To Honk or Not to Honk -- The Dawn of Political Correctness
Forgetting how Democrats booed and hissed during President Bush’s State of the Union address, today in the NY Times columnist Maureen Dowd labels South Carolina congressman Joe Wilson, in no uncertain terms, a racist -- for shouting out “you lie” during Obama’s speech. (I guess that makes Serena a super-sized racist -- for shouting at an Asian-looking linesperson that she would “shove the fucking ball down [her] fucking throat”.)
Anyway, reading Dowd’s race-card play reminded me of the beginnings of a habit I believe most of us whites have long adopted. I remember the feeling first arising back in the late 60’s, as racial “sensitivities” began to blossom. There were many variations of this scenario, but they could all be exemplified in a traffic light decision I recall: The car in front of me didn’t go when the light turned green. Had the driver been white, after about three seconds I’d have honked. However, seeing that the driver was black, I did not honk. Why not? Because I feared the gesture would be mistaken as racist. Thus began for me -- and I think for most whites, the “tip-toeing” – the editing of normal human behavior with blacks for fear of being perceived as racist -- being more patient, nicer, more ingratiating, more forgiving. Maybe a better way to put it is -- tolerating more bullshit than we otherwise would have from a fellow whitey.
A little history: In the mid-60’’s America had finally -- legally at least -- opened all “gates” to blacks, and I think most of us good-hearted souls believed blacks would quickly get up to speed – school-wise, job-wise, less-crime-wise. But, much to our surprise and disappointment, that didn’t happen. Blacks continued to do significantly worse than whites in school and in employment, and to commit highly disproportionate rates of crime. Fifty years later this pattern continues pretty much unchanged.
On top of all this, the black nuclear family, which by 1950 had been steadily approaching its white counterpart in stability, began to unravel. In 1950 88% of white families and 78% of black families consisted of husband-wife households. By 1980 that black figure had dropped to 54%, with the white figure dropping only 3 percentage points.
In 1960 the percentage of black children born out-of-wedlock was roughly 20%. Today that rate has risen to an astounding 70% (over 90% in Washington D.C.) -- most of those children having little or no relationship with their fathers. The percentage of black families classified as “Single-Female Households” rose from 28% in 1950 to 70% in 1980.
Clearly, rather than getting up-to-speed as a result of the civil-rights revolution, blacks seemed to be, if anything, regressing. My theory for this regression is simple -- people quit honking at them. Let me explain.
As blacks continued to struggle in many areas, the Left gave birth to the “race” industry – activists dedicated to explaining and remedying this black/white disparity conundrum. Unfortunately, when coming to THE great fork in the road – whether the roots of these problems lay with white racism or with black culture, the Left “hit the ground running” -- running down the “white racism” road -- and never looked back. Race-preferences were born, and all black negative behavior, all black social pathologies, began to be explained away. Put another way, liberals demanded that blacks be permanently absolved of all responsibility for their outcomes. Blacks’ “legacy of slavery” -- and innate white racism -- were the only allowable explanations. Nobody, you might say, was allowed to honk -- not even blacks -- at other blacks.
And so it has continued right up to our present day. And, since the Left has tirelessly preached for over four decades that white racism is rampant and innate, it has become their chiseled-in-stone gospel truth that any and all “honks” are racist.
So – here we are: Any of us who strongly disagreed with President Obama’s policies – i.e. those of us who were honking (is that where the term “honky” came from?) -- are more and more being labeled racists in the liberal media.
I suppose this must be one of the genuine perks of identity politics – that any criticism from someone outside your “tribe” can simply be dismissed as prejudice.
Prestwood’s Laws -- #10: The Law of Race Card Certainty: In any set of circumstances where blacks are negatively impacted, racism will be charged – regardless of any facts, logic, or common sense that may contradict that charge.