheer the death of one as evil as Holton means he must oppose the death penalty, and that he doesn't care about the children Holton killed. Ultimately, Blecker walks away, clearly shaken, not in his support for capital punishment, but by the way in which others on his own side seem to literally glorify death, even need it.

I was reminded of this scene today, while watching coverage of the celebrations around the country (but especially in Washington D.C. and Manhattan), which began last night when it was announced that Osama bin Laden was dead. In front of the White House were thousands of affluent and overprivileged (and mostly white) college students from George Washington University (among the nation's most expensive schools), partying like it was spring break. Never needing an excuse to binge drink, the GW and Georgetown co-eds responded to the news of bin Laden's death as though their team had just won the Final Four. That none of them would have had the guts to actually go and fight the war that they seem to support so vociferously — after all, a stint in the military might disrupt their plans to work on Wall Street, or to become high-powered lawyers, or just get in the way of their spring formal — matters not, one supposes. They have other people to do the hard work for them. They always have.

In New York, the throngs assembled may have been more economically diverse, but the revelry was similar. Lots of flags, chants of "U.S.A., U.S.A.," and an overall "rah-rah" attitude akin to that which one might experience at a BCS Bowl game, and once again, mostly led by guys who would never, themselves, have gone to war, to get bin Laden or anyone else.

You have to wonder — or actually, you don't because the answer is so distressingly obvious — would these throngs pour into the streets to celebrate in this fashion if it were announced that a cure for cancer had been discovered, or for AIDS? Would thousands of people be jumping up and down belting out patriotic chants if the president were to announce that our country's scientists had found a new, affordable method for wiping out all childhood disease, malnutrition or malaria in poor countries around the world? Though these maladies kill far more than Osama bin Laden ever dreamt of slaughtering, and although any of these developments would be a source of intense pride for millions, there is almost no chance that they would be met with drunken revelry. Partying is what we do when we kill people, when we beat someone, when we grind them to dust. It is not what we do when we save lives or end suffering. Saving lives or doing humanitarianism is like making love, while killing people is tantamount to a good, hard, and largely one-sided fuck; and unfortunately we know which of these two things men, in particular, are more apt to prefer.

Don't get me wrong: I am not a pacifist. I know there are times when violence may be necessary, either in self-defense, vicarious defense of others, or to prevent greater violence. If you were to break into my house and attempt to harm my family, let there be no misunderstanding: you would die, and I would kill you, without so much as a moment's hesitation. But I would not, upon having taken your life (however justified), proceed to pop a cold one, invite friends over and dance around your bloody body. I would not be happy about what I had done. Taking a life, even when you have no choice, is no cause for joy. It is a grave and serious event; and it is utterly unnatural, such that militaries the world over have to dehumanize their enemies and work furiously to break down their soldiers' natural human tendencies to not kill. The fact that violence may be necessary in certain cases, and even in the case of stopping bin Laden, cannot, in and of itself justify raucous celebrations of his death at the hands of the United States.

So yes, we can argue that bin Laden deserved to die. But that's the easy part. Beyond what one deserves, whether they be terrorists or just street criminals, there is the matter of what society needs. And it may be that what a healthy society needs is less bombastic rhetoric, less celebratory embrace of violence, and less jingoistic nationalism, even if that means that we have to respond to the news of bin Laden's death with a more muted tone, perhaps being thankful in private, or even drinking a toast with friends in our own homes, but not turning the matter into public spectacle, the likes of which cheapens matters of life and death to little more than a contest whose results can be tallied on a scoreboard.

It may prove cathartic that one the likes of bin Laden is dead. His death may provide an opportunity for a much-needed exhaling; but that doesn't render it the proper subject of a pep rally. And given the larger need to challenge the mentality of disposability that is at the root of all murderous violence, it may be that in such moments we would be far better off to solemnly commemorate the death of the monster than to cheer it openly, when the latter is so likely to inflame passions on the part of those whose allegiance to the monster remained unsullied right to the end.

Ultimately, the mentality of human disposability that animates war, terrorism, gang violence and all forms of homicidal street crime, is a dangerous one to indulge, and certainly to indulge giddily. Such a mindset feeds upon itself, perpetuates itself without end, and serves to ratify the same in others. Surely we should strive to do better, even when, for various reasons, we can't manage it, and are required to take life for one reason or another. Most soldiers, after all, are not happy or self-satisfied about the things they've done in war. For many, if not most, killing even when you have no choice, is life-changing. It scars. It comes back in the middle of the night, haunting the soldier's dreams for years, and sometimes forever. We do not honor them or their sacrifices by treating the mortal decisions they so often have to make as if they were no more gut-wrenching than those made during the playing of a video game.

Perhaps the only thing more disturbing than the celebrations unleashed in the wake of bin Laden's demise was the cynical way in which the president suggested that his killing proved "America can do whatever we set our mind to." If this is, indeed, the lesson of bin Laden's death, then this only suggests we clearly don't want to diminish, let alone end, child poverty, excess mortality rates in communities of color, rape and sexual assault of women (including the many thousands who have been victimized in the U.S. military), or food insecurity for millions of families; because we aren't addressing any of those things with nearly the aplomb as that put to warfare and the killing of our adversaries.

We are, if the president is serious here, a nation that has narrowly constricted its marketable talents to the deployment of violence. We can't manufacture much of anything, but we can kill you. We can't fix our schools, or build adequate levees to protect a city like New Orleans from floodwaters. But we can kill you. We can't reduce infant mortality to anywhere near the level of other industrialized nations with which we like to compare ourselves. But we can kill you. We can't break the power of Wall Street bankers, or jail any of those bankers and money managers who helped orchestrate the global financial collapse. But we can kill you. We can't protect LGBT youth from bullying in schools, or ensure equal opportunity for all in the labor market, regardless of race, gender, sexuality or any other factor. But we can kill you. Booyah, bitches.

But somewhere, I suspect, there is a young child — maybe the age of one of my own — who is sitting in front of a television tonight in Karachi, or Riyadh. And he's watching footage of some fraternity boy, American flag wrapped around his back, cheering the death of one who this child believes, for whatever fucked up reason, is a hero, and now, a martyr.

And I know that this child will likely do what all such children do; namely, forget almost nothing, remember almost everything, and plan for the day when he will make you remember it too, and when you will know his name. And if (or when) that day comes, the question will be, was your party worth it?

Trump Card: White Denial, Racial Resentment and the Art of the Heel

There is no one in the world more creative than a white person trying to deny their racism, after having said or done something incredibly racist.

Whether it's the Orange County California Republican activist who recently sent around the e-mail with the picture of the Obamas portrayed as chimpanzees, or the folks who show up to Tea Party rallies with signs picturing the president as an African witch doctor with a bone through his nose, no one ever wants to admit the obvious: that they are knuckle-dragging, pathetic bigots. In the case of the above-mentioned Republican activist, she relied on the old stand-by defense; namely, that she has black friends. Of course, she can't name any of them, because she's lying; and more to the point, this isn't a defense to a charge of racism. It would be like a heterosexual man using sexist slurs in the workplace, or pinching female co-workers on the ass, and then insisting that he wasn't sexist because after all, he has a wife.

It all reminds me of my senior year of college, when two crosses were burned on our campus. After the first, which was burned when a previously all-white fraternity had offered a bid to a black student, many whites denied that the act had been racist because it had only been a "two-foot cross." After the second, the perpetrators insisted they had just been throwing wood randomly into a bonfire, when a few pieces "accidentally landed in a cross-like position." Although the horizontal bar of the cross had an MLK Jr. Boulevard sign attached to it, that was just a coincidence, they insisted.

But the most recent award for a "White Man Doing Racist Shit and then Lying About it" has to go to Donald Trump. Although Trump insists that he is possibly the "least racist" person on the planet, and that he actually gets along good with "the blacks," whatever the hell that's supposed to mean, his actions suggest otherwise. Putting aside the testimony of a former colleague of Trump's, who has noted that the Donald once said that laziness was a "trait in blacks" (an accusation Trump never denied at the time it was made), his recent rants indicate a definite willingness to push buttons of white racial anxiety and resentment for political gain.

First, Trump jumped on the birther bandwagon, suggesting that President Obama may not have been born in the U.S. This, despite the fact that state officials in Hawaii had long verified that he was born there, and the fact that the Honolulu newspaper had printed a birth announcement a few days after Obama was born. To believe the president wasn't born there would require a belief that his mother had purposely concocted a conspiracy to place a phony birth announcement: an act that would have made no sense unless we believe that she somehow knew, even in 1961, that her son — her black son — was going to run for president one day and would need the cover of "natural born" citizenship. What makes birtherism racist is simple: it has been part of a larger narrative that has attempted to "other" Barack Obama, as a secret Muslim, a foreigner, an "anti-colonial" African (in Dinesh D'Souza's terms), and as someone who doesn't view America the way the rest of us (read: white people) do. No white president has ever had their citizenship questioned in this way, nor would they. To believe that he would have faced this kind of attack had his name been O'Malley instead of Obama, just because some whack-a-doodle fabricated a phony birth certificate suggesting that O'Malley had been born in Ireland, rather than, say, South Boston, is to believe in unicorns and pixie dust.

Now, with the birth certificate thing settled among remotely sane people, Trump has switched gears, casting doubt on Barack Obama's academic performance and suggesting he didn't deserve to get into the Ivy League schools he attended; namely, Columbia and Harvard Law. Although this plays directly into the long-running narrative so common on the white right for the past forty years, to the effect that black folks are getting things they don't deserve because of racial favoritism, Trump insists it has nothing to do with race. Of course not. Neither could it possibly be about race that Trump would question Obama in this way, despite never having raised the issue of academic merit with any white president or politician, like, for instance, George W. Bush, who was a mediocre student (at best) in prep school and Yale, and actually bragged about his piss-poor performance to Yale students when he gave the commencement address there after becoming president.

Oh, and let's not forget that Little Lord Fountleroy gave money to the McCain/Palin campaign, despite the fact that John McCain graduated sixth from the bottom of his class at the Naval Academy and was only admitted to Annapolis in the first place because his daddy was an admiral; and that Sarah Palin barely graduated at all, bouncing around at five schools before finally getting her degree. So for Trump to now pose as the protector of academic standards seems a bit disingenuous, to say the least, and by disingenuous I mean really, really racist.

By suggesting Obama might not have deserved to be in the Ivy League (despite that whole Magna Cum Laude thing at Harvard Law, which is not awarded, after all, by pulling names out of a hat), Trump has descended into the pit most commonly occupied by Pat Buchanan, who has never met a successful person of color who he thought earned their position. It isn't that Trump is a racist in the classic sense. He might be, but that isn't the point: it's that he, like far too many white Americans seems to buy into a narrative that people of color are getting things for which they aren't qualified: slots in good colleges, positions on the Supreme Court, or even the presidency itself. Rush Limbaugh, for instance, insists that Obama only won because he was black and that a combination of racially-motivated African Americans and guilt-ridden white liberals voted for him on that basis. It's the political extension of what Rush said back in 2003, when he argued that Philadelphia Eagles quarterback, Donovan McNabb, wasn't very talented, but got a free pass from the media because sportswriters were so desirous of seeing a black quarterback succeed. That a guy whose only physical exercise in 20 years had been washing down oxycontin with water would deign to weigh in on who was and was not a talented football player was precious to say the least.

This white resentment is the modern manifestation of racism: it isn't necessarily the old-school bigotry to which the nation was accustomed back in the day; rather, it's the kind that views black and brown folks as taking things that are rightfully ours, as whites. So the brown-skinned immigrants are taking "our" jobs; the black and brown welfare cheats are taking "our" tax dollars; the affirmative action beneficiaries are taking "our" kids' slots at Princeton, or for that matter, the state university down the road. We are entitled to these things, says the narrative; we earned them. But they didn't.

Never mind that according to a Century Foundation study from a few years back, for every student of color who benefitted at all from affirmative action at a selective college there are two whites with lower scores and grades than the average, but who were admitted anyway because of family connections or parental alumni status.

Never mind that even when job applicants are equally qualified in terms of experience and education, applicants with white-sounding names are 50 percent more likely than those with black-sounding names to get a callback for an interview.

Never mind that white male job applicants with criminal records are more likely to get called back for an interview than black men without one, even when all other qualifications are indistinguishable.

Never mind that African Americans with college degrees are twice as likely as their white counterparts to be out of work, Latinos with degrees about fifty percent more likely than comparable whites to be out of work, and Asian Americans with degrees about 35 percent more likely than similar whites to be unemployed.

Never mind that corporations run by white folks receive far more taxpayer largesse (in the form of subsidies and specialized tax breaks) than all poor folks combined, let alone the poor of color.

Never mind that General Electric paid less in taxes last year than undocumented immigrants, despite record profits.

And never mind that Richie Rich, who was set up in business by his father and inherited tens of millions of dollars from his daddy to help him build his own fortune, thinks he is somehow qualified to pontificate on the extent to which others may or may not have earned what they have — which really is the textbook definition of irony, and by irony, I mean balls.

Tim Wise at First Church of Boston, April 20, 2011 – "Beached White Males" and the Pathology of Privilege

Here is a brief video clip from my recent appearance at a fundraiser for Community Change, in Boston. I am discussing the recent Newsweek cover story about the recession and "beached white males," and the way the authors missed the real story. It's not that white men are the hardest hit in this recession–they aren't by a long shot–but because of privilege and entitlement, they have had the hardest time coping with the exigencies of an imploding economy…sadly, instead of using the experience to foment solidarity with folks of color, many are missing the larger lessons…

A Bad Year for White Whine: College Scholarships and the Cult of Caucasian Victimhood

Texas State University student Colby Bohnannon would like you to know, it's hard out there for a white guy.

When looking for money for college, the Iraq War veteran claims he had a hard time finding any, at least of the scholarship variety. And this, he wants you to believe, is due to the lack of such awards for white men, as opposed to the presumably substantial funds set aside for students of color. So, frustrated in his quest for white male scholarships, he's created one, under the aegis of his new organization, the "Former Majority Association for Equality." Get it? As in, we white folks used to be the majority, but since we're not anymore (at least in Texas), now we're the ones being shut out of opportunity, and in need of some affirmative action.

FMAE's scholarships, which will amount to about $500 each, will be awarded only to white men with 3.0 grade-point-averages. Why white women are excluded from his beneficence, and why he is applying a rather bizarre blood quantum test to the awards (offering them to anyone with at least one-quarter white ancestry), remain mysteries. Especially since it would take some incredibly brain-dead math to suggest either that white men alone had ever been a majority anywhere, since displaced by the dreaded "other," or that those with at least one white grandparent are not still a majority today, even in Texas, where large numbers of Hispanics are quite recently connected to Anglos.

But what is perfectly clear, and not at all mysterious, is the fundamental absurdity — however ubiquitous it may be among white Americans — at the heart of young mister Bohannon's claim of racial grievance. Indeed, his notion that he was unable to secure scholarship monies because all the dough was going to people of color — in other words, to suggest as he does that money for whites like himself is crowded out by scholarships for black and brown students — indicates such a fundamental ignorance about the world of higher education that it should likely disqualify Mr. Bohannon from attending college anywhere. There are supposed to be intellectual standards, after all, even for white men.

The Facts About Scholarships for Students of Color

Though I have written about this before — and no doubt will have to again, seeing as how white victimhood arguments tend to get recycled every few years — for Mr. Bohannon's sake, and for the sake of those who think as he does, perhaps it would do us well to remember a few things.

First, it is simply false that scholarships for people of color crowd out monies for white students. According to a national study by the General Accounting Office, less than four percent of scholarship money in the U.S. is represented by awards that consider race as a factor at all, while only 0.25 percent (one quarter of one percent) of all undergrad scholarship dollars come from awards that are restricted to persons of color alone (1). In other words, whites are fully capable of competing for and receiving any of the other monies — roughly 99.75 percent of all scholarship funds out there for college. Although this GAO study was conducted in the mid-'90s, there is little reason to expect that the numbers have changed since then. If anything, increasing backlash to affirmative action and fear of lawsuits brought by conservatives against such efforts would likely have further limited such awards as a percentage of national scholarships.

Second, it is also false that large numbers of students of color receive the benefits of race-based scholarships. In truth, only 3.5 percent of college students of color receive any scholarship even partly based on race, suggesting that such programs remain a pathetically small piece of the financial aid picture (2). So when Mr. Bohannon walks around campus and sees students of color, he may believe them all to be wards of some race-based preference scheme; yet the evidence suggests that at least 96.5 percent of them received no race-based scholarship at all.

Additionally, to suggest that race-based scholarships can in any way explain Mr. Bohannon's own inability to find funding for school is preposterous. There is an incredibly diverse array of scholarships available for all kinds of things, that have nothing to do with academic merit alone, but are tied to various aspects of a student's identity: scholarships for people who are left-handed, or kids whose parents sell Tupperware, or the children of horse-breeders, or descendants of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, among many thousands of such awards (3). Although affording college education is increasingly difficult for pretty much everyone — and on this I would agree with Mr. Bohannon — if he couldn't find scholarship monies to help defer the cost, he frankly couldn't have been looking very hard. For instance, it took me all of 30 seconds on Google (which I'm told the young'uns can access, even in Texas), to find several such awards for Iraq War veterans like himself, as with over 400 such awards, worth up to $5000 each, offered by the Horatio Alger Association, or others provided by the Military Officer's Association, or, for that matter, financing available from the Army College Fund, or the Montgomery G.I. Bill. Indeed, veterans may be among the most favored groups in this regard, ever since Congress decided over half-a-century ago to ease the cost of college education for those who had served in the military.

Are Minority Scholarships Unfair? The Structural Reality of White Privilege in Education

But beyond the practical matter of just how minimal an impact so-called minority scholarships have in the real world of higher education finance, even the philosophical assumptions at the heart of Mr. Bohannon's argument — and the whites-only scholarships he's creating — are deeply flawed.

To begin, the claim that whites are being disadvantaged by minority scholarships, even in theory, ignores the many ways in which the nation's educational system provides unfair advantages to whites from beginning to end. It ignores the fact that the average white student in the U.S. attends school with half as many poor kids as the average black or Latino student, which in turn has a direct effect on performance, since attending a low-poverty school generally means having more resources available for direct instruction (4). Indeed, schools with high concentrations of students of color are 11-15 times more likely than mostly white schools to have high concentrations of student poverty (5). To point to minority scholarships as a source of unfairness that somehow tilts the opportunity structure too far in favor of non-white folks, is to ignore that white students are twice as likely as their African American or Latino counterparts to be taught by the most highly qualified teachers (in terms of prior preparation and specific subject certification), and half as likely to have the least qualified instructors in class (6). This too directly benefits whites, as research suggests being taught by highly qualified teachers is one of the most important factors in school achievement (7). To scream about the unfairness of minority scholarships is to ignore that long before the point of college admissions, whites are twice as likely to be placed in honors or advanced placement classes, relative to black students, and that even when academic performance would justify lower placement for whites and higher placement for blacks, it is the African American students who are disproportionately tracked low, and whites who are tracked higher (8). Indeed, schools serving mostly white students have three times as many honors or AP classes offered, per capita, as those serving mostly students of color (9).

To ignore this background context is to miss the ways in which the academic success and accomplishments of white students have been structured by unequal and preferential opportunity, and the ways in which students of color have been systematically denied the same opportunity to achieve. So although it is true that whites are excluded from 0.25 percent of the scholarship monies available for college, this cannot rationally be considered a disadvantaging factor in our lives, given the larger, ingrained and systematic advantages from which we benefit, and from which most people of color are excluded. The 0.25 percent of scholarships for students of color is literally a drop in the bucket compared to the latter.

Despite the claim that race-based scholarships for people of color amount to a double-standard (since scholarships for folks of color are considered legitimate, but white scholarships aren't), in truth, the standard is simple, straightforward and singular: persons belonging to groups that have been systematically marginalized should have opportunities targeted to them so as to allow for the development of their full potential, which otherwise might be restricted. Special efforts to provide access and opportunity to such persons should be made, not because they are black, per se, or Latino, or whatever, but because to be a person of color has meant something in this country, and continues to mean something, in terms of one's access to full and equal opportunity.

In effect, these are not scholarships based on race, but rather, scholarships based on a recognition of racism and how racism has shaped the opportunity structure in the U.S. Because race has been the basis for oppression, and continues to play such a large role in one's life chances, it is perfectly legitimate to then offer scholarships on the basis of the category that triggered the oppression. On the other hand, for whites in need, it is simply not credible to contend that their disempowerment has been due to their race. Rather, whites who are economically marginalized have been so marginalized in spite of their racial status. So think of the most disempowered group of whites in the United States: Who are they? Most would probably say those from the Appalachian mountain region, in places like West Virginia or Northern Kentucky. But are those whites — who indeed are largely cut off from the larger economic opportunity structure, and are culturally isolated as well — suffering because they have been the victims of racial subordination? Of course not. Whereas people of color have been specifically targeted for discrimination because of race, such has not been the lot of even the poorest whites. So as we seek to create greater opportunity for poor whites — and I know of no one on the left who doesn't support such efforts — we have to recognize that creating race-based programs for such folks misses the source of their disempowerment altogether, and is therefore off the mark. Scholarships for Appalachian folk (including the roughly six percent of the region's inhabitants who are black, and suffer from regional, cultural or economic oppression) would make perfect sense. But white scholarships as a way to get at the economic marginality experienced by low-income whites makes none.

Race-Based Scholarships as a Vital Tool for Equity

If anything, American colleges and Universities should be offering more assistance to students of color than is currently the case, including so-called race-based scholarships. And the reason is simple: Even persons of color from economically stable families (in terms of occupational status, education and incomes) continue to face obstacles on the basis of race, and these deserve attention and consideration by institutions of higher education. Even when families of color are solidly middle class, for instance, their children are far more likely to attend high-poverty and low-resource schools, are more likely to be tracked low, and, when compared to whites of comparable income, face ongoing barriers to equal housing opportunity. All of these factors translate to diminished opportunities based on color, not merely economics. In other words, to merely target scholarships to those who are economically needy — regardless of race — as many recommend in their rhetoric against minority scholarships, would be to ignore the way that non-poor people of color continue to face race-based barriers to achievement and success. And because of a history of unequal access to wealth accumulation, even middle class black and brown folks with good jobs and incomes find themselves in considerably worse overall shape than comparable whites, as scholars like Thomas Shapiro, Melvin Oliver, and Dalton Conley have noted. Unless schools or private organizations that offer scholarships can develop an accurate way to pinpoint the assets and net worth profiles of the families from which their applicants come, to use only indicators like income or parental occupation as proxies for need would be to ignore the chasm-like differences between the white and black middle class, and thereby disadvantage people of color even further.

Not to mention, more than two decades of research on academic performance — especially standardized tests — has indicated that even (and especially) for middle-class, highly academically inclined students of color, the fear of confirming widespread and racist stereotypes about their ability can depress performance, despite actual ability or levels of preparation, due to increased anxiety and stress. Thus, highly capable students of color may well be missing out on traditional merit based awards, not because they are truly less capable or talented, but because of the psychological effect of racism, as a social force, on their individual academic performance, due to the widely-recognized problem of "stereotype threat." Thus, scholarships pegged to high-achieving people of color can help balance out the effects of such a phenomenon, ensuring higher education access for those who are just as meritorious as whites, but whose on-paper credentials may have suffered through no fault of their own.

While Colby Bohannon is not likely a bad guy, let alone a racist in any overt sense, his scapegoating of minority scholarships stands as a troubling indicator of how quickly white men like himself resort to blaming racial others for their personal struggles in life. Whether it's affirmative action, or immigration, or so-called welfare programs presumably soaking up all the tax dollars, whites have, for forty years, made a habit of looking to those darker than ourselves to explain why our lives have turned out less satisfying than we otherwise might have liked. That this scapegoating emanates from a bunch who constantly criticize people of color for claiming to be the victims of discrimination — even when the evidence of that victimization is overwhelming — would be amusing were it not so pathetic. Sadly, in an era of white racial anxiety the likes of which we have entered these past few years, it's the kind of thing we'll likely be seeing more and more often, facts be damned.

NOTES

(1) U.S. General Accounting Office, 1994. "Information on Minority Targeted Scholarships," B251634. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, January.

(2) Stephen L. Carter, "Color-Blind and Color-Active," 1992. The Recorder. January 3.

(3) National Scholarship Research Service, 2002. The Scholarship Book.

(4) Judith Blau, 2004. Race in the Schools: Perpetuating White Dominance? Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Press, 204.

(5) Gary Orfield, et al. 1997. "Deepening Segregation in American Public Schools: A Special Report From the Harvard Project on School Desegregation," Equity & Excellence in Education. 30: 5-24; Valerie Martinez-Ebers, 2000. "Latino Interests in Education, Health and Criminal Justice Policy," Political Science and Politics. September.

(6) Linda Darling-Hammond, 1998. "Unequal Opportunity: Race and Education," Brookings Review. Spring: 31.

(7) Michael K. Brown, et al. 2003. Whitewashing Race: The Myth of a Color-Blind Society. Berkeley: University of California Press: 111; Jawanza Kunjufu, 2002. Black Students, Middle-Class Teachers. Chicago: African American Images: 57-58.

(8) Rebecca Gordon, 1998. Education and Race. Oakland: Applied Research Center: 48-9; Claude S. Fischer, et al. 1996. Inequality by Design: Cracking the Bell Curve Myth. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press: 164-5; Leonard Steinhorn and Barbara Diggs-Brown, 1999. By the Color of Our Skin: The Illusion of Integration and the Reality of Race. NY: Dutton: 47.

(9) Gary Orfield and Susan Eaton, 1996. Dismantling Desegregation. NY: New Press: 68.