Letters to the Editor
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Typical White People
"bringbackmalcolm" offers an honest, heartfelt story of the personal effect this campaign is having on her and her family. It is a touching story, very visual, a very easy-to-relate kind of tale (frustrated apartment hunting, dilemma of how to reveal truths of world to innocent children).
But white people hang on her emotional statement: "Everybody hates black folks."
I'm white but I know what Bringback means: given the amount of discomfort (at the least), suspicion (upon average), and venom (lesser, but still too common) displayed toward blacks by the majority of whites and other races, it sometimes seems that, with a few wonderful exceptions, everybody does have a problem with black people.
I mean, when THOUSANDS of Americans soldiers are killed in an unpopular war (along with perhaps MILLIONS of others), when gas price are at a historic peak (with no sign of falling), when the price of food and other necessities is climbing, when the entire country seems off-course, and the only thing the media, along with millions of Americans (so-called "liberal" Americans, no less), can talk about is how much a BLACK preacher scares them (even though WHITE preachers have been on TV for decades claiming God sends hurricanes to kill homosexuals, punish America for tolerating sin, etc.) (Yes, even your beloved Rev. Billy Graham, who spewed fire and brimstone in his day), when the very BIBLE that so many claim to honor and believe utilizes much the same language as Wright, and the most famous SERMON in the Bible (the one on the Mount, remember?) exhibits a similar opinion about divine justice (but in 16th century English, and not 21st century vernacular, which makes its more palatable to white folks)
Well, how can you conclude anything other than the notion that what really bothers so many Americans about Wright is not what he said, but the fact that a black man dared criticize white America?
I mean, this woman is showing part of her heart to you people - and your main drag is that she told her ADULT DAUGHTER, "Everybody hates black people" -- and admitting her fear that her sentiment broke not only her daughter's heart but her own... expressing deeper tremblings about the future of her grandchildren... and this is what you get stuck on?
Let me tell you something, White America: your hand-wringing and crocodile tears about "why black people hate us" is about as convincing and useful as your post-9/11 wonderment about the same hatred and resentment coming from the Middle East. You know why black people have negative feelings toward whites. The real mystery (and if you have any soul, the true source of your confusion) is "WHY DO WHITE PEOPLE HATE BLACK PEOPLE SO MUCH?" (It's a mystery, similar to "WHY DO SO MANY GENTILES HATE JEWS?" The explanations from the haters are similarly confused.)
When you have enslaved, oppressed, murdered, and otherwise shit on a group of people for CENTURIES, you have no right to expect them to trust you, love you, or even want to sit at the same table with you.
For white people, racism and discrimination seem to be a "thing of the past" because they never endured it. It was never "present" for white people in the first place. It's alien to them.
For black people, it is present today - on the street, at work, even here on Salon.
What white people really ought to wonder is: After our ancestors practiced racial genocide and built our national and family fortunes on the blood of enslaved peoples, why are black people so nice to us?
Now that's a fuckin' mystery.