Eugene Kane has an interesting description of Jeremiah Wright's church. It is, he says, the kind of church that "many black people attend to hear black preachers talk the way black folks talk when white folks aren't around." By that, I take it he means bitter attacks on the United States, broad accusations of white racism, and crackpot theories about AIDS, drugs and Pearl Harbor.
I am, by definition, not in a position to know what "black folks say when white folks aren't around." I would not presume that it is the type of dime store sociology that we have heard from Reverend Wright but Eugene Kane wants to tell me that it is.
Let's assume that he is right. Kane's implication is that we ought not to make much of it. He quotes his barber's comments that "white folks" won't vote for a "black guy" and are "just waiting to trip him up." The suggestion is that raising things like Wright and Ayers and
bitterland and on and on are all just efforts to "trip him up" and somehow illegitimate; part of white America's refusal to accept a black President.
Is that right? Even if, as Kane says, this is the way that "black folks talk when white folks aren't around," does that mean that white voters are behaving in a racist or otherwise improper manner if they decide that they don't like it? Is some measure of tolerance of that type of talk the price of racial reconciliation?
8 comments:
Is some measure of tolerance of that type of talk the price of racial reconciliation?
Short answer: yes.
But that doesn't mean it's a fair price to pay, nor that it's a price we should pay at all.
"By that, I take it he means bitter attacks..."
You must be assuming incorrectly. Otherwise there'd be congregations spending part of Sunday listening to preachers with a message consisting of talking about people behind their backs.
Best face is that Wright (and others like him) are part of an older generation (say, over 55 YO) who have been mistreated.
Younger ones?
I dunno.
Maybe Kane should survey that group.
The implication of Kane's comment -- and you seem to shy away from it -- is that blacks are bitter racists.
I just flat out don't believe that.
I think what we have is "professional blacks" (Kane certainly being one) telling white liberals and leftists what they want to hear.
And white liberals and leftists eat it up, oblivious to the damage that would be done if whites started to actually believe that those attitudes are typical.
bitter attacks on the United States, broad accusations of white racism, and crackpot theories about AIDS, drugs and Pearl Harbor
"He was artful, impudent and vindicative, without any cause or provocation that could be assigned."
It says Republican on my ballot in California.
Nevertheless, I like Barrack Obama as a person; he seems like a forthright guy, maybe not politically astute, but a good man.
Before we get lost in the sideshows over “Bitter” “Rev. Wright” was “Hillary: under gunfire or not” ”where did McCain get that wife?” and all the other noise out there.
It seems to me we need to get back to the basic question:
Whom do you want at the helm of the Ship of State from 2008-2012?
Alternatively, if this is easier to visualize:
Whose finger do you want on “the Button” from 2008-2012?
And why?
I matters not to me that blacks will talk one way when together and another way when around 'white' people; the issue is whether you want someone who does so to be the Commander in Chief...
Thanks for the forthright analysis anonymous 7:39. If others were as honest we wouldn't have to sift through all of this innuendo.
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