As one egregious incident of racial oppression after another turns out to be imaginary — the Duke lacrosse players didn’t rape Crystal Magnum, George Zimmerman didn’t murder Trayvon Martin, Darren Wilson didn’t murder Michael Brown — the purveyors of the racism narrative are getting desperate. The facts may be wrong, they seem to be saying ala Newsweek‘s Evan Thomas, but the narrative remains right! It’s all about the white privilege, explains one group of Big Thinkers. You don’t need racists to have racism says another. It’s all about the micro-aggression says yet another.
You can almost hear them begging: “Please don’t take our oppression away! It’s all we have!”
Well, quite. America is the least racist multi-cultural society since the Roman empire. There’s really never been anywhere on earth where so many different peoples live together so well. The trouble that besets us is not white against black, and it’s not black against white either. It’s the left against liberty.
Leftism — by which I mean the end of liberty through forced “equality” — by which I mean the absolute power of a ruling class over the unwashed many — by which I mean tyranny — by which I mean leftism — uses race as a ploy, uses the poor as pawns, uses violence as a means, but has only one purpose: power; the power of the elite few. As valid excuses to exercise that power (slavery and segregation) fall away, it creates false excuses (Duke, Trayvon, Ferguson). When the false excuses are exposed, it creates make-believe injustices (white privilege, micro-aggression). When the make-believe is laughed off, it seizes the next moment of high tension to spew lies, gin up emotion, and engineer violence. Then, in the aftermath of the wholly unnecessary turmoil, rage and destruction, we’re all supposed to wearily agree: “Something must be done.”
The only thing that needs to be done is to boot the leftists out of power and off TV.
Racism is a real thing, even here. I can’t join those on the right who say it’s wholly imaginary. I lived in England many years. It’s a great country, but anti-semitism is pervasive there in ways it simply isn’t in the U.S.. I frequently overheard people in London clubs and restaurants complaining about “The Jews.” I was often asked, “What sort of name is Klavan?” It took some time before I realized the person asking wasn’t interested in my family history. It was just his way of asking, “Are you a Jew?” Talk about micro-aggression! Even close friends would make appalling comments. “The Jews run the country.” “A Jew can never really be an Englishman.” For the first time in my life, I felt I was wearing my heritage on my face. I suspect it was only the faintest taste of what it’s like to be black in a majority white country.
That sort of racism is annoying, but it never goes away. Not ever. It’s baked into human culture, maybe into human blood. If you let it make you cringe, you’ll cringe your whole life long. If you let someone convince you you are helpless until it’s erased, you’ll be helpless your whole life long. If you dedicate your life to getting rid of it, your life will be wasted. And when people incite you into an unwinnable fight against it, you really have to ask yourself: What’s in it for them?
If American blacks are fighting against institutional racism, the fight is over. They won years ago, as well they should have. If they’re fighting against human racism — white privilege, micro-aggression, racism without racists, whatever you want to call it — they’re being suckered into a fool’s game, they’re being used to win other people power. There are far, far better ways to spend your life than worrying about what racists think of you. Just about any way is better, come to think of it. For blacks — as for women, as for gays — it’s time to let your oppression go. Like leftism itself, it’s really not good for you.
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