Berea Reformed Evangelical Church

There are two race issues that I’m leaving to the side of my plate, folded into a napkin because I got tired of chewing them. Accordingly, I am not talking about white racists who are allegedly refusing to vote for Obama because he is non-pure-white (-whatever-that-means). I’m not going to talk about it, but then I do need to check and make sure that it is still tastefully hidden in my napkin, and not sticking out for other restaraunt patrons to see (we have PEOPLE whose job is to clean this napkin later, but in the meantime I don’t want anyone to know that my saliva is not an industrial-grade solvent, capable of mastisizing even the toughest of beefs and scrap metals (Admit no weakness!).) So, anyway, white racists no doubt continue to exist, though their numbers as far as political weight is concerned are likely overinflated by media pundi(<overstrike>n</overstrike>)ts [seriously, what is up with this attempt to gerundize (in Latin!) this word lately?] who simply cannot believe, absolutely shocked I tell you, that if you drag a camera through a crowd waiting to get into a political rally, sheer statistical randomness should predict that there will be some unstable and/or angry souls with close to zero social awareness skills who are actually proud to do something incredibly stupid for Cletus and LuLu back home. (I’m awn the teevee! Look at mah Obama monkey!) So that the “other side” (in this case, liberals/progressives) does not get the wrong idea, let me repeat my earlier expressed view that racism is very, very bad. And let me also acknowledge that it continues to haunt us today, which is obvious in the race issue I am going to discuss in a minute. But the notion that there is an army of blatant “single issue” anti-black voters that is actually making the difference in the states that dare not lean towards Obama at this point, is absurd.

The other piece of gristled steak growing cold beside my dessert fork is the phenomenon of black voters voting FOR Obama because he is black. Again, that this is happening is 1 million SHU on the hot peppers of certainty scale, but it also is completely unsurprisingly and, frankly, completely understandable. To anger the “conservative” readers for a moment, I think that if any particular group of people has faced official alienation for anything longer than, say, a month, then the urge to support <I>any</I> political candidate in that group is going to be very high among its members. The arbitrariness of the decision against any sane measure of actual political leadership, is unfortunate, but it is a downstream effect of the arbitrariness of the original racism. This is a sociological analysis, regardless of what any conservative/libertarian ideal might say about a person’s obligation to rise above such shallow considerations and forge their own path and vote for who is right “on the issues” (whatever that means). My own guess is that, if you’ve been on the wrong side of any arbitrarily-tiered social system, then the lingering effects of that arbitrariness IS an “issue” for you, and this should surprise, disturb, or shock absolutely no one. So, if you are truly angry that black voters are going to turn out in overwhelming support of Obama on November 4, then you need to blame the white cultural and political leaders who instituted, perpetuated, and lingered at reforming the racist system in the first place. If you oppress, then victims of said oppression might have grandkids who don’t vote in ways that your grandkids will like…

But now that that is all out of the way, it’s time to point out the REAL race issue with Obama. And this one is likely to have a genuine effect on the election, and it is genuinely disturbing, in my own opinions. White people, particularly of middle- to upper- class pedigree, are going to vote in record numbers for a Democrat on November 4, and they are going to do it largely because he is black and wouldn’t that be nice. (So nice to get a black fella in there for a change).

"I say, Buffy, did you see that a black man is actually running for President this year?" "Oh, let's vote for him, Hugh! It will be delightful!" Image HT: stuffwhitepeoplelike.com

Look. No amount of “white guilt” is going to make past oppressions better, nor is it really going to let you off the hook for feeling guilty about those past oppressions. If you really feel guilt over them, which you shouldn’t by the way, then you are going to have to do far more to feed the beast than simply pull the lever for a black candidate. Oh, we’ve put a black man in the White House now, so I can sleep at night about my upbringing and education and opportunities that were set up better than those of many of my black counterparts. Um, no, you can’t. If you’re really worried about the discrepancies in your own upbringing and opportunities compared to those of others, then you should tie one hand behind your back at work, refuse to put your college degree on your job applications, and deliberately an uneducated manner of speaking. But those things would actually, you know, hurt you socially and economically, so instead you’ll just vote for the Great Black Hope and feel like you’ve done your part.

This whole thing is a dead end, people. If you want to get past race, then you need to get PAST it. Stop thinking about it, stop making decisions based on it, etc. Stop worrying about whether this or that “looks racist,” etc. Just live, man, just live. If you yourself are not a racist, then start ACTING like a person for whom race simply does not matter one way or the other. If this takes you some time because you are yourself a person of a minority race and you have a history of trouble made for you by others because of it, then you are in a different position. But for the white liberal, oh so sweet and caring and just wanting to change the world for the better, then take the first little tiny step toward actually doing that and STOP caring about Obama’s race, one way or the other. No demons of racism past will be exorcised by electing him, for only God can deal adequately with those demons. Demons of the past are just like that.

And, by the way, Obama IS at least a quasi-socialist (though so is McCain, but less so), and his war on the wealthy and successful will be a disaster. But, by all means, go vote your conscience so you can (maybe? this time?) sleep better at night. Throw us all into a hole if it makes YOU feel better.

That is all. End transmission.