Racism and the Political Left
Imagine if someone said the following:
“You know, there are a lot of men out there who are not necessarily sexist who felt uncomfortable for the first time in their lives about whether or not they wanted to vote for a woman.”
At best, the statement is a poor excuse for sexism. At worst, it is a way to explain away sexism as the nature of men. Hiding behind language such as “necessarily sexist” is a failure to accept that sexism is a structuring force within our society no matter one’s individual proclivities.
The following is a quote from Bernie Sanders (2018):
“You know, there are a lot of white folks out there who are not necessarily racist who felt uncomfortable for the first time in their lives about whether or not they wanted to vote for an African-American.”
There are many problems inherent with this statement, particularly coming from a “progressive” leftist. Here Bernie highlights a problem not only with his views on race and racism, but also with white leftists in general. He, and others like him, seem either unable or unwilling to address the latent racism that pervades so much of white America as well as their own party. And it’s not clear which is worse. This is evidenced in his, and other leftist scholars/thinkers/politicians, repeated attempts to reduce the election of Donald Trump by white, working class voters to mere ‘economic anxiety’ (without ever fully defining what that means), and in the idea that only the most blatant forms of bigotry can be clearly defined as racist, as if racism isn’t both overt and covert. Voting against a candidate because they’re black? Not racist. Using racist language? Racist! Supporting racist policies that are going to directly and negatively impact communities of color? Not racist. Wearing blackface? You racist!
Bernie and other leftists like him walk a fine line where they can critique the racist and xenophobic tendencies of their white constituencies, but only so much. This unwillingness to call a spade a spade, allows latent, insidious forms of racism to continue to spread. And to thrive. And to take on other forms. Take the explicitly racist language around immigration, for example. Donald Trump framed immigrants as rapists that were a threat to white women in order to rally his base. (Never mind his own history of alleged sexual violence against white women) How is that not similar to Dylan Roof’s racist ideas about black men and his fears about their access to white women? There is a direct thread between the language of anti-immigration and anti-blackness. The inability of many white leftists to address the subtleties of racism means that they are also ill-fitted to tackle the larger, more entrenched elements of racial domination. You can’t balk at calling racists racist and then fight a racist police-state.
Not only that, but Bernie’s politics of economic inequality being at the root of social ills in the U.S. is laughably untrue. Or, rather, it is laughably limited. Any good historian worth their salt will detail how much race and class are interwoven in American history. You cannot solve economic inequality without solving racial inequality. This is most apparent in the decades following WWII. From 1945 - 1970s, there was unprecedented growth in the economic stability and income of the American middle class, as well as a shortening of the income gap between the wealthiest Americans and the poorest. Thanks in no small part to the effort of unions and their organizers whose power unfortunately declined from the 1970s onward. While African Americans and other racial and ethnic minorities were able to see important gains during this period, those gains were unequal to those of their white counterparts, and many found themselves locked out of the social and economic opportunities afforded to white people. This helps to explain why black activists have continuously fought for both economic and racial equality.
This isn’t to Bernie-Bash, but his emphasis on economic equality, while great, elides how much income equality is still predicated on racist practices. And his statement about racists not being racists for doing racists things is troubling. Actually, it’s worse. It’s enabling. And it suggests that he has a limited take on the pervasiveness of racism and even less of a good idea on how go about fixing it.
https://www.theroot.com/bernie-sanders-didnt-mean-to-tell-the-truth-1830344771
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