Tuesday, October 28, 2008

How to spot a racist

This campaign is not about race. It’s one of the great things about the Obama candidacy, we are on the brink of a historic moment and it seems like a footnote in an election defined by much bigger issues. In other words, race is not much of a political story right now.
However, politics is an important race story. So what can we learn about racial politics in America because of this election? We learn that racists speak in code. Code is used to deceive others, to deceive yourself maybe. Most importantly, code is used to communicate to those who may be afraid to speak their prejudice out loud.

My favorite incarnation of this is the speech about race that Obama gave a while ago in response to the Rev. Wright controversy. If you missed it you really should give it a look: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/03/18/us/politics/20080318_OBAMA_GRAPHIC.html

Early in the semester Ray Strother (http://www.strotherduffystrother.com/) told a class I was in that when someone says “I just don’t know enough about Obama” they really mean “I am not comfortable voting for a black man.” How can you tell? He has campaigned for 17 months, been in 3 presidential debates and dozens of primary debates, he has written 2 books about himself, run more advertising than any candidate ever, been the subject of endless news coverage and has one of the most extensive and easy to navigate websites ever created. If you don’t know much about Obama it’s not because there isn’t a lot to know. In fact, how would one know a bunch about McCain and not enough about Obama? Have they been watching Senate debates on C-Span for the decades he’s been in office? No, at this point that is code.

More code: “he’s not like you and me,” “he’s a secret Muslim,” “he’s a radical/extremist,” “he’s too risky,” “Barak HUSSEIN Obama,” etc. etc. etc. All of these are stand in phrases for “I’m not sure I can vote for a person of color.” How is he “not like us” any more or less than any other politician we’ve ever voted for? What is “risky” about him and not some other Democrat or Republican? Where does this radicalism come from?

Tell me this isn’t race code:


If you don’t believe this is race baiting then tell me how Palin caught so many fish with it:


Look at what civil rights icon John Lewis had to say about the situation:
http://www.politico.com/blogs/jonathanmartin/1008/John_Lewis_invoking_George_Wallace_says_McCain_and_Palin_playing_with_fire.html

Also, watch for familiar plot lines to come up. Dangerous black man hunts helpless white woman is a popular story. If you make the characters the appropriate race and gender you can insert the plot and not say a think about race, the stereotype is already invoked. Here are two examples of this story emerging in the campaign:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/24/mccain-supporter-who-clai_n_137484.html



In any event, I believe that we can still learn a lot about racial politics in this country by watching how people talk and act regarding the Obama candidacy. Thoughts?

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Yay! I figured it out! Turns out it is pretty in your face. I'm just blind. OK so this could be a much more thoughtful response if I took the time to do a little research, or at least recall my sources from the dark recesses of that thing that barely exists anymore, also known as my memory, but I'm not. Because I'm lazy. Just a disclaimer.

But essentially I agree with you and have found this whole thing fascinating for a couple of reasons. 1.) McCain is an educated man and I tend to think that rascist thought is bred through ignorance. So I don't think McCain is really racist so is he actually just approving this rhetoric to be used by his political machine to win an election? Do people really do that? I mean I've heard politics is dirty but based on some of the stuff I've heard, Obama may have to fear for his life if he's elected President much more so than any other and I feel like McCain's campaign is gonna have to take responsibility for some of that if that ends up being the case.

2.) I was totally shocked that Obama did as well as he did considering he was running against a white female candidate. Both candidates would have provided a history changing moment by winning the primary and possibly the election if thats all americans wanted. So why Obama? Historically Americans have always been more eager to give power to white women than black men, isn't that what fueled the feminist movement in the first place? Hillary also had more experience than Obama so what does this say about America? Yes there are many still struggling with the concept of a black president, but I believe these same people also would have struggled with the concept of a woman as president and you would have the same kind of 'code' talking going on if it were hillary who was running. So, I think aside from the lulu's, the fact that Obama was chosen as the nominee over Hillary really says alot about America. That we are in fact ready to put this stuff behind us, or at least consider the possibilty.

Anonymous said...

As an optimist I like to believe that we as a country have matured since the days of slavery and segregation, but deep down inside I know the real truth. We haven't matured at all, we've just learned to hide racism by turning a blind eye and by hiding behind eloquent speaking and rhetoric.

I received an email forward the other day questioning racism's role in this election. You may have seen it before, maybe not. Essentially it asks the reader to flip-flop the personal lives of Obama/Biden & McCain/Palin to determine if your opinions of either party would be different in doing so.

The original sender is an Obama supporter, but I will try not to include any of the pro-Obama statemets to better prove the point. Essentialy it asks questions like:

What if the Obamas had paraded five children across the stage, including a three month old infant and an unwed, pregnant teenage daughter?

What if John McCain was a former president of the Harvard Law Review?

What if Cindy McCain graduated from Harvard?

What if Michelle Obama's family had made their money from beer distribution?

What if Obama was the one who had an affair? What if McCain had only married once, and Obama was a divorcee?

What if the Obamas had adopted a white child?

There were more examples given, but I think the above adequately proves the point: if the above were true, we as a country would attribute these qualities to the fact that the Obamas are black.

You can bet that if any of the above were true about Obama he never would have even gotten past the Democratic primaries, yet these are acceptable and admired qualities of a white presidential candidate.

The most disturbing thing about all of this is not that racism actually still exists, but that educated individuals such as McCain (and others) purposefully use tactics that encite the racial fears of their constituents.

He has a whole camp of educated communicators, marketors, politial analysts, etc. at his disposal. They know exactly what kind of message they want and are trying to send.