Color Blinders
There is a certain level of schizophrenia involved in conservative views about race, especially in light of the candidacy of Barack Obama. While he is delighting massive crowds of liberals and independents–and even some conservatives–the far right wing is going apoplectic over the whole affair. Wingnuts scramble to find racism in liberals’ appreciation of Obama, at the same time that they strain to see disapproval from the mainstream African-American community.
For the Far Right, everything about Obama is about race. The same voices that claim they envision a color-blind society (by essentially ignoring the racism that exists and allowing it to run unchecked) are the same ones who see nothing but race where Obama is involved–but in classic projection, they claim that it’s the liberals who are obsessed with race. Obama isn’t white enough, he’s not black enough, he’s a way for liberals to assuage their racial guilt; apparently, Obama’s popular only because he biracial, but at the same time, liberals don’t like him because he’s biracial. It’s a confusing barrage of half-baked excuses to make Obama be all about race, while in the background, the standard-bearer for the Far Right, Rush Limbaugh, continues the “color blind” drumbeat by playing and re-playing the racist melody, “Barack the Magic Negro.”
The real irony here is that people who like Obama are the actual ones who are color-blind. They’re the ones who have listened to him speak, have appreciated his charisma and the appeal of his personality, the power of his speaking style and strong talent for communication. It’s not because he’s black, any more than it was because Bill Clinton was white. Obama appeals to people because of who he is.
But here’s how bad things have become on the flipside: a major news network has been forced to completely disable comments from site visitors for stories about Barack Obama. The reason: persistent, voluminous racial epithets–so many, that CBS can’t keep up with them and eliminate them on a one-by-one basis.
So, who is posting these comments? His liberal fans? Umm, not too likely. No, it is probably the “color blind” right-wingers, the ones who don’t “see race,” and who accuse the liberals of rampant racism where Obama is involved. The attacks and threats have become so bad that Obama has been given Secret Service protection earlier than any other candidate in history.
Just look at the right wing’s criticisms of Obama. Try to find one that isn’t somehow connected to race, or act in some way to make his race or ethnicity an issue. You’ll have a hard time doing so. This might be because there’s just not that much about Obama that they can attack. But personally, I think it goes deeper than that. It’s more about the far right’s inability to handle the idea of a liberal man of color taking power, so they focus on that–in a similar fashion that they have always responded to Hillary Clinton’s being a woman.
It’s not pretty, but it is what’s there.
I’ve written before, I am sure, Obama is the rights worst nightmare: a charismatic liberal.
I am not surprised he’s drawing secret service protection, though I am surprised that Bush has allowed him to have it – given the politicization of Government under Bush.
On the right, the penalty for being a charismatic liberal is death by assassination (See John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy, Walter Reuther [plane crash with mysterious circumstances), Martin Luther King).
I like Obama, but I don’t know why. Then, I’ll see him on tv or something and I’ll suddenly remember why. His communication skills are excellent, but it reflects the clarity of his critical analytical thinking skills.
Also, I often forget Obama is black. I notice, when I develop friends, say at a new work place (I was an IT consultant so I worked in many new places) you only notice someones physical characteristics, if at all, from a distance when you first meet them – actually before you first meet them – short, tall, fat, skinny, big nose, bald or with hair, black, east asian, south asian etc – simply because you don’t have a personality profile to fill in the blanks. As soon as you meet them, what ever you thought goes out the window.
The right wingnut biggots can point out Obama’s racial characteristics as much as they want to, but the more people get to know him, the less they’ll recognize his physical characterirstics. And by pointing them out now, it only helps Obama by making his physical characteristics all the more transparent later. By the time he’s sworn in only the most ardent biggots will notice his racial characteristic.
Perhaps, to help them adjust, people should point out to the wingnuts that Obama is half white. If they lynch the black man inside Obama, they also lynch the white man inside him too.
There is one physical characteristic that Obama has, that strikes me every time I see him or hear him speak, that is crucially important to a politician, that is his booming voice. He reminds me of former Missouri Senator, the now late, Tom Eagleton. It helps make Obama leathal in politics: not only does he have clarity on the ideas and the speaking skills to articulate them, but all of those ideas and speaking skills ride the waive of a booming voice from his mouth to our ears. The message can’t get lost.
I would so love to hear his inaugeration speech. He’s not my favorite Dem right now, I prefer Gore or Clark, but he might be the best guy running. And I gaurantee you that his racial characteristics will become transparent to the public by Novemeber 2008, except for a small very hard core set of right wing biggots and the media who will want to celebrate the fact that he became the nations first black president. Such a president could advance race relations down the road by leaps and bounds – perhaps 50 years worth of progress in one decade.
But I hope he wears kevelar underwear. Because they right will have no problems digging up some three named flunky to take a shot at him.
Well,as usual,I love getting your take on things. I only wish you would find a better term than schizophrenic to describe the right. So many people insert that word to mean displaying multiple personalities when in fact the symptoms of schizophrenia aren’t anything close to that.
Umm… Brian, I did not mean it in the multiple-persoanlity sense, but in the sense that they have a distorted or detached sense of reality. I can see how it could fit the other way, and I have long been aware of the common misconceptions about the disorder. But I was touching on the “break from reality,” “faulty perception,” and “withdrawal into fantasy and delusion” aspects of the illness. This seemed close enough to apply correctly with how the far right is reacting to the Obama campaign. Sorry if I offended.
Found you through an Obama article service called University Update. Like the post. I, too, find it hilarious that those who go on and on about a ‘color-blind’ society, can’t seem to do anything but obsess on Obama’s race.
And while the ‘Magic Negro’ racist farce of Rush’s made me roll my eyes, I took it as yet another part of a persistent pattern.
All they have is that he’s Black.
That’s it.
That’s going to be their entire playbook from now until November 2008 (if he gets the nomination).
The thing they’re pointing out is the most obvious thing of all.
I don’t doubt that racism still exists in America, but to be honest, those that wouldn’t vote for Obama because he’s Black weren’t going to vote for a Democrat anyway.