‘The Great Gatsby’ Guide to Taking Down Trump

[Gary]

A classic example of how telling ridicule can be in dealing with racism like the president’s may be seen in the opening chapter of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. There the novel’s richest and most arrogant figure, Tom Buchanan, advances a Trump-like defense of white supremacy that is quickly made to look preposterous.

Tom is the inheritor of vast wealth, the owner of a massive estate, and the unfaithful husband of Daisy Buchanan, the woman loved by Jay Gatsby, the titular character of Fitzgerald’s novel. In the midst of a casual visit from Nick Carraway, the narrator of The Great Gatsby, Tom suddenly begins to lecture on his racial theories. “Civilization’s going to pieces,” Tom declares, citing as his authority a book titled The Rise of the Colored Empires.

“The theory is if we don’t look out the white race will be—will be utterly submerged. It’s all scientific stuff; it’s been proved,” Tom insists. Tom’s self-assuredness in combination with his vagueness about “scientific stuff,” prompts Daisy, to remark, “Tom’s getting very profound. He reads deep books with long words in them.”

Daisy’s sarcasm doesn’t slow Tom down. “It is up to us, who are the dominant race, to watch out or these other races will have control of things,” Tom goes on to say, ignoring Daisy, who turns to Nick and with a wink adds, “We’ve got to beat them down.”

Nick is shocked by the fervor of Tom’s defense of those he calls Nordics. Nick’s shock stems from how mindlessly Tom has bought into the racism he is espousing. Fitzgerald has allowed Tom to undo himself with his own zealotry.

Full article: https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-gre...

[Monty J]

Gary wrote: "Nick is shocked by the fervor of Tom’s defense of those he calls Nordics. Nick’s shock stems from how mindlessly Tom has bought into the racism he is espousing."

After careful study I don't find any textual support for what you characterize as "shock" on Nick's part at Tom's racist rant. In fact, I find Nick himself as blatantly racist in a sequence where he and Gatsby are driving across the Queensboro Bridge: (IV, 73)

As we crossed Blackwells Island a limousine passed us, driven by a white chauffeur, in which sat three modish Negroes, two bucks and a girl. I laughed aloud as the yolks of their eyeballs rolled toward us in haughty rivalry.
"Anything can happen now that we've slid over this bridge," I thought; "anything at all. ..."

Nick's disrespect toward blacks is laid bare to the reader in referring to them animalistically as "bucks" and by comically referring to the whites of their eyes as egg yolks. Nick's racism is then underlined in the phrase: "Anything can happen now," meaning in effect that he'd seen everything (found it shocking that blacks could be chauffeured by a white limo driver. )

What NIck has done in this passage metaphorically demonstrates what Tom had said earlier about Nordics being overtaken by "these other races."

Nick and Tom are both racists, which was much the norm in the Twenties, only Tom is bold and brash about it, where Nick keeps his views to himself.

Daisy simply amused. It gives her something to tease Tom about.

Nor did Nick confront Tom over his racism, so if Nick is "shocked" at Tom's racism, I'm curious to know where in the text this is supported.