|
The proposed apology for slavery makes white guilt permanent
According to CNN yesterday: The House of Representatives was poised Tuesday to pass a resolution apologizing to African-Americans for slavery and the era of Jim Crow….Whoa—this Resolution isn’t just “apologizing for slavery and Jim Crow.” It’s apologizing for the whole unequal condition of blacks, which, it says, was caused in at least large part and is still being caused by slavery and Jim Crow. So it’s exactly as I’ve always said. No escape from white guilt is possible. On one hand, the truth about race—which is recognized and publicly stated by only a tiny number of marginalized people in this country and never by the mainstream media—is that blacks, because of inborn racial differences of ability, will always be significantly behind whites in intellectual achievement, socioeconomic level, and political and cultural influence. On the other hand, the reigning egalitarian fiction says that blacks’ inborn abilities are the same as whites, which means that black inequality is caused not by their own natural limitations, but by white “racism,” as well as by historical slavery and Jim Crow (as stated in the House Resolution). So, according to the official orthodoxy of our society, white mistreatment of blacks has caused blacks to be permanently behind, and therefore whites owe blacks an unending obligation to make them equal to themselves. Which also means that blacks and liberals are justified in demonizing whites until whites make blacks equal. This was also the underlying point of Barack Obama’s speech on race this past March—which could only be understood if you read the speech carefully, as I did (please see my recently revised and expanded discussion of the key passages in the speech). I wrote:
Obama, while criticizing individual (though mostly unspecified) statements by Jeremiah Wright, nevertheless excuses Wright’s hatred as a product of white discrimination. Further, Obama says, with maximum clarity, that it is whites’ responsibility to close the racial divide, which they must do by acknowledging that white discrimination is the past and present cause of black inequality and black anger, and by taking all steps that are needed to equalize the races. Underneath the uplifting tone and folderol, underneath the warm patriotic sounds, underneath the genuine sensitivity to human complexity, the speech represents a cartoonish, leftist-black assault on America. We are a racist country, and we deserve the demented accusations of the Rev. Wrights of the world, until, through the socialist reconstruction of our country, true racial equality is achieved.Again, the proposed Resolution makes slavery and Jim Crow currently active in America, by tying them to the current (and ongoing and inherently incurable) backward performance of blacks as compared with other groups. Therefore the guilt for slavery is not just in the past, and it’s not just in the present. It is permanent. And therefore no apology can EVER clear us of our racial sins. How can you be forgiven for a wrong you’ve done to another party, if you are still committing that wrong? “May one be pardoned and retain the offense?” asks King Claudius in Hamlet. Indeed, from the point of view of our ruling belief system, white America is exactly like the guilt-stricken Claudius, seeking remission of a sin when one is still enjoying the fruits of the sin—which in Claudius’ case is the throne and the wife he acquired by murdering his brother, and in the case of whites is the continuing “unfair” advantages they enjoy in comparison with blacks. From Hamlet, Act III, Scene 3:
KING CLAUDIUS By the way, what did Congress ever have to do with slavery and Jim Crow? Those were state institutions, not federal institutions. We now live under a Kafkaesque tradition in which people apologize for things that other people did, with the only connection between the sinners and the apologizers being that the two groups placed under the same symbolic rubric as whites or Americans.
Anthony Damato writes:
Some white countries like Russia don’t have this problem of white guilt. So when you say “white guilt” it mostly applies to American whites, and not German whites for example. My idea is that white guilt is an American phenomenon exported to other countries in the form of multiculturalism and tolerance. Though one could say that colonialism is the burden of the British.Wade C. writes:
I spent some time this morning reading about the Democrat who sponsored the House resolution. His name is Steve Cohen, and he represents a Memphis congressional district that is overwhelmingly black. Rep. Cohen is quite liberal, but alas, he is white, and he won his seat in 2006 with a narrow victory in a multi-candidate race. He faces a primary challenger this year from his runner-up, a black female attorney. As you might imagine, the challenger is making all sorts of campaign references to how blacks “deserve” at least one of Tennessee’s nine congressional districts. In response, Rep. Cohen hopes that this resolution of apology will help him to prove his racial bona fides to his black constituents, enough to overcome the challenge from a black primary opponent. Some of this background information is discussed in the following links:LA replies:
Long time VFR readers may remember the name Wade C. from an exchange in 2004 in which, after Christopher Roach had been excluded from VFR for his unrelenting personal attacks on me in a discussion about Sen. Kerry’s military record, his friend Wade C. (using his full name) began posting in Roach’s defense and made statements about me and other commenters that resulted in his being excluded as well. I left those comments online so that people who accuse me of being a “thin-skinned tyrant who refuses to reply to criticism and excludes people who disagree with him” would understand why exclusions are sometimes necessary. However, since the point here is to put the past behind us, I am not linking that entry here.James W. writes:
Perhaps Algore could at least show us the way and apologize for his father, Sen. Albert Gore, Sr., who opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and tried to pass an amendment removing the federal government’s ability to enforce it. And perhaps Bill Clinton could apologize for his mentor, William Fulbright, the segregationist U.S. senator from Arkansas. They could all even send a check without me. Who’s stopping them? Posted by Lawrence Auster at July 30, 2008 01:48 PM | Send Email entry |