President Clinton Was Right
Posted by: tony on 03/31/2008 03:36 PM
Updated by: tony on 03/31/2008 03:40 PM
|
Expires: 05/01/2008 12:00 AM
|
Now there's a provocative title for a blog post, from me anyway.
What I'm referring to is President Clinton's assertion that Barack Obama's candidacy is a "fairy tale". I believe it's a fairy tale too, but my reference to the fairy tale goes like this.
Once upon a time, there was a Democratic party presidential candidate who had brown skin, but transcended race. He did not have a chip on his shoulder. He loved his country. He wanted nothing more than to heal the racial divisions that have divided this country and shepherd us, black and white into the new dawn of peace, brotherhood and cooperation.
I had thought that dream was personified in Barack Obama. I guess I was wrong.1
But I wanted to believe. I really did.
What is going to follow is a frank discussion about race on my part, and how I believe it relates to race relations in our country.
I am a recovering bigot.
Before I delve into that further, let me talk about the old sit-com, "All in the Family". Archie Bunker was funny, because everyone knew someone like him. Stupid, bigoted, racist, unteachable no matter how many situations he was in that proved his racist world view wrong. Many white people from my grandfather's generation were like him, and growing up with those people at a young impressionable age, I absorbed their bigotry, not consciously, but through osmosis.
My father's generation was bigoted, but not overtly. They would make the occasional racist crack, but most of it was hidden from us children.
Still have the occasional racist thought, but I realize that it is a base impulse, a sin, and I try and avoid it. I never make racist comments in front of my children, and I'm hoping that their generation will be over this, and will see beyond color.
I think we're succeeding. When my children were almost teenagers, we were discussing one of the girls who sang in the choir with them at church. I didn't know her name, so I referred to her as "the black girl", simply to identify who I was talking about. My daughter said: "What black girl"? Then she said: "Ooooohhhhh... so-and-so! I never think about her as black".
That is the ultimate destination. Where, to quote Rev. Martin Luther King: "Where all children will be judged not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character".
So when I find out that Barack Obama has been attending a black church for 20 years, listening to a former pastor who married him and Michelle, baptized his children, and made statemements like: "White people created AIDS to kill off black people", I realize that my impression of Barack Obama is indeed a fairy tale, and I'm saddened.
My children are being taught by us that racism is wrong. People are people, and you find good and bad in any color, ethnic group or creed. Barack's children are being taught not to pray "God bless America", but "God damn America".
We may not see the end of racism by Barack's children's generation, because Barack keeps them simmering in the pot of racial anger, blame and a sense of entitlement.
In his speech on race, Barack said that he could no more divorce himself from the Rev. Wright, than he could from the black community. The question I have is: Is the views espoused by the Rev Wright representative of the black community at large? I had always thought that these were isolated pockets of discontent that were preyed on by the likes of race whores like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. Is this attitude more "mainstream" than that? If so, I'm getting a bit frightened.
I don't associate with any "Archie Bunkers". I am doing my part to stop racism in my family and immediate friends and associates. Is it too much to expect the black community to do the same? Or am I just being naive.
--
|
