The conversation keeps slipping from some people among a class of people to all who share an identifying characteristic. Stereotyping that reenforces stereotyping to oppose stereotyping.
Fear of the other is used by Trump to keep support. That’s enough to prove that it’s a real issue. But the significance then becomes determined by how any person or group of people evaluates it, subjectively.
I am white. I don’t worry about changing demographics because I see do not think race determines who people happen to be.
I worry about people trying to resolve injustices by applying controls on others to make them act appropriately according to some ideal set of priorities. That means living not in a liberal democracy but in a totalitarian dictatorship of high virtues.
2
"White Anxiety"? I'm white and I don't feel anxious in the way you are describing. I thought the idea was to move away from assigning thoughts and behaviors to people based on their race or gender. What is important about the group you are alluding to--the melanin content of their skin or their ideas? As writers your job is to find the words to talk about these things without just resorting to shallow (racist) identify-based definitions.
5
Diversity + proximity = conflict. Mass migration yields war, according to historical analysis. Every. Single. Time. Buckle up, folks. The fun is just beginning! And if you are white and don't agree with your displacement from the nation your forefathers built, YOU, sir, are a RACIST!
5
What mass migration? Europeans migrating to America?
Humans have been migrating for 250,000 years. What studies prove migration cause wars?
Politicians manipulate human tribalism to justify racism and war.
4
Yeah, white people with European ancestors who hated being limited by bigotries there, came here to find new opportunities from settling and developing a continent. They found a hard life but lots of opportunities. Too many of them were bullies who took lands from people already there, who used slavery to prosper, and to exploit racism to gain advantages. Even among whites many saw these behaviors as unjust and due people with feeble consciences. White supremacy is a psychological reaction to low self esteem. Most white people don’t need it.
1
@Pub
Who are the white people currently being displaced? I don’t know any. Do you know a single white person who has lost his/her home or has lost his/her job due to some kind of racial displacement? It just doesn’t happen. If you think a bit, you may find that xenophobia is the real problem here, nothing else. What exactly are people afraid of? I just don’t understand. White people who occupy their minds worrying about their supposed loss of status are a sad lot. If I’ve learned anything in life about people, it’s that too many of us are afraid of things that simply don’t affect us and never will.
There is a third force - voters who do not have anxiety about a more diverse country or the share of of their race in it, but who are also sick of having every policy and every political utterance analyzed through the prism of identity. People are a collection of a stories and experiences and should be judged on their actions and words, not on their racial or gender identity.
10
I'll just say it -- the values and concerns of racist Americans are of no relevance to me. Just because they exist does not mean they need to be pandered to.
4
"Address It"? Can we back off the normalization of white supremacist ideology please?
4
Here in Wisconsin, there are many days on which various ethnic and religious groups, including those considered whiter non-Protestant, celebrate their heritage. What kind of celebrations do those who wish to honor their white identity propose?
1
When Democrats promised free healthcare care to illegals while so many millions of Americans go without, they sealed their own fate.
10
As a white person, the only “white anxiety” I have is anxiety about what ill-informed Caucasian people in our country will be manipulated to believe, do, and vote for next. Trump has warped their fears in a ruinously dangerous way. I’ve never been as afraid.
5
The article gives insufficient emphasis to the role of the progressive left’s “racialization” of politics and culture in the run up to recent elections.
The Democratic Party has long been accused of playing identity politics, and its platforms emphasized planks intended to appeal to various minority or other groups. What increasingly changed was the left’s justification of these initiatives with vituperative attacks on American culture and history generally and white people specifically.
“White Privilege” became invective. Implicit bias and systemic racism were presumed (what, you can’t see it— its implicit—but you are guilty). BLM, backed by only by media driven narrative as the data is ambiguous at best and generally contrary, pitted the left against conservative law and order whites. Concerns about terrorism, particularly following the San Bernardino and Pulse nightclub attacks were dismissed as Islamophobia. Similarly, any desire to enforce border security or immigration laws is “racist” (although Obama did this too).
The Yale quad screed (or should it be the University formerly known as Yale) or the comments here often insisted that opinions of whites were invalid and did so with anger and vehemence.
That there wouldn’t be a reaction to this defies common sense. Trump’s election followed, not caused, this reaction. He certainly blundered at times, and said offensive things, but most of his alleged racial appeal is simply his obvious rejection of the above.
12
You are understating the problem in my view. And while it goes even deeper (think the Da Vinci Code) and (The Knights of Malta), I recommend you read a recent Time Magazine article entitled Republicans Want a White Republic. They'll Destroy America to Get It.
1
At one time, it was essential journalism to seek out political comments from university professors to give a newspaper reader, thoughtful perspective on where we have been, where we are, and where we are going. Today, not so much. Like corporate newspapers, Fox, NBC, etc., their agendas are just so plain transparent, that a reader cannot but take pause, to give credibility to their "sage" observations.
3
Jimmy Carter said that life isn't fair. But it really is, e.g., if an Asian takes my job, it's probably because he's more qualified. If a non-English-speaking Latino takes a job, it may be because he's willing to work hard and sweat buckets for a low wage. (I can understand that few people will accept picking lemons in 120 degree heat all day, every day.)
But there's three things in general that you can, and will, do about it: (1) attack; (2) withdraw; or (3) compromise.
Many Americans went on the attack: Love it or leave it. Trump is providing morale support, and you'll have lots of company, especially in the South.
Withdrawing seems a losing strategy. It depends on what and exactly how one withdraws.
Compromising is usually or theoretically best. It can be difficult; nonetheless, it's the more mature and wiser choice. What that compromise may consist of varies; it may be learning new job skills, starting your own business, or even going back to college. Or -- an unusual choice -- joining or starting a commune; hey, times are hard for millions of us. We can't borrow the money from our parents to start over because they're broke or dead, or they just refuse to risk their life savings on us, the frequently unemployed or, perhaps, ne'er-do-wells, for which you can't blame them. No child left behind is a noble idea for a family, but often a foolish path for the deadbeats in your gene pool.
Welcome to hard times.
1
@Jim Muncy
I’m not buying what you’re selling.
5
You offer a plausible explanation but really does not address the issues well enough to stand.
People have pretty good knowledge of their circumstances and how to mange things to do well. But they anticipate what to expect based mostly upon what has already happened. There is still uncertainty. Change causes far more uncertainty and anxiety. People have great difficulty in discerning what will help them know what to expect. Their minds tend to try to identify what is meaningful based upon that with which they are familiar, even things not well understood. It’s called heuristic problem solving techniques. Justin’s and seeing what seems to fit.
Dear Emily and Nate,
Unfortunately I don't believe much of what your polls say, due to past failures such as this doozy from Nate in 2016 ... https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/
So I'll ignore your articles, conjectures, and speculations and go out now to meet with my local Indivisible and get out the vote.
I'll be back to read your columns again after Nov. 3, 2020, should abilities to predict outcomes improve. Good luck!
Kate P.
4
After reading through a large number of comments to this article, its hard not to get discouraged with the future of America. Large numbers recognize Trumpism as a logical, natural reaction to the obsession with identity politics of the Democratic party. The progressives' views are reinforced daily by the MSM, including this paper, which insists in analyzing every topic through the lens of white racism, always based on a thesis that whites, and white men in particular, are the root of the evil under discussion. Are you opposed to open borders? Then you are a racist. How absurd.
Guess what? The most powerful vote anyone has is with their feet. There is a reason that when black and brown people flee their countries, they most often head to a majority white country (US, Europe, Australia).
AOC and the squad seem to believe that stoking racial identification is as beneficial to their positions as Trump does. I can start to see this obsession with race ending in a schism, with the Northeast and West Coast states breaking off from middle red states in the vast middle. It could get ugly.
Both sides need to tone it down. And I mean both.
17
When was the last time we had a racist president exploit subconscious prejudices against non-whites? This is what one may call 'institutionalized violence' against social justice in a country that claims equality for all. Hypocrisy in the making?
1
In the 20th century: Theodore Roosevelt (was a eugenicist), Woodrow Wilson (a noted racist who purged Federal Civil Service of non -whites) Franklin Roosevelt (New Deal Social Safety net program for whites only) Richard Nixon (Southern strategy) , Ronald Regan (welfare queens), George H.W. Bush (Willie Horton), and Bill Clinton (welfare remote).
why white Americans do not like foreigners in the usa but invade any other countries with impunity an killing millions without respecting their flag's
Identity politics, white nationalist GOP or progressive Democrat, is going to be a sure loser in the long run, indeed it probably already is given the damage already done to the West, because it is contrived and against human nature. Communism, socialism, and fascism end in ruin because of such a contrived collectivist ethos. People are individuals not baskets of deplorables or voting blocs along Marxist lines.
6
So we have two variables.
White anxiety.
Changes in relative proportions of Americans sorted by where their ancestors were two hundred years ago.
Uhhh you think there may be some other variables?
Statistics can be a powerful fool or just a trolling fraud.
You decide.
White anxiety. Defend that on oral examination for a PhD as a real explanatory variable that controls American politics. Then flunk out.
5
"Address it ? " How about ready to fan the flames of bigotry and hatred to seek personal power and gain out of white anxiety ?
1
Philosopher J S Mill once remarked that 'Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservatives'. Trump's election in 2016 and his 2020 campaign strategy seem to prove that Mill was not wrong. Trump is cunning rather than outright stupid (he is a bit dim though) but his supporters and enablers are definitely situated at the lower end of the IQ scale.
2
Not certain what Utopia is supposed to occur should white people ever become a minority in this country.
Will the newly-arrived people from India suddenly cease identifying one another as higher and lower caste and treating one another accordingly?
Will the Asian Americans suddenly embrace the Black Americans and vie with one another to move into Black neighborhoods?
Will Hispanic Americans welcome millions of Bangladeshis to our shores to take the jobs that illegal alien Central Americans just won't do?
Will the new racial mix finally give a large portion of land back to the Indian Nations?
In short, what wonderful state of existence is supposed to arrive should whites ever cease to be the majority in this country?
Moreover, what does the New York Times have against white Europeans (legally) emigrating to this country?
12
Trump is the first US President that if you care about your children and want nothing but the best for them you have to shield them from the hate Trump spews every single day.
3
There is ample evidence that poor whites were happy as long as they had someone who could be ranked even lower than them on the totem pole and those were blacks. Once that belief was dealt a blow by Obama's election, all hell broke loose.
Arlie Hochschild captured it in her book, "Strangers in their own land". It is mind boggling how these white folks could see the Obamas and other educated African-Americans as undeserving blacks who had come from behind and usurped the lawful place of whites at the head of the queue.
The Republican party has used this knowledge since Nixon to appeal to folks in the South as well as crypto-racists in the North.
What will the Republican party do as we approach that magical year in the future when non-Hispanic whites are a minority? Will it be able to pivot and change its philosophy? How will it play down its past?
Anything can happen in politics. If the party of Lincoln can become the racist party that it is today and the party of segregationist Democrats can shed that identity to truly fight for equality for all, irrespective of color, then I guess we need not worry about the Republican party. They will survive.
The media’s favorite phrase “Breaking news” is finally being supplanted. “Four women of color.”
6
"a country that is growing more diverse"
--The country isn't "growing more diverse" through some inevitable force of nature. The elite establishment is *making* the country more diverse, by importing millions upon millions of immigrants. This has been going on for 40+ years, without the consent of the people.
“All of a sudden, these people who had no vehicle to express these attitudes are now being invited to express them"
--When the attitudes of a large number of people find expression in our political system, it is a threat to our democracy. (sarcasm)
"the rising salience of race"
--Race became more salient starting back around 2013-2014, when (studies show) the attitudes of Democrats began shifting strongly left on racial issues (think Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, implicit bias, etc.). Positions that used to be mainstream, like controlling the border, became fringe; issues that used to be fringe, like reparations, became mainstream. Trumpism is at least in part a response to this.
12
@Tom
Now WHO was the last president to propose and then get through the Senate a bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform bill that would strongly increase the southern border security (by installing e-verify, and tripling the number of Border Patrol agents at the southern border by adding 40,000 BP agents to the 18,000 there until this day)?
Obama.
Who never obtained ANY GOP or bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform "deal", let alone a bill that would strengthen the southern border as much as Obama's 2013 Senate bill?
Trump.
And who was massively employing illegal aliens - until the media found out about it, recently - and didn't even PROPOSE e-verify (= a measure that would penalize Americans employing illegal aliens)?
Trump.
Conclusion: the only ones keeping the borders more open than what could have been the case for five long years already, are the GOP.
Stop believing tweets and start fact-checking, and THEN you'll have southern border security.
5
@Ana Luisa
Dems never support immigration control --
except when it is tightly tied to giveaways to illegal aliens such as amnesty.
9
@Ana Luisa What Sam Finn said. I agree though that Trump has done a terrible job of fulfilling his promises. And certainly the establishment GOP is terrible on the issue as well--they are part of the "elite establishment" I referenced.
1
This whole tempest reminds me so much of the media frenzy prior to the build-up to the Iraq war. Legitimate topics of discussion heated to the boiling point by media hungry for viewers and readers. Trump's offensive and banal comment re. "The Squad" was really so ambiguous that there was considerable disagreement initially if it was truly even "racist." Now, a week later, people are acting as if the sky is falling.
5
Its inevitable that whites will become a minority at some point in the future. Unlike the 1800s and early 1900s, white European nations largely seem to have their act together, as evidenced by the democrats who want to emulate those nations. What that translates into is a lack of people from those countries wanting/needing to emigrate. On the other hand, the areas of the world which are in disarray are basically all non-white, such as Latin America or sub-Sahara Africa. When the crossover occurs is basically up to politics in the US, how open, slightly ajar or shut our border is will depend greatly on who is president over the next 30-40 years. Roughly 2 billion people meet most Dem candidates qualification for asylum in the US, so there will never be a shortage of asylum seekers.
7
How would they not be uncomfortable? They are called racist if they don’t want an open border with no one gettting deported? They struggle to pay for health insurance while immigrants get free maternity, labor and delivery and full medical care in many areas. It is legal and practiced that the children of illegals get preference for college admissions due to minority status. They are discriminated against in many jobs and many require speaking Spanish. Their school budgets are drained by expensive ESL students. They are accused of being racist just for wanting an immigration system that follows laws like every other nation.
16
How would you blame a white parent for being annoyed her child with equivalent scores will be legally discriminated against for college admissions? That she has to study the schools system to see what percentage is minority and drains the budget with ESL?
10
I think a lot of this 'white anxiety' can be attributed to affirmative action.
Can you really blame white people for being slightly fed up when it's perfectly LEGAL in this country to discriminate against them based on the color of their skin (hiring, college admissions, government contracts, to name a few)?
24
yeah and you can add the bunch at the border waiting for their respective handouts too. that's always been the draw. if they didn't expect it they wouldn't be coming.
8
@Luciano
The problem with affirmative action (and "diversity" initiatives in general) is that they don't address the core issue: economic class.
More than anything else, the economic class you grew up in informs your world view and your "diversity".
This was more than evident in Jaime Dimon's grilling by that representative from CA who asked him, point by point, how a teller earning minimum wage at his bank was supposed to survive and continue to be employed the bank he ran, given that they require their employees . He was utterly dumbfounded and falsely said that those jobs are for people with high school diplomas.
Go into any JPMorgan Chase branch, especially in an big expensive city like NYC, and ask the tellers what their educational background is. I bet you 90% have college degrees and the rest have associates degrees. They're not high school kids earning pocket money for college, like Dimon seems to believe.
8
@Viv
Jaimie Dimon and his ilk --
including most corporate CEOs,
most Hollywood stars,
most pro-athlete stars,
most top-level university administrators,
and most top-level government administrators,
and everyone else with more than $300,000
annual income (counting the value of health and pension benefits and other perks) --
-- and that includes both Dems and Repubs
and both liberals/progressives and conservatives -- and their spouses --
-- regardless of race --
ought to be the paying --
and paying big --
for whatever assistance is needed by "disadvantaged" individuals,
regardless of race.
3
As a Jewish person I can't get over the irony that the same people who
support critiquing and lessening the power of AIPAC deny that there are
legitimate reasons why not everyone goes along with the illegal
immigration lobby. Some Americans might not like the huge influx of
"brown people" just like some people's hostility towards Israel may
be due to anti-Semitism. Nonetheless, everyone- whites, Asians,
blacks, Hispanics, men, women, Christians, Jews, wants to have some
control in how their country develop. I don't see wanting immigration
to be controlled rather than wide open to be mostly based on bigotry,
it seems like common sense. Constantly claiming that all whites who
don't go along with the illegal immigration, black, Muslim, Hispanic,
transgender and feminist lobby blindly is doing so out of fear and prejudice is no different than saying that those who don't blindly obey
stringent Pro Israeli lobby groups are anti-Semitic. Can you stop practicing the same methods of stifling dissent that you condemn in those people?
16
What we have here is a clear division in American political culture. On one side those who believe that working-class Americans are, in "essence," divided along racial and ethnic lines because... VALUES! Those include Nate Cohn, Donald Trump and a good number of so-called "moderates" at the NYT.
On the other side, those who know that the real enemy of the Working Class are those who benefit from wealth inequality and the fostered powerlessness of all but a handful of Americans--aspects of Political Culture that Nate and his friends are paid to ignore, which goes far to explain why they will repeatedly fail in their "objective" analyses.
Sanders and the Squad know which side they're on. Which side are you on, Nate, which side are you on?
4
If the attendees of Trump rallies are the “master race”, we’re in serious trouble.
8
The 2020 election is going to be a referendum on the state of radical white nationalist extremism in the country. It is foolish to think that courting the buffoon's racist base will make any impact at all. They have zero incentive to switch votes in favor of a candidate who offers less racism on the menu. With the structural imbalance of the electoral college, a plurality of voters with radical white nationalist extremist views could again put the buffoon in the white house even if an establishment democrat wins the popular vote by over five million votes. There is, therefore, no choice but to nominate a real left wing candidate, who can turn out the Democratic base to pre-2016 levels contrary to the popularity of so many pro-establishment views that openly advocate that any eventual nominee should play footsie with the buffoon's racist voters.
3
Trump thought his daddy's money will gain him respect among the elites in NYC. They despised him as crude, uneducated and loud. He never forgot that slight and has spent his life to wreak revenge by embracing the truly crude, loud and uneducated segment of US population and goading them to support his revenge driven agenda which includes racism. Trump wants to be a dictator and if he becomes one, his revenge will be merciless.
6
@Elizabeth Wong
It wasn't the "crude, loud, and uneducated segment" that bought Trump condos and clamored to get into Mar-a-Lago and his golf courses.
It was news tv stars like Keith Olbermann, Mika Brzezinski and the thousands of other luminaries who bought his Trump tower condos. It was/is even people like Robert Mueller who wanted a golf course membership.
2
Maybe a party that habitually uses the words “white” and “man” as epithets, isn’t, at heart, dedicated to garnering votes.
14
I didn’t think Donnie Trump would do it, but he is now in full swing at making the MAGAts victims.
He says the USA doesn’t win, he says people hate America , he says we need to portray ourselves as victims, and his base agrees. The last thing a victim wants to ask is: is there any justification for the hatred, for my not winning: it is ALWAYS someone else’s fault. Poor little Republican victims.
Trump is a sad old geezer who has been radicalized by age and change: he just cant cope with the world as it is now.
He is a terrorist in the making. He wants the world the way it used to be, with white males in all the leadership roles and no one to challenge what it means to be American, what it means to be sexist, what it means to be racist, what it means to have values. He doesn't like challenges and will respond to them with vituperative attacks. A lot of his base are like that too. They see their power drifting and they want it back. They, too, are terrorists in the making.
5
“What’s different is the willingness to politicize it openly.”
Really?
What has been the left doing like a clockwork from election to election? Every, as in every without exception, Republican presidential candidate in modern history, successful or not, was accused of racism by the left and their media allies.
Live by a sword - die by sword!
13
I bet Native Americans felt uneasy about the changing demographics / increasing percentage of the WHITE population many years ago...! Seasons change, people. Figure out to move ahead in the most peaceful, prosperous way possible. Hint: it ain't by voting for a Rump.
3
@Truth Hurts
That was then.
This is now.
3
I would encourage everyone to listen to the "send her back" chant and recognize how focused and unified the crowd was.
It is not the lazy, half-hearted ignorance of "lock her up." It's Nurembergian in delivery and its utterers will come to pose a real problem.
4
What a bad headline. Trump doesn’t address the anxiety, he exploits it!
2
Joan Williams book "White Working Class" said this a few months ago. I guess somebody read the book toTrump since reading anything is not his strong suit.
2
So Democrats in government, the media, and academia spend ten years or so pushing identity politics to the point wherein the only thing the various identities can agree on is how awful the white male (especially the old white male) is, and then they feign shock when white males and their often (but not always) white wives, sisters, and daughters begin to feel threatened by woke-ism? It appears to me to be a reasonable and intelligent reaction to a threat.
If people disdain you openly on every cable news show (take a listen to CNN and MSNBC panels) and make fun of you on tv shows and effectively legislate against your interests via affirmative action, it is okay to recognize that you are the last group against which it’s okay to be openly racist. When you point that out, the great and tolerant progressive minds have the nerve to tell you that it’s impossible to be racist toward white people. Okay. Instead, you’re told to check your privilege though you don’t feel privileged at all. Yeh, you’re going to feel some anxiety at that. It’s not about fear of a more diverse America. It’s fear of a more hostile America determined to put white males in their place. As the mom, daughter and sister of white males, I fear for them and their futures. Cut out the open throated hostility and maybe the accurate sense of threat will abate.
17
All the white people on here who are suddenly so aggrieved and upset over the recent attention paid to minorities over racism and immigration policies are getting just a mere hint of what it’s like to be black or brown in this country. Whites like me have had such privilege in America that they will never truly know the anxiety of whether their skin color keeps them out of a good job, a new home or a preferred school, or whether it’s the primary reason they’re stopped by a police officer.
If a flood of Norwegians entered the country, I can assure you they would not be corralled in cages. They would now be meeting with immigration officers on a path toward citizenship.
The country is getting browner and we had better embrace our diversity or we’ll end up in a civil war. In 100 years, Spanish might be the national language. Sitting in those cages might be a future Nobel laureate or the scientist who helps to save our planet. Instead of turning these people away, we need to help them be the best they can be . . . just like America did when your white ancestors arrived here decades ago with little money or education.
5
@LIChef
// Whites like me have had such privilege in America that they will never truly know the anxiety of whether their skin color keeps them out of a good job, a new home or a preferred school, or whether it’s the primary reason they’re stopped by a police officer.//
What white privilege to the 29 million (and mostly white people) who live in communities with lead water content twice that of Flint have?
What white privilege do the vast majority of white people have over Asians, who have a disproportionate number of high paying jobs and consequently a disproportionate amount of wealth? https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/visualizations/2018/demo/p60-263/figure1.pdf
The majority of people shot by police are white, by the way. https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/police-shootings-2019/?utm_term=.b26b725f4721.
If over-representation (as a percentage of population) concerns you, why is it that you conveniently leave out the over-representation of Asians in earning power? Lemme guess, they're just genetically predisposed to be smarter and work harder than everyone else, right?
Perhaps you should ground your statements in facts instead of that mythical "white privilege" you seem to believe exists for everyone.
10
What is white culture anyway? I would like Trump voters to explain to me just what they mean by this. The only cultural attributes I see white people embracing come from their ethnic background in Germany, Ireland, Norway, etc. Where they or their ancestors immigrated from. True in my family too.
2
@Oh please, “white culture” is what used to be thought of as “American culture” way back in the 20th century. Your family was part of it as were the families of most of the others commenting here. It includes things like an emphasis on hard work, individual responsibility, individual rather than group justice, as well as holiday traditions, like Christmas carols, etc. Little things, like holiday traditions or food from your ancestors’ original homelands are just a tiny part and don’t even exist in many families.
5
To understand the republican view of demographics, just imagine how you would feel if it was the other way around.
Instead of 300 million new liberal immigrants, who are fine with abortion and higher taxes changing the politics of your (city, state, country), imagine 300 million white people from Alabama who are against abortion and higher taxes.
You would be against immigration too.
11
@John
Ironically, the people from central America are very staunch Catholics and very much against stated liberal dogma. As are most Muslims.
4
"Research is beginning to suggest that white voters who have long been politically motivated by their views of other groups may be starting to think of their own group as an explicit identity. In that sense, they appear for the first time in the Trump era to be thinking about themselves in ways that mirror how minorities have long thought about group identity. "
The words "first time in the Trump era" are simply absurd.
Can't your writers see the obvious? It was perfectly obvious when white children were bussed out of their neighborhoods in Boston and black ones bussed in. It was obvious when race, specifically, was used to discriminate against white firefighters who scored higher than blacks on unbiased tests.
And it remains so today.
The bias against Asians in education is even worse.
The Left has intentionally caused whites to start thinking about demanding their own special rights. And, of course, we, taking the clue from the Left, have the right to define our own
reasons for doing so. Trying to stop us from doing that is itself race discrimination.
The left opened Pandora's box, and can't close it.
13
If Donald Trump has "exploited" White anxiety, or even exacerbated it, according to the opinion of many Times readers, then the New York Times and other so-called 'legitimate' 'mainstream' 'legacy' media are doing everything they can to exploit, even exacerbate, racial tensions, particularly as it relates to championing persons-of-color advocacy at the expense of the White population.
It is not Donald Trump. It is not the Alt-Right. It is not 'White Privilege'. And it is not Vladimir Putin.
It is a country so festering with internal resentment it can't think straight. And everybody---Right, Left, of any color, of any sexual persuasion---will suffer as a result.
The only winners to emerge out of our squabbling over false scraps will be the corporations and super-rich who will emerge, as ever, unscathed and above the fray.
9
"A different politician at the top of the Republican Party — one focused, say, on tax cuts rather than immigrants — might have left these white racial anxieties more dormant, or less clearly linked with partisanship."
The above statement in this piece is so facile and enraging. It is based on the premise that most people are a bunch of dimwits mindlessly following who ever is their leader. People, Republicans in this instance, are all just nodding like bobblehead dolls at any slogan or canard is thrown at them. (That is of course other than the writers and readers of the NYT's of course!)
Trump is the manifestation, not the cause. We need to look at the some of the more obvious reasons for fragmentation and tribalism in the US and the world. In ascending order of importance and impact:
5. MSM and the 24 hours news cycle.
4. Social media and the 'need' to constantly be connected.
3. Hollowing out of jobs due to automation and off-shoring.
2. An elitism across all segments of society, most particularly in our political and governing classes, that is divorced from understanding and addressing the needs of the people.
1. The breakdown of community based structures as we look to 'big' government and other centralized power bases for solutions to our problems.
The current Information Technology Revolution is the equivalent of the Industrial Revolution to a factor of 10. Yet, as back then, we are too often re-acting instead of driving change for the betterment of us all.
4
Arthur Schopenhauer on national pride:
“The cheapest sort of pride is national pride; for if a man is proud of his own nation, it argues that he has no qualities of his own of which he can be proud; otherwise he would not have recourse to those which he shares with so many millions of his fellowmen. The man who is endowed with important personal qualities will be only too ready to see clearly in what respects his own nation falls short, since their failings will be constantly before his eyes. But every miserable fool who has nothing at all of which he can be proud adopts, as a last resource, pride in the nation to which he belongs; he is ready and glad to defend all its faults and follies tooth and nail, thus reimbursing himself for his own inferiority.”
4
It is all about power and privileges.
3
Have you seen how the south american countries that a lot of these migrants come from run? Mexico, a country run by and for Mexicans is so bad that 100 thousand people a month are willing to risk their lives and the lives of their children to get away from it. In Venezuela, people are eating their pets for food after yet another dictator takes control. I believe that south Africa, a different continent but similar situation, may collapse soon, the currency losing value quickly and the government rampant with corruption , this is a hard discussion that does not square with "diversity is our strength", but we need to have it. People see how these other countries are run and know that immigrants are not going to be content with being home health aids and laborers and are going to run for office and want to start running the country just like they do in Mexico and Africa, the results from those countries as a test tube do not fill you with confidence about the future. I don't want to live in Mexico for a good reason and that does not make me a racist, It means that your recognize a cause and effect relationship when you see one.
8
If anger is a motivating force, then Trump is in deep trouble, because the majority of Americans are angry about his behavior, his views, and his administration's corruption.
3
This is real - “ They appear to be concerned that employers and schools may give preference to nonwhite candidates” , it does not appear, it simple is. Every company on their websites or LinkedIn talk about Diversity. They say it is key to their company. On the job application, you need to say if you are “White” or some other race, what does this have to do with your job qualifications?
It is obviously looking to place non-white candidates. The average American is not ignoring this obvious disadvantage you are placing on white candidates.
So all this imaginary stuff you speak about is happening in real time. It may be to right some wrong in general society but to people that experience it - this is personal! So please get in touch with your average person and you will easily understand why race had been made a factor to people.
9
The Democrats started it. How could white people not take notice that the American Press and others made a fuss when Obama was elected the first black president?
And look at the campaign strategy of Hillary Clinton when she ran for president. The Democratic strategy stressed identity politics. They expressed concern and unity with immigrants, Muslims, people of color, homosexuals, Etc. Many white people, especially blue color and poor, conservative whites in rural areas, felt alienated. The Democrats did little or nothing to appeal specifically to working class whites.
Trump is picking up at the point where the Democrats stopped. He is filling a void.
9
@Fatso
What is really interesting is that whenever there is a black man of prominence who happens to be "conservative" (e.g. Clarence Thomas) the MSM vilifies him.
And whenever a woman dares to be conservative or vote for Trump, the MSM vilifies her. Like Madeline Albright saying that any woman who does not vote for Hillary ought to rot in hell.
3
White supremacy and racial anxieties are not recent events. Republicans, actually the modern Tea Party, have encouraged these beliefs and fears as soon as LBJ signed a Civil Rights Bill. Nixon perfected a Southern Strategy, Reagan nationalized the concept and Trump made it global. Trump is transitioning the party and nation from amoral to immoral.
3
Interesting how that shirt “love it or leave it” (aka “go back to where you came from”) shows up at a rally just a couple of days after DT’s tweets; rather looks like his *new platform* to me....
1
Politicians playing one ethnic group against another is as old as this country, probably pre-dates what’s usually called the world’s oldest profession. In case you missed it we just passed the 100th anniversary of Iowa's law against speaking non-English in certain public places. How else were you going to keep those German and Norwegian immigrants in line? Then there’s the Irish, the only thing that could unite the Danish and Norwegian immigrants where I grew up was the need for them to “go back”, apparently burning down a small town back in the good old days at least kept them out of the area for 75 years.
It took 200 years for the Melting Pot to homogenize dozens of different European ethnic groups who fled the United States, usually because their group had been on the loosing end of the latest in a 2,000 string of war/religious/ethnic conflict. Don’t expect recent lumps thrown into the pot to blend in any faster.
2
It's clear that Trump is appealing to racist bigotry. Democrats though should take the high road, and not be caught up in equally divisive issues like reparations. There are plenty of people in America who want everyone to get along, and look ahead to the future rather than dwell in the past.
5
The title of this article is off. Trump is not addressing white anxiety by any means. He is exploiting and exacerbating it for his own interests as he does with most things.
1
I’m black, son of immigrants, MBA, 6 figures yada, yada. I’ll be voting Trump again in 2020. I can’t think of anything Trump has done that truly offended me, maybe that bit where he seemed to mock the handicap reporter.
Anyway I find the current Dems repellent. Everything is boiled down to race, gender, or sexuality. Right now on social media a black politician had some grocery store dispute with an apparent white man.
Evidently this is of great national concern as several Dem presidential candidates wasted no time tweeting out how they stand behind this woman and it’s Trump fault. Turns out the “white” guy is Cuban and a Democrat that posted days ago how offended he was by Trump and has a different story than this lady.
I don’t see why people whose families have been here for generations can’t object to their country being made a free for all for everyone under the sun. It’s human nature. If it takes a Trump to bring it out because other politicians are so weak, so be it. It’s a debate worth having in the open.
11
America is indeed a great country. But you get few holidays compared to comparable economies. I have seen a heck a lot of the world from China to Chile, from Italy to Canada. You guys consequently seem rather innocent and not familiar with the benefits we get that you do not. What strikes me is how you think that things we take for granted like universal health care are somehow extremely far left. Things the squad proposes are not extreme or far left. Now I am retired and spend my time every day watching US cable TV and reading your media.
It seems you have been tricked into believing normal benefits are weird and extremely socialist. Here in OZ we have quite a right wing government and yet we have all the things AOC advocates and more... and we would throw out a government who tries to the them away... real fast. You have been conned my American friends with labels like "socialist" "far left" and "extreme". As a sympathetic and very interested outsider, it is so obvious to me. Affordable health care is normal; not an exotic socialist plot. It is your country that is not normal. Citizens don't need to be armed to the teeth. It looks crazy to be honest from the outside in a country that is quite similar in many ways.
The commies aren't coming to get you. Yet hard right people are fine with Trump grovelling to a real Commie Dictator in Kim. Don't let them hoodwink you into thinking sensible social programs are a sinister socialist plot.
4
Politicians playing one ethnic group against another is older than this country, probably pre-dates what’s usually called the world’s oldest profession. In case you missed it we just passed the 100th anniversary of Iowa's law against speaking non-English in certain public places. How else were you going to keep those German and Norwegian immigrants in line? Then there’s the Irish, the only thing that could unite the Danish and Norwegian immigrants where I grew up was the need for them to “go back.” Apparently burning down a small town in Northern Iowa back in the good old days kept them out of the area for 75 years. Go down to the local library, dig out the microfiche of local newspaper from the 1900’s and 1910’s, and see what our esteemed political leaders were saying about the latest immigrant surge back then.
It took 200 years for the Melting Pot to homogenize dozens of different European ethnic groups who fled to the United States, usually because their group had been on the loosing end of the latest in a 2,000 year string of war/religious/ethnic conflicts. Don’t expect recent lumps thrown into the pot to blend in any faster.
2
"Research is beginning to suggest that white voters who have long been politically motivated by their views of other groups may be starting to think of their own group as an explicit identity."
That's a pretty good description of white people coming to consciousness of their own political commitment to white supremacy. And so, I find it disturbing that this article never uses the words "racist" or "racism." It's inaccurate to describe "racial anxiety" such as the author describes without pointing out that it entails racism.
1
@TMSquared, what’s wrong with thinking of your own group as an explicit identity? I never thought like that until the culture moved on from merely celebrating minority identities, which is cool, to actually bashing white males, which is not. It doesn’t necessarily involve a commitment to white supremacy, just an unwillingness to remain a passive whipping boy.
7
@Z97
Thanks for engaging. I'll just say this. Not thinking about whiteness as a group identity--thinking that whiteness was just normal, while other groups were marked and identified by their color--is the cornerstone of white privilege, and white supremacy. I don't have to think about my whiteness when I encounter a cop, bank officer, potential employer, white salesperson, white person on the street. All those "other" groups do. Too bad for them. What is it about them, anyway? In short, white people haven't had to "think about themselves as a group" in order to in fact be the dominant and privileged identity group in society.
Once I become conscious of that, I also become conscious of the way society has been structured to privilege me. There is a long history to this, which has never been mainstreamed. I'd suggest beginning with American Slavery, American Freedom, by Edmund Morgan.
If my response to this new awareness is now to view those other groups as coming after that privilege--that is, if I embrace my identity as part of the white group--then I'm consciously embracing white supremacy.
@TMSquared, I agree that whites didn’t have to think about their own race much when they made up an overwhelming majority of US population. They didn’t bother with any group identity beyond “American”.
In this comment you sound as if becoming aware of one’s own race is a progressive step for whites. In your first comment you seemed to be saying that this white awareness is an example of racism and white supremacy. Maybe because white awareness can lead to the realization that the modern world was almost entirely created by whites?
Any group that is as large a majority as whites were will perceive themselves as the norm. Chinese in China do it for example. It is a perfectly reasonable mental schema. When society diversifies, the schema changes and group identity becomes more salient.
White group identity isn’t about being afraid someone is going to take away what many see as “privilege”, which is really just the effect of belonging to, a group with a well deserved reputation for being generally intelligent and fairly law-abiding. It’s about saying that if some are allowed care about the fate of their group vs. the rest of society, we should be too.
This society is set up less for whites to succeed than for the smart, competent, and hard-working to succeed. Asians generally do fine, even in “bad” schools. In the past 50 years, we’ve spent billions and bent many rules trying to get blacks up to speed. Did it work? Why not?
6
Trump is interested in only himself. Winning is the goal and essence of his life. Blinded by that, he uses any means to achieve that end ... means indifferent to morality or decency or justice or, certainly, charitable love. He exploits racism in America that is already there. And in doing so he may well promote more intense racism ... but that’s not where begins ... it is rooted in us. Trump has forced us to look at our ugly side. What we do with that and what we do with him in terms of re-election is up to us.
1
“A large if not majority share of white voters, and a majority of Republicans, say this change will threaten American customs and values — a prospect that they say makes them anxious, even angry.”
A more diverse set of customs and cultures can only be a good thing, right? A mixture of cultural standards, cultural cuisine, traditions, clothing, language, religion ... How can this diversity be harmful? This country was built on it, founded on it, depends on it. Diversity is a good thing, there is nothing to fear, no reason to hide or defend yourselves from it. Educate yourselves about other cultures, learn from them, interact with them, teach them your culture, and most of all, enjoy the greatness of diversity.
2
@Canewielder, a diversity of food, clothing, and celebrations can be nice, but do you really want a diversity of beliefs about women’s equality or the importance of individual rights? Also, language diversity tends to be problematic for national unity.
9
@Z97. Of course they need to follow the laws of the country, if they don’t want to follow the laws and the norms of the country then they shouldn’t be here. They should also be able to communicate in the language of the country, but shouldn’t be chastised for speaking their native language among themselves. Without cultural diversity the United States wouldn’t be the great nation it is today and people need to recognise, and accept that. The United States is a smorgasbord of cultures.
2
Yes, they will replace us. It is unavoidable. One can either react like a child, electing one bigoted demagogue after another who promises to stem the tide even though he can't, or one can react like an adult, electing leaders who get it and are truly adults. I choose the latter.
1
@Mark Lebow, why is replacement unavoidable? Actually enforcing immigration law would stop and even reverse the process.
Do you think replacement will make the country a better place for your children and grandchildren? If so, tell me which Latin American (or other non-white run) country makes you believe that.
4
It’s a matter of survival of the Republican party. Years back, demographers pointed out that minorities would soon be in the majority. The Republicans would need to appeal to them by being more inclusive. They chose a darker path. Skew the way electionso are held by radical gerrymandering. That wasn’t enough, so they found other ways to tip the scales in their favor. Those still weren’t enough, and now they’re faced with something they never imagined doing: letting a foreign government— the Russians, of all people— help them. It explains so much... why Lindsey Graham has made such a radical change in behavior, for instance. It’s classic Darwinism: whatever it takes to survive. And indications are that they will do literally whatever it takes.
3
We have much to thank Mr. Trump. He has helped to make explicit that the whiteness of one's skin, in and of itself, gives you the birthright to feel a sense of entitlement. All else flows from this ruling expectation. Now we need to elect a President who tells them shame on you for thinking that. I see nobody with the courage to say that.
2
“Many white Americans have long held what political scientists call conservative racial views, like believing that African-Americans struggle to get ahead because they don’t work hard enough, rather than because of discrimination or the legacy of slavery.”
I find it odd that many, if not the majority, of African-Americans also consider slavery as the primary cause for today’s continuing racial discrimination and inequality. Slavery ended so long ago that probably no one alive today ever experienced it. De jure racial segregation in the South and de facto racial segregation in the North, on the other hand, are both something that many African-Americans alive today DID experience. The ever-present threat of violence, either by law enforcement and/or by mobs, made many African-Americans think twice about whether they wanted to put their safety or that of their family members on the line by trying to go to a certain university or to get a certain job or to move into a certain neighborhood. Multiply such situations occurring across the United States for the 100 years between the end of the Civil War and the time when the Federal government passed legislation and began enforcing protecting the civil rights of African-Americans and other minorities, and there’s little wonder that African-Americans are still behind the 8 ball. (And don’t forget, although discrimination against African-Americans is not as blatant as it once was, it can still be found everywhere.)
3
@me That's an interesting, if incorrect, observation. Preventing discrimination is not the same as granting an advantage. Consider the similarity between the texts of Title IX and affirmative action:
"No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance."
[Government contractors shall] "take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin".
Both seek to ensure equity, not preference, for groups that have long been discriminated against.
So much for the preferences for blacks argument. It is as specious as if one were to maintain that Title IX discriminates against men.
As for the 60 years that you mention during which racial discrimination in employment (https://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2014/06/27/white-high-school-drop-outs-are-as-likely-to-land-jobs-as-black-college-students/#36a103527b8f), access to health care (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3540621/), access to education (https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/08/alabama-county-opens-first-integrated-school-in-2018-heres-why-it-took-so-long.html), and access to retail services (https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/02/us/starbucks-arrest-agreements/index.html) have been illegal, laws often don't help.
I observe a large population of folks (mostly women) who are not at Trump rallies, nor are they are watching MSNBC. They are either without work with TVs tuned in all day to commercial TV, or they are at low paying jobs (night and day) that never cover the bills. Many are white working class American women in relationships with African American men. It would appear that racism has completely bypassed their, and their families’, spheres. This is the picture of the new America that is a fact and that Trump-ites abhor. We need to focus on helping these women feel empowered, and ultimately to vote. They don’t know they have a voice. These ladies have huge responsibilities: child care, health issues, jobs that don’t pay enough, social and emotional needs. These women, and their families, feel marginalized in society and feel they have no voice....as if society is all of “us” and their voices don’t matter. They feel that “all that politics stuff” is beyond them like a foreign country. They cannot imagine how much they do matter and how much their needs matter. Let’s speak to them.
3
Alas this has picked up the wrong end of the stick to understand this phenom. Race is only one aspect of the cultural backlash. And trump is only one example.
2
The differences within black, white, yellow, red, and brown are far greater than the differences between them. Classifying people this way is like classifying books on the basis of page count - essentially useless.
1
I'm white and I don't have "white anxiety," I have anxiety that people can't seem to live together in peace and harmony. Not just here but anywhere. It should be easy. Love and kindness should outweigh hatred and misunderstanding. Love and kindness takes less effort. We should be working together to make life good for everyone. I have anxiety about how women are treated everywhere on this planet. It is 2019, not 1700. Women everywhere should be free and equal by now. I have anxiety about our impact on our environment and I have anxiety that no one is doing anything about it and it will only get worse unless we make changes now. I have anxiety that there is so much injustice in the country and the world. I have anxiety that there is too much pain and suffering that could be avoided if we simply helped those in need. I have anxiety about people not vaccinating their children. I have anxiety about people not being educated. I have anxiety about not having health care. I have anxiety about paying my rent and making ends meet. I have anxiety that a terrible person is President of my country and I have anxiety that there are terrible people in the Senate who don't care about any of us.
9
Virtually all European and American history taught in school IS white male political history.
The misplaced anger of some white voters is, ironically, setting up a backlash. When we become a minority, non-whites will have good reason to really discriminate against white voters.
Smart people form coalitions with others who have similar interests. It’s how city politics have worked for over a century. Of course, if schools don’t teach about the labor movement, the Great Society, and the Civil Rights and Women’s Movements, it’s somewhat understandable that some people resort to tribalism.
3
@Lawyermom, you must not have any recent experience with schools. The Civil Rights movement is now front and center in elementary social studies and language arts curricula. Kids learn about MLK and Rosa Parks long before important background material like slavery and the Civil War. Women get almost as much ink as men. The labor movement was centered on white men, so that doen’t get much attention. Lots of time spent on Japanese internment, though, to the exclusion of other information about WWII.
4
@Z97
You don’t indicate in which Big City you reside, but it’s my understanding that just as some school systems don’t teach evolution or human reproduction, they also don’t teach about controversial parts of our history. I don’t mean elementary school, but middle and high schools.
I’m white, and not anxious, except for the fact that I have enormous privileges in this country, and that doesn’t seem fair. When rules aren’t applied fairly I get anxious.
“Injustice Anxiety”.
Someone write a piece about that.
3
As a second generation American (white middle aged male) I only identify as American. As a person who has lived aboard for a significant part of my life I can identify as an immigrant. I fully agree with the American dream and assimilation. Assimilation does not mean giving up ines culture but respecting the host culture. Having navigated those issue my entire adult life I believe societal harmony is achievable. Forget racial harmony, race by definition means difference. However until we get to that point don’t underestimate the power of white rage and society and business need to account for this. That is my field of IO Psychology studies show that diversity programs lead to stress while inclusion programs do not. Diversity equals difference, inclusion means all. Learn form that.
6
We shouldn't confuse disliking the Pres. with disliking our country.
For millions of us, DJT is destroying our nation and our international status.
Hopefully , the Democrats will get to the point where they can speak with one voice and programs that address peoples' needs and have a good chance of becoming laws once DJT and McConnell are defeated in 2020!
2
Our lenient individual income tax code made it
profitable for companies to offshore manufacturing. It is difficult for middle age workers to find work. Employment often comes without benefits. This has nothing to do with immigrants. Reinstall the high marginal tax rates on super high incomes and run away greed will stop. Even the super rich will be happier because this madness cannot be sustained.
7
It’s not just Trump and deplorables who are feeling the anxiety; if anyone is interested in a more balanced narrative I recommend the excellent piece by James Crabtree in The Financial Times Weekend Edition, “ A Brave New World”, he discusses the very negative effects of globalization as well as reviewing two recently published books on the subject; I never imagined in a million years I would been recommending the F.T. for a point of view in support of the working class, but here it is. Globalization, including immigration has damaged developed nations and their middle class in irreparable ways, yes it has helped pull millions of Chinese out of poverty but we’re discussing American anxiety and although not mentioned European anxiety as well, finally conceded by The Financial Architect of the Clinton, Blair era of neo liberalism and the “all in” exuberance of those such as Thomas Friedman so expressed in his “The World is Flat” book on the subject, is it possible these very smart guys were so wrong or were they merely carrying out the wishes of the mega donors and friends, something to consider as we enter another election, will The DNC be allowed to pick another tool of the big money interests they represent, will we hopefully get a long overdue fresh start or will we get more Trump and more anxiety: I know who Im betting on, the only politician in this country who has expressed a consistent message for decades.
5
We should all share an appreciation for the Anglo roots of this country, and recognize the superlative political foundation they set up for the rest of us. There are only a handful of countries in the world where things like ethnic and religious heritage aren't the main solidifiers for one's status and opportunities in life, and this country is one of them.
Instead of appreciating things like this, we've been on a roll since the 1960s in disparaging everything white and elevating everything non-white to the point of not even being able to have a shared understanding of even the most basic of things: that it was the cultural and political heritage of white Europeans that enabled them to set up a political system that made it possible for us to have something like the reformations that happened in the 1960s.
As long as Americans of any background show a willingness and ability to integrate into mainstream society, I don't think whites feel suspicious or uneasy. It's when you get enclaves of this or that group who don't show much interest or knowledge about the English language and our social norms; who seem ambivalent about and/or antagonistic to our cultural and political values---this is when you get white people anxious, because they are the main embodiment of this things and know that these things comprise our national heritage. I wonder which citizens of any country wouldn't get anxious when they their national heritage under threat.
8
Donald Trump is clearly setting the Agenda for 2020 elections by playing to Majoritarian fears. This is a winning ploy which Democrat can only lose. Democrats must not get trapped into responding to this ploy. Democrats must Actively set the Agenda back to the key Issues of Infrastructure building, Medicare, better paying Jobs & other daily-life concerns of the American people.
2
What's the point in being afraid? It's not like we can stop the changes.
1
When you suppress speech, problems fester. These days, no one can speak honestly about these issues without being labeled a racist, even losing their jobs. But if you win the trust of a Trump voter, and even some Democrats, you'll find that they have a deep fear that the country is going to turn into Latin America, with the misery and loss of democracy that that entails. And no one can tell the full truth on that. I can't. Not in an era when you can lose your job for writing a memory. We've all become undocumented thinkers, and the sad result is Trump.
6
“ … some white people … losing status in America…”
Who ? The out of work miner? The high school student who can’t afford colllege? The secretary replaced by a computer?
Unfortunately it’s true; opportunity for these people is vulnerable to a ‘changing work environment’. But workers of every color and race in similar situations are equally vulnerable, perhaps more.
The fantasy that white people are suffering because of newer, less white immigrants is the product of a political party which separates people and destroys opportunity by suppressing progress in almost every industry.
How did we get here? During the 70’s / 80’s America became complacent. We grew since the 50’s. We subsidized the oil industry by building an interstate highway system to allow people to drive longer distances, enabling a boom in the construction of single family houses in expanding suburbs. We fought wars to keep oil available. Tax cuts helped the rich. The Infrastructure of cities and mass transit decayed.
Lobbyists saw government spending priorities reflect their interests, connections insured by unlimited terms for members of congress.
We reduced investment in the future by cutting education funding. We didn’t fund development of new sources of energy, forms of transit, or housing.
Our situation is summarized by two quotes:
From a young person I recently met:
“I only want to learn what I need to get a job.”
From the person in the white house:
“I’ll bring coal back.”
1
I have grown up with white anxiety. It was prevalent in the south of the 1950s. It was prevalent even when white supremacy went virtually unchallenged and seemed it might endure forever. White anxiety has never been absent from these shores. It started with the first sight of the people we were to kill and whose lands we would steal and grew when the first boatload of slaves landed to work that stolen land. White anxiety, and festering white militancy, survived a decisive war and Lincoln's magnanimity and is impervious to everything intended to placate it. I am tired of the national millstone of white anxiety. It is intractable because it springs from an injustice so deep as to be beyond mending. I think it long past time the wells of sympathy for anxious white people just went dry.
5
In "The Fire Next Time", James Baldwin wrote:
“I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.”
Neither the GOP nor Trump are "addressing" white people's anxieties.
They are EXPLOITING them in order to pass one bill after the other that increases the income gap and shifts more wealth to their wealthiest donors and themselves, all while having their voters completely fired up, distracted by the relentless cultivation of racism, which obviously does NOTHING at all to address their own, real, often deep pain and suffering - quite on the contrary.
It is IMPOSSIBLE to truly care about "American customs and values" and then start imagining that cultivation of racism is somehow compatible with the Constitution.
What white people care about is what all people care about: to be as happy and healthy as possible, to have access to healthcare and education, and to see your children thrive.
There's NOTHING that the GOP has done in Congress, during the last decade, that would help its voters become happier or healthier or wealthier. Instead, they created Fox News, a 24/7 propaganda machine that brainwashes 40% of the American people with constant fake news, including the idea that somehow people with a different color of skin, creed or gender would be threatening what is most important for them.
By doing so, the GOP is shamelessly betraying its own voters. This won't end well.
7
People who don't understand why they are not allowed to celebrate "whiteness" are missing the point. Whiteness isn't a culture. There is Irish culture, and Polish culture, and Greek culture -- each with their own values, foods, music. But whiteness as a concept was created when a bunch of people with quite different cultures (Swedish, Italian, Russian) realized that they could band together to create a social caste system in which they were on top and everyone else was on the bottom.
No one says you can't celebrate Swedish culture, or Irish culture, or Polish culture. But if you are celebrating white culture, you are really just celebrating the historical tradition of being able to band together to oppress others. And that's not a tradition worth celebrating -- which is why Civil War statues need to come down, and white supremacists need to stop having a foothold in national politics.
And it doesn't make a white person oppressed to be told that they have spent centuries creating a social caste system that involved behaving badly towards others, and that it needs to stop.
6
"fears among some white people that they are losing status in America, and those holding such views are increasingly aligned with the Republican Party. These voters perceive anti-white discrimination."
Those same people felt that about desegregation in the 1950's and the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960's. This is not new. It is mostly the same people, for the same reasons.
What is new is the success of the George Wallace approach to them. That approach is also from the 60's, but it failed then.
Is Trump an aberration, or it that approach now about to succeed?
In the 50's and 60's, it lost out because it was opposed by something, by ideals and policies to pursue those ideals.
If we now shrink from our ideals, and fear to put them in policies, we lose to the motivated George Wallace types, lose before we start.
The way to win is to fight. Fear of failure only produces failure.
6
If elections are just going to be about people of different races fighting each other for money and power, why bother with an election? Why not just fight a real war and get things over with? I seriously don't understand how anyone who knows anything about history cannot see where this is going...
2
Not all Trump backers are white supremacists.
When Republican politicians ignore essential American values to save their positions, and American corporations outsource jobs for short term profits, why would you not expect lots of American voters to willingly abandon their long held values in the hopes of regaining the economic security that they once had or were expecting to achieve? Today, the former middle and working classes are desperate! It was easy for Trump to sell them snake oil.
Democratic politicians must grab the microphone and focus on:
1. low cost, high quality, health care, (great for individuals and businesses); the public option in the ACA with permission to negotiate with drug companies would not be outlandishly expensive;
2. tuition free, high quality, public education and job training, (coordinated with employers); as New York City offered to qualified students in the 60-s;
3. the abundance of good jobs and business opportunities that can be created by a variety of well planned, large national projects.
And 4. a vision of steeply progressive, inequality reducing, taxes and large spending to pay for the above, i.e., healthcare, education, and JOBS. I believe that many Trump voters would prefer to vote for the party with an honest clear plan that would provide personal economic benefits, especially if they could do so without having to abandon their sense of decency.
4
I would suggest that the majority of white Americans,that voted for Donald Trump did so to protect their jobs.
He has tried to reduce illegal immigration and unfair tariffs.
He has had a measure of success,and believe that and not racism is why he has gained support of working people of all colors.
6
Every continent has it's indigenous populations. Asians, Africans, Europeans, etc. The Americas' indigenous people were essentially trampled over in the European colonization of the "New World." Now indigenous people are moving back in, and the European descended people feel nervous. Can't hardly blame them. The question seems to be - are we going to enforce our line in the sand, and keep brown people on one side with white people on the other. Or are we going to embrace the descendants of the original inhabitants of this hemisphere, and welcome them into our society? While the answer lies somewhere in between, how we answer this question is going to have a defining impact on the future of this country.
@Syd, the “brown people who are moving in” came from the area south of the US. This is not their ancestral homeland, just a country that some white people created that is better run than the ones they created. I have sympathy for the actual Native American tribes who lived here before it was settled by the English. They have a legitimate claim. Mayans, no. This was never their land.
3
@Z97 : So I'm guessing you're for keeping brown people on the other side of the line? My point is that Mayans, Aztecs and others were indigenous to this continent. Perhaps a little south of our line in the sand, but they could have walked on up if they wanted. Until white people, who had to cross an ocean to get here, took the land and drew that line. The problem is, due to multiple political and environmental reasons, the pressure against that line is increasing, and people are going to keep crossing. The larger point is that this country was built and made strong as a melting pot of people from all over the world. But a lot of white people, who have enjoyed a perch of unquestioned dominance throughout our history, seem bothered that the original inhabitants of this continent also want become part of our mosaic. They should be allowed to.
1
@Syd, ok, how many should we let in? How many benefits should we give this stream of people? The ultimate issue isn’t race, it’s sheer numbers. At what point are we degrading the quality of life for actual citizens? Already school systems are having to take funds away from educating the descendants of slaves and putting them toward ESL for recent arrivals, mostly either illegal or using the asylum seeker loophole. Is this really fair?
1
It's troubling that Mr. Hopkins thinks it's a "mystery" that the GOP has flip-flopped on their racial statements. Their rationale has remained exactly the same: to seize and hold power by whatever cynical lies necessary. They do extensive research and use it accordingly. If they saw an opportunity to lie to Latino voters, they were prepared to court them. But the income inequality that has been growing since Reagan and that boomed with Bush ultimately gave them an easier target group, lower-income white voters whose jobs were shipped overseas so that the 1% could get even richer. There's no mystery here, just a case study in opportunism of oligarchs.
2
Race is not always the only or main variable in elections. There is this misguided tendency to paint Trump voters as racist. Given that it is impossible to find a candidate with whom they agree on all points, some voters might focus on the topics that matter to them and therefore decide whom to vote for on this basis, even though the candidate they choose, has some stances they do not agree with.
2
Three things:
1. The article assumes there are no real concerns about current immigration policies that have 50 to 70 percent, depending on family makeup, of legal immigrant families receiving taxpayer assistance, and the failure of government seen in its perceived encouragement of illegal immigration.
2. Did people seriously believe that white people would ignore the emphasis on tribal identity as an important factor in government and corporate decision making and meekly accept their relegation to lower tier status without organizing to fight?
3. If a political party bases its election strategy on appealing (pandering?) to various tribes it would be wise to counsel its members and spokespersons not to go out of their way to offend members of the largest tribe.
4
@Michael
Do you actually believe that white people deserve a better treatment because they are a larger demographic group? Or do you believe in liberty and justice for all?
If it is the former, would you describe yourself as anti-American?
2
Right on target. A national dialogue, to define what are the American values that will guide America to maintain its world leadership for a better future for all, is critical.
2
Many years ago, in grad school and before the internet, I browsed through some Chicago newspapers from the 1890s (on microfilm as I recall). It was full of stories of how Swedes, Norwegians, Poles, Italians, Irish, among other immigrants, were destroying the culture of America with their subtly subversive foreign lifestyles. Swedes! In Andersonville no less, a short walk from the rich neighborhoods on the near North Side... It was a real eye-opener for me.
This xenophobia is nothing new. We need to be vigilant with those reactive voices but also put this in historical context. New cultures enrich our country. They assimilate while they change us for the better. It is also inevitable.
Can't we just live and let live and treat our new arrivals with some compassion--it is in our collective interest after all. Someone has to fund my generations social security, right?
39
@Ylem
"their subtly subversive foreign lifestyles": think of it, how many generations does it take before they learn to put ketchup on their French fries!
1
Everyone votes in favor of policies that will help the individual voter. A white person may vote for candidates supporting policies that directly help nonwhites, but that is because the voter feels that helping minorities indirectly helps everyone eventually. When politicians propose programs that are aimed directly at minorities, they should explain how the program will benefit the white voter now or later on. The benefit does not have to be necessarily financial, but it should be there, even if it is just helping raise people out of poverty. Otherwise, it looks like the politician is just trying to buy votes of the specific minority group targeted.
9
What comes first, voter concern about minorities, or Fox News and Trump stoking that concern. There is a role for being taught something that they would not have thought, otherwise. At the very least, you cannot unlink the two. Or another way of looking at it is, under good leadership (and responsible media) such concerns would be dispelled and people wouldn't vilify minorities for their own suffering.
13
Caucasian whites are very concerned over The New Social Democrat Party who is , evidently, on a race- based mission to change this still” great country into their idea of socialism E.U. Lite. Or another Zimbabwe!
27
@Moe
The EU and Zimbabwe are worlds apart. They have completely different histories, leadership, and economies. Furthermore, one was a collection of wealthy colonial powers while the other was the colonized. There is simply no comparison and conflating the two as if they are one and the same just shows ignorance and yet another reason why America is in decline as a global leader.
1
@Moe
Europe has a healthier and better educated education, and a smaller income gap.
Zimbabwe has a much less healthy and much less educated education, and a huge income gap.
What's the difference between both? Not "socialism". European Western countries are capitalist democracies, Zimbabwe is a developing country, which was first exploited by the West as a colony (without this kind of exploitation, capitalist countries would never have become as wealthy as they are today), then adopted an apartheid-like regime led by white nationalists, and then turned into one of the worst and most corrupt dictatorships.
And somehow you want to imagine that universal healthcare and education, as most Western countries have, would lead to the exact same outcome as Mugabe's dictatorship ... ?
Don't you see how utterly absurd your hypothesis is ... ?
And then you want to take such an intellectually flawed comparison as an excuse to massively cultivate racism here at home ... ?
It all doesn't make any sense, does it?
1
Please keep going, Moe. It’s good to be reminded about the flimsiness of our oppo.
The title is false
None of this is new
America has been very racist and genocidal along racial grounds for the majority of its history
It’s the media that has failed to really educate Americans about their own history
Instead we have nonsense propaganda about the land of the free
That was only meant to apply to white people
63
@Dc You are absolutely right, Dc. One of the really important recent books on this subject, a book that has received rave reviews from all the major review publications from the NY Times on down (or up), is Greg Grandin's "The End of the Myth." It discusses and analyzes that history of racism and minority-group murder from the 18th century to the present in America. There are also 68 pages of notes and references, maps, etc. It was a revelation to me.
1
@Dc
The whole world has been "racist and genocidal along racial grounds" throughout history.
The correct comparison is not comparing America in the past to the rest of the world today.
The correct comparison is comparing America today to the rest of the world today.
So tell us, where is the condition of other countries in the world today.
How does America today compare to China today?
to India today?
to Pakistan today?
to Brazil today?
to Argentina today?
to Mexico today?
to Russia today?
And if you insist on looking at America then
-- choose your year for then -
how did America then
compare to China then?
to India then?
to Mexico then?
etc. etc
2
@sam finn O.K. And how does America today compare to the following countries today (in no particular order):
Canada, Australia, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Belgium, France, U.K., Germany, Switzerland?
5
Minorities are affecting the lives of these white folks. Once, a colleague of mine said that Asians are putting pressure from the top and Latinos putting pressure from the bottom referring to at high and low skill levels. So, the white folks getting squeezed in the middle. My recommendation is that the white folks bootstrap themselves and go out, work hard and compete to advance themselves instead of listening to comments and slogans that are tainted with racism. The American culture is a melting pot of different cultures and that is what made America a great country.
139
We do need to address opportunity.
I believe it is slightly more complex a situation than you see it as, especially when I know friends who lost jobs at the top of their game from 2008, who have never stopped adding skills, reinventing themselves, and yet never finding another job.
32
@Kodali
I agree with LIlly regarding the fact that it’s far more complex than just “work hard.” I believe we must revisit the very old Protestant Work Ethic that seems to have poisoned much political-economic-social-cultural discourse in this country for far longer than many people realize.
If we are observant citizens, we would notice that the people who work the hardest are most often those who are paid the least. The truth is there are not enough “jobs” to go around. How “work” is defined is the issue. My faith tells me that everyone deserves a decent quality of life. Since there really will never be enough “good-paying” jobs to go around, one of the answers is to cut the typical work day to four hours, perhaps. And to share work, including the unpaid work that people (usually women) do in the home.
5
@Kodali
As Elizabeth Warren correctly says, the system IS rigged, and constantly hammers the middle class while shifting wealth, GOP bill after GOP bill, to the wealthiest 1%.
It's only normal that when more and more decent, hard-working people start to struggle to make ends meet, the sense of "competition" increases too.
And in our society, even Ivy League trained Americans only get half of what a real education would offer, as it utterly lacks any "education of the heart".
In bonobo societies, apes are living together peacefully as long as resources are abundant. When they start to become scarce, aggression and violence go up. They way they to lower it again: having sex, as much as possible, and with as many partners as possible.
As Western "morality" denounces doing so as "bad" (and as human brains probably need a bit more than that to calm down ...), all while giving people NO tools at all to learn how to lovingly embrace and hold their own negative emotions, it's only normal that when politicians start to cultivate racism, all of a sudden they start to imagine that competition coming from people who look different, must be "unfair". "If only we could have a society where half of the population is gone so that I'd only have to compete with other whites, I would be better off!" - people start thinking.
And although that's perfectly understandable, it's nevertheless not a solution. ONLY better income distribution bills - and compassion training - is.
1
White nationalist's worries are based on illusions (of white supremacy), forgetfulness and white privilege. America's white privilege has denied citizens of color to partake the full benefits of American citizenship for so long. How could you justify an idea that black people who have been in this country for 10 generations – who speak only English and are also Christians – should remain just minorities and deserve less than white immigrants who just migrated to America a generation ago? Only the Nazi could justify that sort of thinking.
36
@Matt Jones, no one, not even Trump, is saying that African-Americans deserve less. If anything, the argument is that very recent immigrants, many of them not even here legally (incl. asylum fraud), should not be skimming off the benefits that were intended to help America’s poor poeple, the descendents of those who came long ago and, in the case of slaves, not of their own volition.
You do realize, don’t you, that the money it takes to educate the children of illegal immigrants comes out of the budget for educating black children? My son’s 88% black high school had to cut 5 regular teacher positions, including the computer science teacher, to pay for ESL services for a surge in immigrant students.
2
And yet, all these white people flock to the beaches to roast themselves brown or red. Some even paint themselves orange. Maybe tan envy is the driving force.
28
Nailed it !
Trump has turned the tables on the race baiting leftists- and they don't like it. Big ol surprise!
43
This "white anxiety" reminds me of the constant fear of a slave revolt that the ancient Romans lived with (slaves constituted approximately 30% of the ancient Roman population) . . . white Americans who still believe that people of color are objects to be dominated and exploited should live in fear.
23
Don’t forget the fear of a slave rebellion Southern plantation owners had.
The authors of this piece themselves wrote that ".....without a politician of the president’s stature so vocally exploiting it, political scientists say, this lurking sense of white status loss would probably not be such a combustible theme in American politics."
So to whoever came up with this headline: "White Anxiety, and a President Ready to Address It", please, less pussyfooting around. The headline should have read:
"White Racism, and a President Ready to Fan It".
20:25 EDT, 7/20
22
although I have been reading the ny times
for 50 years, I have
never seen the level
of pure unadulterated
snobbery towards whites
as I have recently. all
this talk and writing
about less educated
voters as if they were
a species of cockroach
absolutely amazes me.
please ask your young
analysts to lose the glib
attitude towards those
who think differently
than they do and try to
get into the minds of
these people instead of
treating them like aliens
from some dark planet.
82
This attitude of utter distain that Hillary expressed further cemented the country divide.
Bernie has the humble attitude of respect for citizens that Lewis Lapham described was missing in an essay I read of his decades ago. That citizens should not be respected solely based on wealth accumulation or proximity to power. This does not describe democracy. It is the court mentality of the gilded ages of feudal Europe.
Please consider the approach that Bernie is fighting for, which moves us toward a racially just and sustainable world.
1
@Frank
Dear Frank: You vastly underestimate the ability of progressives to read the minds and hearts of the Trump cult, and it isn't hard to see the moral darkness in that cult and its leader.
Nor is it "snobbery" to view with horror people who support a president and political party as corrupted as the party of Trump.
Trump heaps vitriol on a courageous immigrant woman who came here poor and is now in Congress. He scoffs at Congressional subpoenas and lawsuits filed against him by women.
He loves Putin, the Saudi princeling, and Kim Jong Un, but hates young women of color who are American-born citizens in Congress, along with journalists and prosecutors.
All of us should applaud the good people who recognize the festering right-wing cabal that's poisoning our country.
1
@Frank,
Agree, reality is a large chunk of folks who voted for Trump were affluent whites, not the hicks and uneducated white Americans the MSM tries to project .
1
“But what, in America, is the will of the people? ...The people, whoever they may be, know as much about the forces which have placed the above-named gentlemen in power as they do about the forces responsible for the slaughter in Vietnam. The will of the people, in America, has always been at the mercy of an ignorance not merely phenomenal, but sacred, and sacredly cultivated: the better to be used by a carnivorous economy which democratically slaughters and victimizes whites and Blacks alike. But most white Americans do not dare admit this (though they suspect it) and this fact contains mortal danger for the Blacks and tragedy for the nation.
Or, to put it another way, as long as white Americans take refuge in their whiteness—for so long as they are unable to walk out of this most monstrous of traps—they will allow millions of people to be slaughtered in their name, and will be manipulated into and surrender themselves to what they will think of—and justify—as a racial war. They will never, so long as their whiteness puts so sinister a distance between themselves and their own experience and the experience of others, feel themselves sufficiently human, sufficiently worthwhile, to become responsible for themselves, their leaders, their country, their children, or their fate. They will perish in their sins—that is, in their delusions. And this is happening, needless to say, already, all around us.” - James Baldwin, in a letter to Angela Davis, 1970
16
@Rosie
Just this weekend alone, I have learned and been told by my " Democratic betters" that I am racist because I have dogs and tip 15%-20%. As a person with significant Native American blood proven by testing and paperwork versus " family stories", I am completely and utterly over it. It is kind boggling how many times a day and in how many new and improved ways the media with the full throttled support of the Democrat Party can demonize anyone who appears white. What do you seriously think is going to be the outcome? Do you ever wonder where it ends? What does someone of White appearance have to do to meet the goal? To have the daily barrage stop? People think about this a lot. They then conclude the obvious. It never will. When power continues to push and push with no end ever remotely in site, the inevitable pushback will occur. Then you in true Democrat form will have something new on any day ending with "y" to push on about. The problem is the average elitist Democrat will not like the outcome and not have the spine to look at themselves honestly and own their part in how they got there.
2
@Renee D,
You miss Baldwin’s — and my point in posting him here—entirely. His is a humanistic compassion that acknowledges the ways in which the capitalist system -and ‘whiteness’ itself- was created to exploit ALL people, white and black alike—and support the self interested goals of those in power, be they Dems or Republicans. As we devolve into these cultivated tribal corners they sit and watch us squabble, all the way to the bank.
“White Anxiety, and a President Ready to Address It”. Seriously?
Who titles NYT stories, and why do they feel the need to use titles to obscure reality rather than to simply, succinctly expose it?
Try this instead: “White Anxiety, and a President Ready to Incite It.”
You address problems.
You incite, excite or allay anxieties.
21
Very well said
Trump is fanning the flames of racial resentment, without a doubt. But he's also doing something more insidious. He's luring people into accepting that the rights and ideals enshrined in the Constitution are conditional, negotiable, optional. And his rhetoric about who is anti-American, who hates America, who has a right to be here is being parroted all over the internet as though Trump = America, and not our constitutional foundation and government of, by and for the people.
25
If any group in society is concerned about their status declining relative to other groups I can’t think of any better ways for a group to strengthen and increase their status than to get married, to stay married and to have more children!
If in the coming decades white people cease to make up the majority of the population of the United States one of the most important if not the most important reason will have been that immigrant groups out-reproduced them.
What greater influence can people have upon the future of their society than the children whom they lovingly conceive, cherish, nurture, educate and lead into the best of their religious, family, moral, civic and cultural values?
Those who have the most babies win!
6
@Rodney M Jackson
What happens when mothers have lots of babies by men who do not help the mothers "nurture and educate" them the babies they father?
And if the result is not good,
whose fault is that?
The mothers who chose the absent fathers?
The absent fathers themselves?
Or "society" and "government"
funded by taxes on mothers and fathers who do raise their children together?
One of those is not at fault.
Not hard to figure out which one.
1
I have read many of Trump’s surrogates argue that he is not a racist and he has helped people of color because of the low unemployment rate.
So America, if the foregoing is true, then white Americans have no reason to fear being marginalized.
If they do fear being marginalized, then the fear is supported by data or it is not.
If the fear is supported by economic data, then is reality that only the wealthy in this country are doing better?
If the fear is supported by whites being less competitive in the job market, is it the result of meritocracy - that is, more people of color are presenting better resumes?
If the two previous possibilities reflect reality, then white’s anxiety and anger is misplaced if directed against non-whites.
The anger then should be directed against a system that has fewer economic opportunities when tax rates were higher 50-60 years ago, when the government spent more on education, the space race and other programs.
The government’s spending on the space race spurred economic development in the area of computer science, aviation, communications, and medical science that no one could have anticipated.
We need a race for renewable energy. Success in this area would inure to the benefit of consumers and workers and would make US less prone to enter into foreign wars across the globe.
10
If there is anxiety, it is about the diminished opportunity for Americans by the wealthy and this administration. It is the ever increasing caste system of $ and how it is out to destroy the public sector, American and the world. I can't imagine living in a racially segregated world, even the one I experienced growing up in a northern community where everyone was expected to conform to a stereotype built on bias of one form or another. White men despite their belief that they ruled were ridiculed by their fathers, their friends, and family for showing weakness, wanting another kind of life and being entrapped in a system that punished non conformity. How is this Republican administration a representative of that life. Multiple marriages, provoking violence, not paying taxes, philandering with sex predators, playing with dictators, embracing communism, attacking American values. It's twisted. I would rather move to a diverse place where I can be a person.
8
"Affirmative Action" is wrong in so many ways.
First, it is clearly a thin disguise for racial quotas,
which of course are enforced with racial discrimination.
It is not merit-based.
If it were merit-based, there would be no point to asking race for candidates for any college or employment or anything else nor to measuring racial breakdowns.
Second, as correction for slavery and Jim Crow,
it is morally wrong
because it robs people who did not perpetrate either slavery or Jim Crow -- and were not even born at the time of Jim Crow -- to pay other people who were not victims of slavery or Jim Crow nor even born then.
Those who defend affirmative action cook up all sorts of statistics about "impacts" on "groups". That kind of reasoning treats everyone as a member of a group -- i.e. discriminates based on group characteristics -- like race.
They also yammer about "historical justice" -- based on ancestors of groups. History is a long, long trail over hundreds of generations littered with injustices.
The way forward is not to go backward.
Forwards means helping those who need it now --
regardless whether they are a member of a certain "group".
And it means everyone now paying for the help,
regardless whether a member of a certain group.
34
The Electoral College is affirmative action for white rurals. It weights their votes several times more than people who live and work in cities. Trump supporters who are opponents of affirmative action must be fighting hard to eliminate the electoral college. Otherwise they’d be hypocrites.
1
Let’s be clear: the so-called “White anxiety” is the result of the media whipping it into an “issue” to foreshadow the real cause of their distress: an economy that’s not working for them. For years now, the press has been “reporting” on papers and “studies” that “projected” that the country was moving into a “minority majority” nation. Implying thereof, that all that is bad was coming down on people’s lives Who would want that? It’s as when the battle for the ACA was being debated, people didn’t want the ACA because It meant government intrusion and because the government was going to take their Medicare away. This is where we are: a deceptive campaign of misinformation
The economic hardship of American families was caused by Wall Street’s looting of this country into bankruptcy; the neocon-led Iraqi war that cost trillions and the offshoring of industries for greedy ends. As Steven Miller, well knows, Mexicans didn’t architect any of these events.
21
I'm white, and have no "white anxiety."
I don't label people because of their ethnicity, or fear ethnicity.
I fear people who are anti-environment, pro-war, pro-abortion slavery, pro-hunting, pro-killing, pro-Trump, no matter what race they are.
I fear mean people who love guns more than life itself.
I fear people who publicly, vehemently claim to be Christian but act opposite to how their Lord Jesus would have acted.
I have no white anxiety, except to the extent that all the MAGA people I know are white.
I'm more afraid of the Trump cult than I am of any other group of people. What kind of anxiety is that?
43
The fusion of various races is not only the attraction but also the strength of the U.S. Giving up this attraction leads to damaging the strength of the country.
6
It is not actually white anxiety. I think it could more precisely be described as xenophobic fear. It does not afflict all whites. Only a subset of whites. Let's call them xenophobes. Using whites suggest that we all have this "anxiety", which is far from true.
If you live in a world where Donald Trump is your idea of a leader your likely to have many fears and neurosis. Anxiety probably feels normal.
13
Around a third of people in any country will support some variety of Fascism if it becomes 'socially acceptable' in their peer group, and more especially in public discourse.
That happened during major economic and cultural dislocation from the 1920s to the mid-1940s in Europe, and now it's happening in America.
...Which is very sad, disheartening and shameful, given America's central role in defeating early Twentieth-Century European and Japanese Fascism...
...and especially given America's long shameful record in her treatment of the original inhabitants and owners of the land, and of the labourers who mostly built America, after being brought from Africa literally in chains - both of these groups regarded as subhuman by much of White America for much of its history.
A third of people in most countries seem largely exempt from shame, and a a protofascist third of Americans now feel publicly exempted from shame by their utterly shameless current nominal leader.
So people like me will also now feel absolutely no shame in calling out Trump's American Fascism for exactly what it is, and will keep trying to shame over half the population there who *can* feel shame to try and save their country - and the world once more - from this despicable recurrent sickness.
13
@Martin
Spot on!
Remarkable that white voters are agonized about no longer being in the majority in 2045 - yet resist calls to avert catastrophic climate change that will be much more devastating.
16
American patriots have free speech rights too.
They are not not just for America haters.
17
“How do you go from a Republican Party after 2012, which was very actively talking about courting Latino voters, to a Republican Party in 2016, which was doubling down on appeals to white voters?”
Because they never meant it.
17
I don’t have white anxiety; I have white privilege. And I don’t take kindly to that as it comes at the expense of other folks.
10
The headline should use the word “exploit” rather than “address” with regard to white anxiety. This poor excuse for a president is “exploiting” the office rather than “fulfilling” its obligations.
Perhaps some “whites” are now getting a taste of the anxiety, fear and terror people of various skin colors have always felt, and still feel, in the presence of greedy, violent and paranoid “white” colonial exploiters.
10
This is exactly what Make America Great Again feeds on
7
The Trump party will do anything to stay in power. Anything.
7
What should not be lost in this is the Democratic Party telling white males especially what appalling human beings we are. They’re playing right into Trump’s hands. There’s a middle ground between Trump’s outright racism and the Democrats blaming white men for absolutely everything. That’s the irony here: we’re not allowed to judge anyone by the color of their skin or their gender - anyone except me!
39
I welcome diversity --
as long as it's not forced --
either by the government
via reverse discrimination (aka "affirmative action")
or by powerful whites looking out for their own interests --
and as long as it's not engineered by massive immigration. Some merit-based immigration, yes,
but not massive uncontrolled immigration
25
Hey Trumpish American tourists, are you sure you want to visit Canada? Trump has labeled us as crooked conniving con men cheating Americans through the nasty NAFTA. Canada is a sovereign country we do not kneel before Trump. Trump's racist policies are not popular here. We too suffer from a growing bigoted group of right wing fascistsbut weare not afraid to call them out on it. Even the right wing Conservative party calls out members who go overboard. The Republican party in the States does not share these values. As long as McConnell, Rand and that tiny little man who has taken over Lindsay Graham's body defend the occupant of the White House you are doomed to continue in your cultural war.
11
During his campaign for the 2016 presidential election, Trump bragged: “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and wouldn’t lose any voters, okay?” On numerous occasions during his presidency, Trump has proven that statement to be true, because Republicans in Congress continue to support and enable him. Just look at the video of his recent rally when supporters chanted “Send her back!“ and Trump paused to relish the hatred he had incited. Like mass shootings, we have come to expect yet another display of racist behavior from Trump that we condemn. Until the next time.
6
I came to this beautiful country shortly after WWII as a high school student. More than 70 years ago and I am still here writing stupid comments. America is really a free country. Freedom of expression and freedom to move around. No one cares. Seventy years ago America was a fully segregated society. Everything divided white and color. Yet no one at that time was concerned about the segregation. What happened? The people were stupid? They were very tolerate to all kinds situations and not too demanding. I remember a school mate of mine from India and he was not allowed to admitted to a movie theater to see a movie. I was shocked but my friend told me just go to see the movie, Robe, by myself. Of course I couldn't do that. So we went to a nearby drugstore to order some milkshake. Today everyone is so demanding and no one is willing to compromise. Confrontation and confrontation. When this is going to end? Now everything has to be balanced, one white and one black. Just look at the TV news programs and new movies.Everything has to be balanced. This is not the America I remembered.
8
It is time to read between the lines, of what is really America to Trump, his party and die hard supporters. If you are a non-white, or a white that is not as white as Trump, and his supporters, then the following will make sense.
When we talk about "White America" it is an exclusive club of those who are of English, Scottish, French, Flemish, Dutch, German, Swedish, Finish, and Norwegian descent. These ethnic groups make up much of what controls this country. They have been in the minority for a very long time.
Other "whites" are tolerated, and have been in the second tier or third tier. The Irish, Italians, Spaniards, Slavs, Russians, Greeks, Portuguese, Catholics, and Jews. Third tier "whites" are Arabs, Persians, South Asians, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs.
So, what "white America" are they protecting, and have anxiety about? The rapidly declining first tier, because of low birth rates. And, the increase of population of non-whites. Combined with 2nd and 3rd tier whites which side more with non-whites, the the first tier whites.
Trump, is trying to get the 2nd and 3rd tier whites to his side to, in his mind, purify America.
If they could get away with it, the census would include citizenship, religion, and ancestors country of origin. They use surnames to separate whites into the aforementioned tiers. This determines what college you get into, organizations one can join, and how high one would rise in the corporate ladder. This is Trump's America.
7
"Many white Americans have long held . . . conservative racial views, like believing that African-Americans struggle to get ahead because they don’t work hard enough, rather than because of discrimination or the legacy of slavery."
But the lack of material wealth of African-Americans can be more easily explained by the huge differences in educational attainment. Those differences are staggering and are not explained by 'white racism.' The achievement of African-Americans in NY schools, which are all equally funded, is appalling.
If well-off liberals think that few Caucasian-Americans have been passed over for a job because a 'minority' was underrepresented, you need to spend more time talking to poor folks.
If you work as a housepainter and can't make a decent living, and workers here illegally keep driving down what you earn, you want to limit illegal entry to the country.
If we want to win Pennsylvania, liberals are going to have to pay more attention to the poor folks of every color, who need better wages and are afraid their jobs are going to illegals.
It's hard to get people's votes if you call them racists when they disagree with you. You won't get their votes if you call them deplorable.
If you can't understand any of this, then you won't be able to understand why that horrible punk sitting in the White House just might 'win' again.
33
It’s time to tell Donald that this is no country for old men. Somehow, he is permanently stuck in the 60s, bashing darker skinned people, swinging, and dodging the draft.
5
There are those who believe that Any criticism
of Anyone "of color", by white people, whatsoever,
is, on its face, inherently racist. Those of us who
do not subscribe to the doctrine of Afro/Latin/
Asian/Native American infallibility, beg to differ.
I forget who said: "of all the reasons I have to
dislike you, what makes you think your race,
is one of them?", but I heartily agree. In the face
of political, racial, sexual, religious correctness,
freedom of speech has dam near gone extinct.
While I do not agree with the underlying
sentiment of the "Send Her Back" chant at
a Trump rally, neither do I see it as racist.
They were, I believe, refering to llhan Omar,
a congresswoman born in Senegal, who
criticized Trump and his policies. If the
black criticism of a white president ain't
presumed racist, then why should the
criticism of a black politician by a white
crowd, be presumed racist?
She sees them as undemocratic, they see
her as unyanqee, even treasonous. In their
eyes, she has revoked her own citizenship
in voicing her disproval of the Yanqee Empire.
I think they're both stupid and wrong, for
many reasons, but being stupid and wrong
ain't necessarily racist.
10
So, white folks are worried that the playing field is becoming more level, that "minorities" are increasing in number and in political strength, and that "white privilege" is slipping away?
And they think this loud, narcissistic, ignorant, reality-TV star with absolutely NO grasp of how to govern the country will "make it all better" for them?
Yeah, good luck with that.
10
A recent Op-Ed piece claimed that 61% of elected officials in the U.S. are white males but only 31% of the population is. Assuming that the NYT fact checks things like this, I’ll accept it as at least close to reality.
So, where is all this white anxiety coming from?
6
Before dismissing me as an angry Trump bigot, let me say that I am Black, have a graduate degree and have had very successful careers in law, business and government.
This paper is fond of the argument that Republican party is aging itself out of existence and that the "browning" of the national demographic will usher in a younger, government-dependent electorate that will bring about a progressive revolution. One does not have to harbor racial animosity to fear that outcome. That version of America -- identity-based policies complete with mandatory political correctness, redistribution of wealth, and a country governed more by multinational organizations than a national government focused on American interests -- is scary to those American who embrace our success norms and do well as a result. And that secret Trump voter you fear so much might very well be your neighbor who just wants a prosperous economy and the freedom to live his life free from know-it-all progressive dictates.
The progressive movement needs unusually high Black turnout to win elections, hence the emphasis on roiling racial tensions and equating conservatism with racism. There is nothing inherently racist about low taxes, private health care and individual liberty. You just need to hope that most Blacks never figure that out.
127
@AR Clayboy. I think you have constructed an elaborate straw man to fit your personal definition of ‘progressives’. I know of few liberals that envision a ‘government-dependent’ electorate according to your definition. In fact, most of the states that depend heavily on governmental largess happen to be the ‘red’ states which are financed predominantly by those in the ‘blue’ states.
All of us want low taxes, good health care (public or private), and individual liberty. Unfortunately, the current government enjoys increasing our national deficit and debt so we have a current artificial ‘prosperity’, which will be paid for by our children and limit their individual liberty.
80
@AR Clayboy....you know, if we were talking about policies around taxes, health care and liberty we would all be fine...we are witnessing a demigod driving fear and hatred...the problem is the messenger not the message.
8
@AR Clayboy -- It's worth carefully analyzing whether very expensive private health care is not actually, due to systemic race-based income inequality and wealth disparity, "inherently racist."
7
We are in the midst of tectonic demographic changes.
Which is why we need a progressive forward-looking change in governance.
And with our modification and taming of greed-driven capitalism—making it more social, for the people, rather than for Mitt Romney's "corporations are people"—
We must also prepare to update our founding 1700s document to our present time of colossal state population/power disparity.
6
If someone comes into my home and starts to criticize things , I can ask them to leave .
But , if both of us live in and share the same house and one of us starts to criticize , then we need to sit down and work it out because we both belong and live there .
We can’t ask one to leave their home just because they have a different viewpoint ..this is their home too ...
10
Racism is an implicit, ever-present issue in American life. Particular anti-black bias.
Anti-Asian bias, while very much a factor and equally odious morally, is not the issue anti-black bias is. I suppose economic and cultural factors explain this, at least to some extent.
Anti-black bis will be a huge issue in American society until whites know how it feels to be on the receiving end of it — that is, until we know that and, at the same time, feel we deserve to know how it feels.
We need places where white people go to know how it feels. Something like a restaurant chain with a whites-only seating area, where the service is gnarly, or churches where white people can’t sit up front, or Disney playground-like places where white people take rides that go through fake (but realistic) forests with fake (but realistic) dead whites hanging from trees.
8
@David. Try east LA or certain areas of Detroit or Chicago.
12
@me According to Wikipedia, the last known lunching in the US (of a black teenage male) occurred less than 40 years ago—in 1981. The larger point, though, has to do with what you might call intergenerational memory—one generation’s trauma impacting and being felt by the next. Here we’re talking about multiple generations of trauma, the impact of which, even on many black children born in the last 40 years, is real. Most white Americans have little understanding of, or feeling for, what I’m talking about.
2
@David Posted like a man. Women have places they have to go on a daily basis where they know what it feels like not to be in power or safe. Women of all colors.
2
The t-shirt in the photo - "Love it or Leave it"
I love my country without loving Trump.
It is my right as an American to disagree with political leaders.
Trump is not my "favorite" president.
That does not make me anti-American.
It makes me a citizen who respects the Constitution and my First Amendment rights.
I am of Czech, Scottish and English descent.
My skin may be white, but I am descended from immigrants.
Just like every other white American.
Republicans used to feel is was patriotic to criticize the president and disagree.
The GOP spent from 2009 to 2017 being the Party of No and obstructing and delaying everything Obama did.
The people at Trump rallies are not representative of America. A sea of white faces,their small, narrow minded views of who can be a "real" American are based on ignorance and hatred. None of them understand the Bill of Rights. Freedom of Religion means a person is free to follow a religion -any religion, or none at all.
Trump is waging a "do-over" of the Civil War with his tweets as the bullets used to kill our democracy. His followers love it. Trump has freed them to publicly hate and demean.
The crowd of people welcoming Rep. Omar home looked like America. There were many different faces. A mix of colors, white, black, brown, tan.
That is America, open and welcoming.
I respect the Constitution
I will continue to speak out against Trump.
And I will vote against him in 2020.
It is my right as an American to do so.
563
@D.Demarco;Well said,you uphold the creed of the "Declaration of Independence" .
41
@D. DeMarco thank you. well said.
43
@me People who attend a rally where hate is applauded are, by definition, small minded.
58
No mention of the Democratic party's embrace of identity politics as a cause of white anger and anxiety. Hard to miss that.
231
@flix Please. Give us all a break. Your so-called 'white anger and anxiety' can't be blamed on the Democrats.
Instead, this anxiety is due entirely to insecure whites terrified of losing their unearned status as being near the top of the hierarchy due to nothing more than the color of their skin.
You disingenuously fail to mention that white superiority in this country was supported by institutional colonialism, militarism, and discrimination -- enforced with the power of legalized oppression. For example, how long ago was it that black Americans couldn't drink from the same water fountain or sit at the same lunch counter as white Americans?
So don't you dare try to deflect and gaslight by telling us that white anxiety is due to Democratic mischief. History reveals your entire premise to be a lie.
123
@flix Don’t worry, I’m sure historians will have lots to say about that belief in the future.
8
@flix
What does identity politics mean exactly? If having to yell a little louder to be heard, stand a little higher to be recognized is identity politics, hallelujah! Bring it on.
23
If race were not a factor in hiring or admissions then the question would not be asked. We are told that race isn't a factor, when clearly it often is.
145
@Billy There used to be a law in NY that race could NOT be asked and a photograph of the applicant could not be asked. That was to prevent race from being a factor. Now, race must be asked and a photograph is most often required. WHY? Because you are right. Now, race is a factor. A majority of New Yorkers support the change.
15
@Billy so your comment implies that perpetuating historical racial bias in schools, housing (remember trump and daddy were guilty, twice, of not giving blacks the same opportunity as whites), and education would be preferable? am i correct? i just want clarification. thanks.
17
@Billy Race has always been a factor -- if you were white male, you were presumed to be superior to non whites, females and other minorities. Affirmative action was instituted to open the eyes of institutionalized "whiteness" to the fact that people of color, women and other minorities are just a capable and worthy of that job, that place in university, etc. What you are seeing now is that society has absorbed this influx of "formerly excluded citizens" into the mainstream, an a lot of white citizens don't like what they are seeing. Perhaps you are worried that we will do to you what you did to us? On the plus side, Frost and that poem are among my favorites.
25
Politics is based on perception, which explains why uneducated white males tend to feel the way they do. It's easier for those folks to blame their state on things they can imagine, rather than on things they cannot imagine or choose to ignore. A hundred years ago there was a great need for workers to do manual work in manufacturing, mining, carbon-based energy production, etc. Today the need for people of any color to perform such work is decreasing as technological developments reduce the need for people of any color to do such work.
Computerization makes workers more efficient, which means if workers want to stay employed it would most likely be in their best interest to acquire new skills in areas that are increasingly becoming in greater demand. Anchoring ones wants in the past is not likely to lead to a brighter future no matter what color one is. Predictors of the future in this regard are obvious to those who choose to look at this situation with open eyes.
2
“They don’t understand why cultural norms encourage nonwhite racial groups, but not white people, to openly identify with and celebrate their race.”
Again, this is not an unreasonable question. Back in the late 20th c. When I was in school, the only people who were allowed to celebrate their group were the descendents of slaves. The reasons were easy to understand and accept; black Americans really had been treated badly over hundreds of years. They were a 13%ish group and they had a legitimate claim to some sort of recognition. The major contributions of white men to the building of the modern world were still in the textbooks without constant belittling of their race and gender, their statues were still standing.
Fast forward to the 2010’s. Hispanics, as well as Asians and Muslims, have now been added to the list of groups that get to herald the achievements of members of their group. Most of these people are relatively recent arrivals, without the history of oppression that African-Americans have (no, internment camps and Chinese exclusion laws do not equal slavery and jim crow). With all these additions, important contributions by white men start disappearing from the curriculum. Robert Fulton (steamboat) and Samuel Morse (telegraph) are pushed aside for minority members who didn’t do anything nearly as important.
In a multiracial country, the rules must be the same for all groups. To single out one group and forbid them to act like the others is unjust.
199
@Z97
To quote an author, "resentment is like swallowing poison and expecting the other person to die."
Not quite sure of your point. As another white person, I don't see the harm in recognizing that people of other races or nationalities have also made considerable contributions. The answer to your concern about text books is that somethings are always left out. Just ask your wife or your sister. Trust me, women of any color are truly underrepresented.
Your resentment may harm your body and will surely harm your sense of humor and your enjoyment of life while having no effect on that which underpins it.
Try to let it go. You could be a much happier person for it.
75
Fabulous, true, and insightful.
14
@Z97 100% support
13
“They don’t understand why cultural norms encourage nonwhite racial groups, but not white people, to openly identify with and celebrate their race.”
The entire culture celebrates whiteness as the norm against which every other group is compared. The entire culture encourages white people to identify as deserving of every advantage handed to them, without naming that advantage as white privilege. The entire culture identifies nonwhite racial groups as less-than. Thus nonwhite racial groups need to vocally push back against that perception, which is a lie. White culture has perpetuated that lie. Whiteness is in its essence an identification against non-whiteness. But both concepts are invented, not natural!
I think what white people (and all people) need to understand is that whiteness is an invented concept that has changed over time. My grandparents and great-grandparents were Irish and Jewish. Depending on the decade, they would not have been considered "white," or not white enough, in this country. Power differentials have changed and the concept of whiteness has changed. The second thing to understand is that the concept of whiteness inherently involves hierarchy, and that this hierarchy is not natural, but constructed, and extremely harmful to every group. White people would not feel threatened if they didn't believe that a natural hierarchy were being overturned. They don't want to consider the concept of oppression until it applies, in their mind, to them.
214
@me The problem is the wording of your question. There is no "white" culture. There is an American culture, and it is informed by the successive waves of immigrants as well as slaves and indentured servants that have contributed to that culture. No one is asking white people to hate that; it's an absurd statement.What you really mean is that you think Americans shouldn't be forced to recognize that American culture is diverse. Btw, you assume the countries you list are homogeneous; they are not.
27
@me Well, I don't think I said that white people should "hate" their culture. But everyone should know the history that got us here. Also, interestingly, the American melting pot model means that the distinctive elements of French, Danish, Dutch, German, Irish, Norwegian cultures that immigrants arrived with have been pretty much lost in this country. (Some cultures less so, such as Italian, and South Asian and East Asian cultures.) My mom doesn't have recipes for Irish bread from her great grandmother. My Jewish grandfather was born in Russia, but nothing Russian or Jewish was carried forward by my dad. White culture is basically a bland mix of European cultures, with all the flavors left out. White American culture is homogenized WonderBread culture. Now that's a loss that white people often don't know to mourn, because we/they are not even taught that we/they're white. We/they are just "normal," "generic" "people" who invented the best things.
16
@L and R Thompson, the article mentioned that Republicans had thought to court Latinos not long ago. Other immigrants have found themselves eventually included in the "white" tent before. Wouldn't be a surprise if it happens again.
2
White anxiety is really status anxiety. It was best illustrated at a place I worked many years ago. The workforce was about 95 percent white male, but I often heard a lot of whining about how that demographic was being discriminated against. Most of them also bought into the myth that blacks didn't get ahead because they didn't work hard enough, yet they also believed that two black workers out of about 80 was plenty. So at the end of the day, it all boils down to white supremacy, not anxiety.
306
@oldschoolfool. The American economic pie is not getting bigger for the lowest 80%. Most people now do not move, unless it's down, from the class they are born into. It's convenient for working class whites to blame "others" for the increasingly desperate mess (debt, low savings, housing, education costs,taxes, etc) that is eating what little of the middle class and working class that still exists. Getting ahead, even in the best economy in 50 years, is an iffy proposition. The scramble and resentment will only get worse as the race to the bottom in the global economy accelerates. Race is an easy thing to blame it on, but it's just convenient. It's economic inequality and that's not how go change.
14
@me
Where have you ever seen that, or heard of that? Where, historically, has that ever occurred in the USA?....and the Asians who built the railroads did not do so because they "preferred" to.
10
@me ME! I prefer to work with the best person for the job.
6
What's interesting, is that on a global level, the right-wing anti-immigrant backlash seems to be expanding, if not winning. Anecdotally, I assumed it was part of the economic downturn of 2007-2009.
When a Dutch family member came to the US, he alluded to the problems the country was having, and I immediately knew he was talking about the immigrant backlash. Generally, immigration is fine as long as everything is going well with the economy, and people feel prosperous, but during a downturn, 'cheap labor' becomes a target. It is not that immigrants are cheap - I work in technology, and H-1B holders run the range - but they are then blamed for the ills of the unemployed or the less-than-thriving.
The real problem is our plutocratic economy, the one that keeps people employed, but at low wages, where most of the profit is scooped up by owners, with almost nothing going to labor. Under the current political regime, there is no concern with human welfare, only a focus on profit for the few, and this miserable state only makes the suffering contemptible double-down on the contemptible policies. Politicians could choose a more benevolent form of capitalism, but it runs counter to American history and law. Instead, under Republican control, we see a denigration of women, and minorities, one that focuses on extractive industries and denigrates education, led by a cretin that speaks at the 5th-grade level.
333
@James Igoe
Amen to all that. Well said. The resentment is aimed at the wrong target because the billionaire class - to which Trump aspires or is in - are constantly playing "I see a bear" with the public. The "bear" being anything and everything but unbridled capitalism.
64
And his businesses benefit from cheaper immigrant labor. Then there's wifey #1 and #3. Oh wait...they're white.
20
@James Igoe You cannot have both high immigration and high wages. Competition lowers wages.
26
You write: "The Obama presidency made many traditionally Democratic and often less educated white voters aware of the Democratic Party’s alliance with black voters; it implicitly called into question whether the party was for them."
Guys... slow down.. History will prove me write: Obama governed right of the center on many issue, and by far he worked for LBGT rights 10 times than what he did for black rights. Obama is a fake liberal and here is a quick proof: The situation of blacks here in the US is worse that it was in 35 years or even more, Obama saved the banksters (Fat Cats), Obama's stimulus was mostly tax cuts, Obama Care was a big boon for the pharama and insurance companies, During his presidency the middle class has shrunk by more than 25%, Obama spied on American more than ever and this paper exposed him, Obama promised shutting down GETMO and he didn't bother to spend any political capital to close it, GW Bush used to kidnap and torture terror suspects but Obama started killing them from the air in the thousands (which is more human all too human), Obama backed the coup in Egypt and behind the scene helped Sisi, ...etc.
The word liberal has been debased, and it has to be liberated.
6
No one suggested he was a liberal. The fact is a true liberal would be as unable to rule a blended society as a true conservative. Ideologies are expediencies of campaigns, while centrism is the expediency of leadership.
5
@Salah Mansour
Wow Salah Mansour . Please note I am a White American ( whatever that means! Did not decide to be born white )
Have been registered republican for over 30 years . Never voted for Obama . Now registered as a democrat
Yes Obama did many things that I do and did not like. However he was and is a decent person. May have made comments that were not accurate . ( " If you like your doctor you may keep your doctor" He should have added but only if your government like your Doctor.
With all his faults almost all americans are as well or better off than when he assumed office.
Today all americans most decide if we will be better off by Donald Trump.
5
@Salah Mansour
Obama had a natural edge over Hillary
in getting out the black vote.
Come on now, admit it.
Meanwhile,
Obama was smart enough to govern center-left --
at least for a while --
at least until the Latinos pushed him into DACA,
which sank in on whites in 2014 and 2016 --
and Hillary embraced DACA -- and more --
but that did not bring in black voters back for her.
4
White Americans are rightfully concerned when mainstream papers like the New York Times hire and promote editors like #cancelwhitepeople Sarah Jeong.
48
The only white people that need to fear a liberal press are those who trying to hold onto an exceptional status they don’t deserve.
8
It seems we are given two choices:
Profess to hate ourselves or be cast as lowly racists.
21
The economic pie equals100%, always has and always will. As the % of the pie is concentrated at the top, the remaining population has to fight for a smaller share. This leads to antagonism between those fighting for the smaller share of the remaining crumbs. Those at the top often seek a group in the lower classes and pander to their similarities with those at the top and their differences with those who they compete with for the reduced remaining resources. This leads to fear and hatred, which leads those in the lower class who identify with the top group to stigmatize and agitate against those who are not like them. This is the basis of a Trump rally and eventually violence will erupt.
12
@Michael Tiscornia
Begs the question of who actually bakes the pie,
and who bakes better pies and bigger pies.
2
Preaching to the choir is political wheelspin. However people loosely fit relative to issues of humanism vs. personal interest, they're infrequently moving elsewhere because of someone's energies seeking to set their perspective on fire.
Of course, we should speak out against the bigotry, sexism, and elitism which now characterizes our American presidency. Yet if we make Donald's immaturity as a human being the focus of our politics, we massage his narcissism, empower his manipulative divisiveness and play in his arena, one ever so knee jerk amplified by whitebread minions.
Better to focus on what's behind Donald's successful stoking of voters' fears. we need to expose his hardcore indifference and the hypocrisy of his charade on multiple levels. Hammer away at GOP inattention to out core eroding infrastructure, devotion to exploding elitism nurtured in deflating middle-class economics.
Challenge those who believe they love their children relative to Republican values as they relate to a less nurturing earth, soaring education costs, dismantling of health stabilizing and consumer safety mechanisms, as well as the stoking of our floundering nationhood.
5
"White anxiety," still refusing to call it what it is, bigotry and racism.
18
This is the easy, lazy train of thought. Any group being gutted from historical relevance will react the same, make no mistake about it. The point of the article, which you might have missed, is that it requires a self-serving, re-election optimizing politician to stoke that into an electoral advantage, which closes a destructive, but electorally advantageous, feedback loop.
8
White anxiety needs to be addressed better. Why are some whites so anxious?
2
The only question, of course, is why did it take so long for whites to adopt the loud racial chauvinism of every other group.
18
Because when your in the driver seat cries of discrimination fall on deaf ears.
2
@David : What a shallow, embarrassing non-question.
6
If you want to celebrate being Irish or Polish or Italian or English, you are celebrating your heritage and history. That’s fine.
If you want to celebrate being white, you are celebrating being Not Black. Not so good, and anyone pretending not to see the difference is lying.
19
@Di Poor, oppressed whites.
1
My perspective sees racism to extreme on "both" sides. You vote Trump you are labeled as a racist and bigot which may or may not be true. You vote Democratic you are labeled to be more concerned about other racial ethnicities than the white people. Common sense should see "both" sides come together and stop labeling voter choices as simply race related.
7
Except for when they are obviously are racially motivated. Supporting Trump doesn’t make you a racist. Supporting any politician with his positions an race does. You can’t cherry pick his issues. Trump is all of his views...not just some of them.
4
@Beetle Stop: Concluding that "both" sides are the same is never accurate. The evidence, & tge underlying logic, never supports "sameness" for two opposing elements,
2
Terrible headline. Trump and his racist mis-administration are not "addressing" white anxiety. They are fomenting, exploiting and fanning its flames.
16
I'm a white male who detests Trump, Trumpism, and racism in general. My candidate is Bernie. All that said, Trump has been as brilliant as Hitler at channeling and exploiting the rage and bitterness of the working-class men who've been shamed and symbolically castrated by defeat in wars and by economics at home. The obvious next step for both demagogues was to focus all that rage on convenient scapegoats to kick around to make the white males feel "strong" again. Above all, Trump figured out the obvious fact that blacks are a small minority of Americans, only about 1/8, and outnumbered by whites about 5 to 1! All Trump had to do was do his American imitation of Hitler Lite, and he could wrap up as fervent loyalty for himself as Hitler had for himself with about the same plurality of Americans (in the low 40s) as Hitler's plurality with Germans, most of whom were as fervently against him as most Americans are against Trump. But the combo of that 40% or so and the most hated Dem candidate in history, Hillary, was enough to pull it off for Trump. Bernie would have crushed him, as all the Rust Belt exit polls proved incontrovertibly Let's hope the Dems can find someone less hated to run against Trump this time, or he'll win again. And the small minority of Americans who are black ever have, or ever will, have political influence in America is to find ways, like Bernie's emphasis on a fair economic shake for all, to unite with a large number of the white majority to gain power.
8
A lot of liberals, or left leaning people stayed home in 2016 becuase Hillary was not a great candidate (most hated is pushing it.. Russian bots are not people). That’s not likely to happen in 2020.
2
The title of the article is misleading. The word 'address' should be replaced by 'exploit'.
12
So it was racism after all. Yay.
Welp, 40% of the country is racist. The US is doomed.
6
Some of us who are hoping to elect the first jewish president who wants to bring the whole world together in peace to address climate change, are hoping this will change.
3
I am very confused. Who is more angry? What does love of country mean? and who arbitrates all this? and who leave? Maybe angry resentful white people need to leave.
13
I imagine the Times will censor my comment, but here goes. I think it is perfectly normal and reasonable to prefer a country to be majority dominated by one ethnicity/race/tribe.
Since the the 60's the Democrats have done everything to challenge that. If it wasn't for this issue, I would not vote Republican at the next election.
18
Your view is valid, but if you prefer that kind of country you could easily find one. America has never been that place.
6
@Howard Mandel, actually, up until recently, America was that kind of place. Then some people decided it would be better to replace the existing white population with one that would more reliably vote for Democrats, using non-enforcement of immigration laws as a tool. The NYT has had many triumphalist articles about the coming non-white majority and how that will usher in a permanent Democratic majority.
The terms "white anxiety" and "white privilege" don't cut it anymore. The aim of the Trump McConnell Republicans is the forever preservation and augmentation of white male conservative entitlements, prerogatives and dominance. When Trump conflates nation, race and party, he is resorting to fascism. Trump seized power by appealing to the ignorance, prejudice and fear of his base. That is, he feeds them the most vile racism, and they adore him for it. We call such a person a demagogue. Trump and his Republicans can get away with murder so long as they tell their own white base that the least among them is still better than the best black man. In short, Trump is a white supremacist demagogue, his base is an idolatrous white supremacist personality cult, and Trump's party has embraced an apocalyptic vision of white supremacist fascism.
14
This assertion is asinine and insulting, as most white people feel comfortable with and in fact welcome diversity: "...a sense of anxiety among white voters about their standing in a country that is growing more diverse. ..."
6
@J Sharkey
I welcome diversity --
as long as it's not forced --
either by the government
via reverse discrimination (aka "affirmative action")
or by powerful whites looking out for their own interests --
and as long as it's not engineered by massive immigration. Some merit-based immigration, yes,
but not massive uncontrolled immigration.
6
In 1992 it was the economy—"stupid."
In 2020 it is the elimination of a human workforce—"stupid."
9
Some of theses comments are deeply depressing to read. Ignorance and hate are much more widespread than I believed.
12
This is true: “These beliefs that whites are discriminated against, that undeserving minorities are getting more than they deserve, and hard-working whites are getting less than they deserve — those are always there.”
Every other day, the New York Times runs a piece on white male privilege, vilifying white males and, in every article, the issue of class and economic inequality is elided. This newspaper is stoking the flames of racial hatred, in Pavlonian response to the racism of Donald Trump.
As a life-long democratic socialist, I lump the New York Times in with the Trumpers, locked in some kind of sado-masochistic embrace, each of you unwilling to concede that the other side sometimes has a legitimate grievance.
For once, please let's have some nuanced discussion of the contemporary situation that includes economic and class insecurity.
81
@Simon Taylor Yes...they are doing what they ALWAYS have done. The poor dears who run the NY Times are so sensitive to the Right calling them the "liberal media" that they bend over backwards to put out some sick sort of "fairness." They did it during the run up to the Iraq war..which they apologized for but didn't learn anything from. So then they did it again in 2016 trying to equate Hillary's emails with the racism he spewed...even though they knew by experience what he was really like. And this is the result of them being too cowardly to even take a stand even when the results could be horrific. Their still trying to be "fair."
7
@Simon Taylor
As a life-long Democrat socialist, I lump you in with Chavez, Maduro, Ortega, and the whole crew of nation wrecking, economically illiterate merchants of envy.
Other than that I agreed with your post in its entirety.
4
discrimination and slavery stopped long ago - why is this still the excuse used for this 'problem"
sad
4
@Andre Slavery stopped, but discrimination lurks beneath
the surface and is being inflamed and condoned by Trump and a frightening number of Republicans. Question for
educated Republicans: Are you going to vote for four more
years of Trump?
5
Discrimination is alive and well. The Obama presidency didn’t end it, it just gave bigots the excuse to claim it did.
7
Stop illegal immigration and white anxiety about our national culture as a nation of laws will be very much allayed.
22
@O'Brien Not in Trump World. Anxiety comes from people of color and immigrants having the status and the rights to have a say in what American culture is. This is why Trump can't bust talk sensibly about illegdl immigration. He has to invoke stereotypes, stoke fears and project a zero tolerance stance - which soon will include eliminating legal migration, if he has his way.
4
Are brown Americans people? Are women people? Trump and his Republicans say no. The Trump base is worried that the answer might be yes. That is the source of their white anxiety.
14
@Robert, how is Trump denying the personhood of any of these groups? By cracking down on illegal immigration and asylum fraud? By not expelling states with restrictive abortion laws from the union?
@Z97
The Trump Republicans couldn't care less about the rights of American women or brown Americans (or brown people anywhere). For example, they are compelling rape and incest victims to carry the embryo of the rapist to term. The only consistent Trump Republican policy is racial demonization, i.e., the explicit denial of personhood. For instance, Trump has just now said time and again that that brown American citizens may not criticize the government, hate America, must be sent back.
Call an overt white supremacist an overt white supremacist. There's no good reason to use euphemisms.
7
I love it when people tell me what I think. Then, when I refuse to toe the liberal line, I’m a racist. Nope, sorry, not racist because I want whoever comes here to come legally and to assimilate.
29
If you support a racist candidate your a racist. The NYT didn’t make him a racist, he’s always been one.
6
@Howard Mandel. That attitude will get him re-elected.
Misleading headline, it should read...
"White Anxiety, and a President Ready to Exploit It"
7
More very poor liberal analysis by the NYT, as it overlooks the fact that many overwhelmingly majority white counties, in places such as Wisconsin (e.g., La Crosse County) and Ohio (e.g., Sandusky County), that are now viewed as anti-minority havens were won by Obama, easily, twice, with wide margins on his second run.
15
We are not an "arian" nation! Never have been...never will be! The ignorance of the trump
voters is astonishing......there is no homogenic race on this continent other the native americans who's origins are still in question.
None of this matters..it is trump's distraction and a magnetic "hot-point" issue easily directed to the ignorance of trump voters in the southeast, midwest, people unaware that their perceived race exists only by the blood and treasure spent to acquire the lands they now occupy....but for how long?
4
“White Anxiety” is being offended when the middle class wages your dad earned in construction/slaughter houses/etc are now less than minimum wage jobs and performed by mainly undocumented people. It is also paying more in premiums/deductibles/coinsurance/copays than ever before while the “diversity will save us” democrats offer FREE healthcare for all who cross our border illegally. Oh, and they want to give he border crossers a free pass by not making their action a crime! Forget about the drug smugglers who bring 90% of the fentanyl through our southern border. Hey, only about 69,000 Americans (mostly white) die each year from overdoses. Now tell me why white people who have a grievance should not vote for someone who tries to fix it instead of the person who says it is imaginary? Do all academics live in a world where facts count for nothing?
17
Because he has no interest in fixing it, just using poor people’s willingness to hate other poor people to his advantage.
8
I would like any white person to tell me, an African-American whose first ancestor born in America served in the Colonial Army over 200 years ago, to go back to Africa. That person can say it to my face!!!
12
@Abel Newport You can always suggest that you'll entertain the notion right after Melania goes back to Eastern Europe...which will be never.
1
The older, white, non-college males do not like to be told that they are stupid and vote against their best interests, but they are the ones who are susceptible to the race-baiting and red-baiting of Trump. In the 1840s and 1850s they were called Know-Nothings. What should we call them now?
12
What many white voters do not get is they have created their own anxieties and now think that having a rich white schoolyard bully will keep their demographic in power-indefinitely. Ask the white owned businesses what they need and want. No regulation and cheap skilled labor. They want their cake and then some. It’s the same old Jim Crow now Juan Crow. We want them to use but we don’t want them voting. We need them to succeed yet we don’t want them living in our neighborhood. We will give them bank accounts but we....... you get the idea. Help wanted but no trespassing. Trumps white supporters represent the new cold civil war. If he wins in 2020 it may go from cold to hot. By hot I mean more random acts of violence and shootings. It is regressive politics. Leadership on the low road to nowhere.
12
He is not ADDRESSING white anxiety, he is STOKING it.
14
The majority of Americans, those who didn't vote for Trump in 2016, and have grown in numbers since then, need to keep Trump and his white, racist-chanters in perspective. They are NOT a powerful group of voters, though the media coverage of them would have you believe differently. And they are getting smaller everyday.
So let Trump and his white racist mob stomp and shout all they want, because it shows how desperate Trump has become. It is not a winning hand in 2020.
7
Love it or leave it. Minority will exceed 50 per cent before 2050. Donald's white USA is a futility.
6
@Uly, this is exactly the kind of statement and tone that creates more Trump voters.
Heaven forbid us white folks have to go though life without privilege. /s
Fairness and equality of opportunity should only be frightening to the weak, the unprepared, or the lazy.
— White Male, 50
9
Maybe you feel you already have everything you need.
The challenge comes when this is not the case.
4
The fundamental question at hand
One that’s echoing across the land
Is that we don’t yet know
Just how low he will go
This man who’s so unnaturally tanned
4
Between 30-50 years from now most of the planet's population will be wiped away, never to be seen or heard from again. All this trash talk and rebuttal, hopefully, will be cleansed away by mother earth for good and the endless chatter will cease and the animals will rejoice.
7
Yea! trump supporters can finally reach deep down and bring out all the festering hatred and bigotry that they've keep hidden inside. Finally they have a man who encourages the release of their worst angels. They gather together, they chant and sneer, faces distorted with hatred.
Their lives haven't turned out as they'd planned, but now they can place the blame on immigrants, people of color, especially women of color, the costal elites and anyone except themselves. Well good for you. But please do not call yourselves Christians or good citizens. You may think that trump is your hero, that he's just like you. He's not. He is a malignant narcissist. He acts like the kid you hated in grammar school. trump is an embarrassment to our country, which by the way was settled by immigrants like the people that you and trump despise. Go figure.
13
Comparing the opportunity gap map at
https://www.opportunityatlas.org/
to the trump support map at
https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/FS3WI/2/
Makes me think that Republican voters share a fear of losing what they have.
1
@jwdooley Middle class and poor Republican voters share massive ignorance. Ignorance of the fact that Republican politicians work against everything that could possibly help them prosper. Republican voters also share the fact that they've been conned and taken advantage of for decades.
Good grief, ladies! The white christians of the heartland are finally so absorb by their own martyrdom that they may not put misogyny first on their list of reasons to vote. Quelle surprise!
They seem to think any credit given to anyone other than a white (usually) male is too much. They need it all, all!
There are so many more important things to address, like whether we will have a habitable planet in the near future, and THIS is the best they can do?
Remind me, what are we even giving this attention?
9
After listening to another diatribe by a conservative friend about all the advantages blacks have, I asked him how much I would have to pay him if I could wave a magic wand and he would wake up black the next morning. Same college degrees, experience, home, spouse that he has now.
He refused to name an amount. That’s how valuable white skin is.
14
White Fragility is the book about white anxiety.
Trump talk of "send her back" is a distortion of his fear that non-whites will take over the country and willl send the white people back to where they came from.
It's all psychological. I could probably start a GoFundMe account for Trump to go to therapy but I'm sure he wouldn't go to therapy and would just steal the money and go play golf....
5
White anxiety over what? Paranoia personified. I am amazed that the GOP has not emphasized white European immigration to the US. We can deemphasize the Indians and Chinese, the two largest by far of legal immigration to the US. They are educated and bring achievers to the US. Shut down hispanic immigration entirely. That means whites will have to start mowing their own yards, clean their own houses and build all their own housing. Fat chance you say?
6
All media organizations - inc yours - have been boasting & crowing about the “browning of America” for *years*, & what this would mean for the ultimate domination of your political agenda.
16
The title should be White Anxiety, and a President Ready to Exploit it. Or Fan it. Or Inflame it. Or Pander to It.
9
The race-baiting has been going on since Nixon's Southern Strategy. But everything was in code and dog-whistle.
Now it has been blown wide-open.
The upside is that it can now be confronted for what it is.
15
The white majority fought for and voted for equality for minority races. They see what was supposed to be temporary extra consideration given to minorities has turned into an entrenched expectation of permanent preferences over white people in education and hiring. They do not see that they will be accorded equality when they are a minority and no longer have the majority power to protect their equal rights. They see that they have to assert their right to equal treatment under the law now or lose it forever. It isn’t racism. It is self preservation and assertion of equality for themselves.
9
@KBronson This is a take that seems at odds with what was once called reality. The white majority fought for this? Not quite. Assuredly, none of the advances could have happened without white actions, but the southern strategy of the Nixon years and its success, the white shift from the Democratic to Republican party, particularly in the southern states; these are facts that belie your statements. I submit that it is racism. To have a white inlaw (I am white) state that he is a bigot, as a matter of fact (also a Trump voter) tells me the reality is not as you see it.
3
I’m a white man, and like many white men I know, I am content to be left alone. I have my own money, my own health insurance, my own house and pretty much everything else I want, all of which I worked and sacrificed for myself. I stopped worrying about “white privilege” when I couldn’t get into the college of my choice, the job I wanted or the promotion I deserved because affirmative action/diversity candidates got preference. I did what I had to do and never thought much about it until people started asking me to give them what I worked for. I don’t want to pay for your health insurance, college education or reparations. I don’t feel anxious about it either. If you try to take what I have expect me to put up a fight. Yes, that includes voting for Trump, which is rather like getting root canal: painful, but necessary.
13
How do you feel we should solve for our current conflicts then?
What policies of Trumps do you like the most?
5
@Larry Yes - you did all by yourself with no help from everyone. Like the white guy that hired you. Never facing racism on a daily basis. Not being subjected to petty discrimination and prejudice. Everyone loves to think that they did all by themselves with no help from anyone. White privilege is real and it's OK to acknowledge it. After all, it's white people who first colonized this country and therefore arguably had the best piece of the pie and continue to do so. But economics and demographics are going to become reality too. Neither Republicans nor Democrats addressed the loss of manufacturing jobs decades ago when it could have been possible to do something. Now our President wants to address it with cheap lines and racist tropes. Coal mining jobs are not coming back. Steel jobs are not coming back. If you think Trump will change all that - I wish you had gotten into the college of your choice so you could have gotten better critical thinking skills. And please, don't blame affirmative action for your failures. You are exhibit 1 for this article.
8
While one can understand anxiety of uneducated portion white males as indicated in this article, we currently have only flame throwing leader and spineless republican party enablers. They exploit the situation aided by social media rabble rousers and a certain blatantly faux TV news/opinion outlet. The oligarchy funds this and corrupt cronies/family have taken over key govt depts to quietly milk them when everyone is focussed on the next outrageous red meat thrown to this base. Hillary identified this group as the 40% deplorable electorate!! Only hope is if the next Inspirational leader like MLK or Kennedy to emerge to unite the country and address real problems such as income inequality, climate change, fixing the runaway costs of healthcare, STEM education etc. Hope is America in the past always managed to get such great leaders. So let us hope this is the case this time too!!
3
I think the title should read White Anxiety, and a President Ready to Exploit it. Using the word Address makes it sound less nefarious than the reality of what he is doing.
7
I suspect that most of the white racial backlash is concentrated among white, non-college educated white males, who unfortunately are incapable of seeing the long range picture of the US and its position in the world. Short of a fascist regime with intents for a final solution, there is nothing anyone can do to prevent the present non-Hispanic white majority of becoming another minority shortly before mid-century. Any action by this president and any following president of like conviction elected through fear and voter intimidation will only end up permanently destroying our great democratic experiment. We will probably survive as a pariah state, armed to the hilt to enforce our will on all those weaker countries not dancing to our tune. We will become economically inconsequential compared to China. Our great cultural, educational, judicial and intellectual institutions, if not totally faltering, will become shadows of themselves. Parallel to this nightmare will be the missed opportunity of averting or even limiting the catastrophic consequences of global warming. But never mind, the resulting economic and environmental apocalypse - the real threats facing human survival as we know it- is at best a not-to-be concerned hoax for the Trump followers, who seem to worry less about the survival of this great country and its privileged global position than the prospects of loosing their cultural status deeded by historic privileges, rather than their enterprise.
6
Correct me if I’m wrong, but it’s my understanding that many whites with college degrees did, in fact, vote for Trump. Simply because he was not a “Washington insider” and could “bring something different to the table.” This coming from supposedly educated, rational thinking people. Not look at the mess we’re in.
4
@DCF You're right. There was a nearly 10% "defection" of educated/suburban whites (men and women) to Trump. In addition, many Hispanics voted for him too. That put him over the edge in the electoral college if not popular vote.
4
The white anxiety, fear and anger we are seeing is not new. It has been out there under the covers for a long time. Governmental efforts to help minorities, while being a noble and just effort, have exacerbated the issue. Lower and even middle class whites have understandably become increasingly angry as advantages have not been extended to them. They mistakenly blame those programs for their economic woes.
Understanding their anger, Trump embraced it and has used it to create a powerful political force, in the process making it “respectable” to hold and discuss racist views. So now we hear all this hateful rhetoric which not long ago would have been condemned.
Government tends to mandate what it wants to accomplish, not embrace it and “sell” it. So, six decades into the civil rights movement, it is still just that; a movement to change American values. It is unfinished and will never be finished by laws, litigation and mandate. We desperately need charismatic leaders who will “sell” to the American people that we are one people and need to support each other. We are very divided and “a house divided against itself cannot stand.” As long as that divide exists, opportunists like the President will fill the void. We have many national challenges and we will only solve them if we come together as one people pursuing our common good.
4
I think it was only a matter of time before the hatred of black and brown people would break out into the open. Trump was only the catalyst, not the originator. Who remembers Willie Horton? Who remembers Newt Gingrich’s campaign video showing an America with flags flying from many homes, with white picket fences, with the folks enjoying lemonade on the front porch . . . and with not a single person of color?
These were dog whistles. Trump uses an air horn. Like cockroaches, he brings out the worst in Americans, who are alarmed by our increasing diversity instead of realizing it’s what makes us great.
7
Push any group and they will push back.
16
When people in Colorado take down the American flag and raise the Mexican flag (by the way, did the NYTimes do a story about that?), or when AOC says that immigration laws don't apply to Hispanics because "we are on our land" (the ex-President of Mexico Vicente Fox once said, "we are 120 million people [100 million in Mexico and the rest in America] that live together and are working to construct a nation"), or when the left pushes open borders, the impression one gets is of something called "La Reconquista" or some kind of conquest of the US in opposition to the white cultural origins of the country. Whites are rightly concerned about a seeming effort to displace them from their communities. This is similar to how the Turkish PM Erdogan says, "Make not three, but five children. Because you are the future of Europe." But whites aren't allowed to express anxiety- it's taboo for them to develop their Identity politics, and the media pushes a one-way narrative against them.
16
With the demographic shift in not only America but Europe as well, this anxiety is well deserved. The white working class and middle class is facing a death of a thousand cuts from globalization and immigration.
Your job is exported or they bring someone in with an H1-B1, driving down your wage and job security. You have few if any benefits and you and your spouse are both forced to work; having a family seems almost impossible and homes are increasingly expensive from foreign 'investment'. The political parties that should be fighting for you are seemingly catering to people that aren't even citizens. As the population gets more diverse and the identity politics/special interests increase, good luck trying to get people together to make any substantial change in your quality of life: Divide et Impera.
When your demographic share goes down, so does your voice. Concepts like "White Privilege" and "Reverse Racism doesn't exist" seem harmless now, but that changes when you're no longer in power. No one wants to end up like the Afrikaans, paying for the sins of the father even if you are generations removed.
10
The authors have a bit of a short memory about modern racial politics. The Southern Strategy began in the late 1960s and there have been dog whistles in every Republican campaign. Jesse Helms ran a TV commercial for his Senate race showing a pair of white hands tearing up a job application because a black person was hired. Rep. Steve King had a Confederate flag in his office and he wasn't even from the South. Perhaps the difference is that Trump has made it explicit for the mainstream and thus has removed their shame about expressing it. That's what the rejection of "political correctness" is about.
5
Would I be as terrified of this administration, had I not traveled the world and seen how far there is still to fall?
Would I be as terrified of this administration, had I not been unwittingly married to a psychopath, similar to the likes of Voldemort, who creates chaos and crises and blames them on others, who professionally gaslights, isolates, divides and uses others to harm the innocent, who’s every word is a lie?
Maybe not.
But I have been.
So I am.
8
Americans of all colors have seen the middle class and the meritocracy disappear over the last 50 years. At the same time the top has just gotten better and better off. Now they are being told the country is going to be culturally and ethnically more diverse every year and it's going to happen no matter what they do and if you don't like it you're xenophobic racist. This race based, discussion is a smoke screen for the bigger issue. The population of the US has doubled in my lifetime. We are 335 million plus now and growing by 2-3 million/year, more than the populations of 15 states. That's number 3 on the planet. We can argue all day whether it's a great idea to add millions of Guatemalan peasants or Norwegian bus drivers but the fact is, the numbers are what we should be talking about. What kind of future, diverse or all white does the US face as nation and planet where there is a permanent over supply of people and labor and that over supply is killing the planet we all depend on. Climate change is not PC. it doesn't care if we are diverse or not, if we are the highest per capita co2 producers on earth (which we are). In the end, only the total number will count and no one is discussing this because identity politics is fashionable.
9
They should be anxious. Decades of low education, extreme obesity, heroin and dependence on rural and farm subsidies and handouts have made the flyover country in to a mess. Immigrants and non-white Christians are doing much better than trump base.
5
New academic research by Zach Goldberg and David Rozado shows that "The Great Awokening," the ongoing anti-straight white male campaign in the prestige press, began in roughly 2013, well before Trump. It's more sensible to think of Trump's popularity as a natural reaction to the numerous triumphalist expressions of hatred and disdain in the national media against the non-diverse.
For data on this important question, see:
https://www.takimag.com/article/the-great-awokening-conspiracy-theory/
8
There’s an academic journal called Takimag?
Come on.
It's not the "diversity" that's the issue; rather, it's all the Cultural Marxist--e.g., Booker, Buttigieg, Harris--"white privilege" stomping to promote it and all the DNC Politburo American flag-burning identity politics that must necessarily be a part of it.
This "Upshot" opinion piece with its self-serving thesis--"A large if not majority share of white voters, and a majority of Republicans"--being a part of the former and our Sovietized mass-media being the means for the latter.
And let’s not leave out Marcuse elite’s who ignore the fact that many with college educations support Trump: “‘It really takes a Trump to ignite it,’ said Michael Tesler, a political scientist at UC, Irvine. ‘These beliefs that whites are discriminated against, that undeserving minorities are getting more than they deserve, and hard-working whites are getting less than they deserve--those are always there.’”
But nowhere in this piece does Tesler tell us that a 93% black vote for Obama was racist--which it was per se. And nowhere is there made the point that recent history is replete with “public expressions of anger by African-Americans”--Baltimore and St. Louis being just two.
Point of fact: Waves of legal immigrants through Ellis Island brought no flag-burning rhetoric or "white" hate berating of the citizens and their presidents--Teddy being quite the nationalist, too.
Perhaps the mix being Germans, Italians, Swedes, Russians, Poles, Irish et al. wasn't real "diversity" at the time?
9
Trump has every reason to rant and rave that citizenship status should be on census forms. Just do the math. How many undocumented immigrants are Caucasian? No wonder he's on a campaign to bleach America.
1
What's especially troubling is that white voters feel the need to preserve their own "identity" and believe that all people of color only want to take their jobs and rape their daughters. The chants show a racial animus that's always been there, and it took someone like Donald Trump to exploit it in such crude terms. I'm fortunate to be from a more cosmopolitan area where we're all from the same race: human.
As for those who say the president has a right to express his opinion -- he does, but when it's only done to divide us and instill hate, it's irresponsible and anti-American. He doesn't care about the issues (or even know what they are), and that suits his voters just fine. Move past this ugliness by gaining knowledge (Trump is the anti-intellectual), exploring the world and talking to others.
2
What anxiety? That you no longer can be handed out things just because you lack pigmentation? No longer climb the steps of society without education, qualification and at the expense of others? That the playing field might be leveled?
6
As the ethnic and racial diversity of our country shifts so does the diversity in our military. see www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/04/13/6-facts-about-the-u-s-military-and-its-changing-demographics/.
Trump is racist and divisive but he is ultimately more a self-serving opportunist. He is a master at feeding off of the fear and ignorance of many in white America. Trump and his followers need to look at the black, brown and Hispanic men and women protecting our freedoms the world over before they spew their racial venom.
4
Larry Wilmore had it right. 2016 was all about "The Unblackening," of America. That being said I doubt even he thought it would be this bad.
1
Where do we go to look and accuse for this willingness to politicize demographics openly? Certainly not A.O.C., who elected to characterize her political struggle with speaker Pelosi as due to the Squad being women of color. Not race attack faker Jussie Smollett. Not race baiting Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza. Certainly not racial ambulance chaser Al Sharpton, or our pandering Mayor who opened the City coffers to pay the former's equally unscrupulous daughter a large settlement for a demonstrably fake injury. None of these, of course. Just the usual targets, the supremely fed up who forget to keep quiet.
4
It's not white anxiety. It's straight-up hate. Trump's tweets and public statements this week have been racist, but more importantly, generically, they've been hate speech aimed at people he perceives to be un- American. I wish Democrats would get better addressing Trump's bigotry in a way that his base will understand. No Democrat in the House of Representatives hates this country. But in Trump's little narcissistic world, if you disagree with him then you hate America. If the press tells the truth about him they are the enemy of America. Scolding him in terms that is base couldn't possibly understand is useless. On one hand you're preaching to the choir, those of us who know that Trump is the worst president ever, and on the other hand you're essentially speaking Greek to the people who do support him. The DNC should have YouTube, Facebook and other social media platforms covered with videos that demonstrate Trump's hypocrisy, his lies and how he preaches hate. So far, nothing. Just idealistic Democrats in search of purity.
8
Why is this a surprise to anyone. The left was incredibly naive to believe it could encourage identity politics among minorities without it breaking out among whites. Now we see what they unleashed. Unfortunately it’s the history of the left to double down on these things so expect white identity politics to also become a stronger force in politics and culture.
18
It is not White Anxiety or The Aggrieved forgotten White Man. It is Racism and we need to stop sugar-coating what it is. When the Civil Rights workers were killed in Mississippi in the '60s it wasn't because noncollege educated White Men felt ignored. Nixon had a Southern Strategy, Bush Sr. had Willie Horton and Clinton had Sister Souljah. Today we want to find a reason for what is in our DNA so we blame demographic and cultural shifts? What was the reason last century for lynchings and terrorism by The Klan? The only difference today is that Trump realized that Racist need no longer wear bedsheets and Burn Crosses. Trump's rally last Wednesday could have been a Klan Rally. Trump is showing us who we are not our Glorified idea of who we think we are. The Left's hands are not clean in this either. When Obama was vilified by The Right where was the outrage from The Left? Trump is just The Symptom of The Disease that has consumed us for four hundred years. Mitch McConnell declaring Trump is not a racist should have Abraham Lincoln turning over in his grave. The same McConnell who plotted from day one to take down Obama. Where was the outrage when Obama was called a liar during his firstState of The Union address? Let's stop trying to pin the tail of The Donkey and call it for what it is. Racism! Racist don't need a reason to hate because their hate was taught at the breakfast table.in most instances.
6
Address? No: Exploit.
6
There is definitely a racial and cultural shift going on in America today. It started in the time of the Reagan Presidency when the Democrats snookered Reagan into signing an amnesty bill, whose terms the Democrats have failed to live up to. Supposedly in exchanged for Amnesty the government would crack down on individuals illegally present in the US and on the firms that hired them. The illegals got their amnesty but the country never got the enforcement portion of the bill. This why there will not be Immigration Reform today – the Democrats cannot be trusted to live up to any enforcement in the bill. And today we see the Dems at the party Open Borders, Health care for all Illegal aliens, but nothing for poor Americans. The Sanctuary movement promoted by some Western State Governors have also soured the pot. To many voters the Democrats seem to be anti-American and the party of illegal immigrants.
Actually I think churches should be punished for giving sanctuary for illegal aliens. I would take away their tax benefits and make them pay a fine which increased daily the longer they hide the Illegal alien.
This has finally broken out into the open, but it was inevitable that this would happen. It merely took the right person to stand up for American people to make it happen. Now that the genie is out of the box (so to speak), it will be difficult if not impossible to put him back in the bottle.
8
@Judith weller
But Trump is only standing up for a segment of Americans, and he's standing up for the segment that has always had the most power to begin with.
No, this is just plain old racism.
5
A nation needs a common identity. Excessive immigration is not allowing us to sufficiently forge our national unified identity. Let’s slow it down please and it will have the added effect of increasing wages at the lower end (it’s absolutely the case that immigration crushes wages for low end workers). The disparity in wealth is directly tied to the immigration question.
21
@Kevin The disparity in wealth is directly tied to the 'tax giveaways' to the 1-10%. Period.
16
@Eddie O'Donnell increase supply of labor equals downward pressure on wages. Econ 101.
5
@Kevin sorry the disparity in wealth has zip to do with "the immigration question".
7
Evidence of concern about demographic and cultural shifts : the authors seem to imply that there is evidence of concern , but no evidence of demographic and cultural shift.
If there is evidence of demographic and cultural shift, can't some be concerned about it? and should not it be discussed and addressed in the public sphere? Is the US President barred from expressing his own opinion? The democratic process cannot exclude discussing difficult questions. Thank you, Mr President.
27
@Peter Font The president isn't discussing anything. He's stoking resentments and deepening divisions.
8
This piece doesn't hit the mark for me. First, if Trump were "addressing" anxiety, he'd be talking to his supporters about it in a sensible way. But I don't believe anxiety plays a role across the board. It does, especially for those who've lost a lot and don't have much to hold on to. But Trump's support also comes from those with jobs, those with college, those with money from wealthy zip codes, long-standing, secure Republican families. Closer to the mark, I believe, is Jamelle Bouie's truly remarkable piece that appeared here yesterday. Bouie, writing about the joy of hate touched on a human dynamic seldom publicly addressed.
While not the lynch mobs of the past, Trump's crowds revel in joy felt from their group-experienced hate, mobilized by him toward those who come from elsewhere or who look different. In their gated communities or high above New York City, there's no reason to doubt that some of the very affluent don't share that feeling with the joyous, rowdy rally crowd. It's an important consideration because once experienced, like with a street drug, that high can be craved and cement a bond with Trump or future Trumps, not broken by rational persuasion.
29
@blgreenie
There is a pernicious thrill in a mob. I wish I could find the quote about the mobs in 1930s Germany, where a little lonely shopkeeper or lonely old maid find their belonging in a one giant voice of a mob in full cry. I remember seeing pictures of people Hitler-saluting with a glittering ecstasy in their eyes- truly like someone in a delusional fever dream.
7
Unfortunately little is said here or elsewhere that I have seen that tries to plumb into the significance or roots of racism among so many whites, particularly males.
My experience in the South for over 25 years is that white males of lower class are treated just slightly better than Blacks. I am referring to white power holders, from supervisors to mayors to religious leaders and top business people. They all see a stable workforce as the number one priority, and that includes subduing them with veiled threats, comparison with Black low economic level people, and the heritage of protest against the urban intellectuals of the Democratic party, going back to the civil war and beyond.
Of course these low level people will respond to Trump's dog whistles. That is their patrimony. And they see little alternative to their past and current lot. There is much more to this culture that I have just described, and having Donald Trump at the top of the heap is certainly no help, except for "saying what these folks cannot say," as several people told me before the 2016 election.
But I think it is critical that this culture is exposed for what it is, and who we have to thank for it. In my efforts to help with community discussions about race and racism here, none of the power brokers attended. And would Blacks protest that phenomenon out loud? Hardly-the repercussions are all to clear to them.
When are we going to delve into this destructive culture to the needed depth?
14
"Surveys show fears among some white people that they are losing status in America, and those holding such views are increasingly aligned with the Republican Party. These voters perceive anti-white discrimination. A growing share say the nation risks losing its identity because of openness to foreigners."
Wait, what?
Anti-white discrimination?
The nation risks losing the identity that was built on the backs of people from, literally, everywhere?
Where did the ancestors of this "growing share" come from? I doubt that these fearful voters are indigenous people.
"A large if not majority share of white voters, and a majority of Republicans, say this change will threaten American customs and values — a prospect that they say makes them anxious, even angry."
I wonder how anxious and angry their predecessors would have been if they were told "No Admittance" or 'Go back to where you came from."
What is wrong with people?
28
@Monicat This country has been majority white since before 1776. It has also been largely Christian. Christmas is a national holiday and has been treated as such for nearly 300 years. That is part of the US identity, an identity that Ellis Island era immigrants accepted and joined without demanding changes. Many Jews came during that era; none of them demanded Christmas be toned down. Now, standard Christmas songs have been removed from classrooms and shopping mall soundtracks in order to accommodate the sensibilities of newcomers from different traditions.
Why should the people whose ancestors helped build this country have to change their traditional celebrations for newcomers? Immigrants should assimilate to the ways of their new home, not insist on changing them. Otherwise, they should stay home or emigrate to somewhere more congenial.
Think about it: Would it be right for you or I to try to change the culture of a country we immigrated to, or would those attempts be condemned as cultural imperialism?
12
more than white anxiety is economic anxiety.
historically black [post civil war], chinese, mexicans, irish, italian workers were the source of "white" economic anxiety.
today it technology that is the actual source of economic anxiety—Trump is exploiting it and using the "other" as the boogey man rather than elimination of the human workforce.
the nirvana for capitalists has always been elimination of the human workforce.
elimination of the human workforce drove the industrial revolution, and every incremental production revolution for the past 300 years and it is what is driving AI and quantum computing as the final solution to a human workforce.
7
"Now, some white voters, especially less educated ones, see a bigger difference between the two parties on racial issues."
So now you have to less educated to notice that Democrats, and not Republicans, are calling for black reparations and free healthcare for illegal immigrants? I'd say anyone not in a coma would be able to discern how the two parties are radically different regarding those two issues. And the longer their primary candidates refuse to completely disown those two losing positions, the less likely Democrats are to win in November 2020.
52
Guess what. Every life matters, and white people are entitled to their feelings too. Their identity should get equal time and credit. Democrats only win their identity politics game if they can convince whites to ignore their own identity.
69
@TL
@TL
As a Democrat it might surprise you that I agree with you to some extent. I am not white but the effort to keep pushing the idea that whites are to blame for every societal ill makes me uncomfortable. That said, the notion of America for whites above all else pushed by Trump is a false narrative and I can only hope that most whites don't share that view. I hang on to the hope that the plurality of the origins of this country is a truth that shall prevail in the minds of those that truly value the history of our country.
12
@TL
As a Democrat it might surprise you that I agree with you to some extent. I am not white but the effort to keep pushing the idea that whites are to blame for every societal ill makes me uncomfortable. That said, the notion of America for whites above all else pushed by Trump is a false narrative and I can only hope that most whites don't share that view. I hang on to the hope that the plurality of the origins of this country is a truth that shall prevail in the minds of those that truly value the history of our country.
2
@TL Except EVERYTHING -- seriously, everything -- is white-centric. Which is to say that whites haven't been ignored -- they've been the masters of the universe, dictating matters of great importance for everyone else. However, things are shifting as we move towards accommodating others. Our government has to be more representative of it's people, not only racially and ethnically, but also economically. We need more white people from the working class just as much as we need working class people of color.
12
If nothing else, Trump’s election has exposed the lie that Republicans stand for anything other than the maintenance of the extant power structures and status quo. White anxiety is a fear of loss of status and power stoked by fear of “the other.” The GOP has always fueled white anxiety among its base as the means to maintaining its’ power; Trump has lit the match. The GOP has never, ever, intended to pursue policies or a tax structure that would improve the lives of their low-income and middle class supporters. And by continuing to undermine access to high quality public education for people living in lower income school districts or to quality job opportunities that pay a living wage, the GOP makes sure that their lower-income, angry white supporters stay that way — ignorantly aggrieved, powerless and voting republican. Wake up GOP voters. You’ve either been seriously duped or you are seriously unAmerican.
15
Mr. Trump has one goal: to sow chaos for his own gain. He does not care one iota about poor nor middle-class White people. He is on record joking about how easy it is to deceive White Republicans. That is all his rhetoric amounts to: deceit.
However, this is an old as dirt elitist strategy that goes back to the 1700s. Sow discord among lower income people of European, African & Native descent to disrupt the powerful organizing they do together. Convince folks they are alright as long as they are White, even if they are broke, homeless and only have one tooth left. This is the real reason they killed Dr. King. Because he wanted to unite poor Whites and people of color to dismantle the powers that be. They said he was a socialist, too.
It's 2019. For God's sake, stop falling for it.
25
When a Democrat retakes the White House, get ready to tell all those Trump voters that if they don't like it, they can leave.
23
Do not try to hide this attitude under an undeserved veneer of politeness. This isn’t anxiety. This is plain old racism.
26
We don’t pay enough attention to skin color, the defining characteristic of humans, as we are informed. White this, brown that, Black this—we are all focused on skin color, as we should be. Let us never forget what skin color we were born with—it’s essential to our development as individuals. Societies can only be understood in terms of skin color. Thank goodness we can now ignore the words about judging by character and not skin color. Skin color is the sine qua non. To paraphrase Keats (dead white guy): ‘skin color is all you know and all you need to know.’ Viva skin color! Let us talk about it endlessly forever!
10
Many white Americans have long been expressing their racism on conservative talk radio shows but what Trump has done is given them a way to do something about the situation. I don't think he is the first to try. George Wallace and Pat Buchanan also tried. But Trump had some real advantages. One was he learned over many years how to manipulate the media. And maybe that is why the cable TV networks kept showing his campaign speeches while largely ignoring the other Republican candidates in 2016. He also had the advantage of social media and had mastered Twitter. In addition, in the general election he had the advantage of Russia working to get him elected. Trump's views seem to fit in very well with those of white supremacists and he comes off as an authentic white supremacist. If he were pretending I doubt if he could pull it off. White supremacy has long history in the US and it has been persistent despite some major setbacks. Everyone fighting white supremacy needs to realize the white supremacists are in this for the long haul and are not giving up any time soon.
14
"Divide and conquer" works only until both sides of the divide realize it only works for the ruler.
12
@Mark Alas, do you think Trump voters are intelligent enough to figure out that they are being played? Read some of the pro-Trump comments in this thread, and you'll see that they idolize Trump for giving them permission to hate non-whites. Meanwhile, they are unaware that their own white pockets are being picked, jobs being stolen, healthcare being diminished, environment being destroyed by Trump and his cohort of oligarchs.
4
Identity politics.
What a powderkeg.
This is the end result--white identity is all of a sudden a quasi-mainstream thing. And there is a playbook to exploit developed by politicians on the left that played it to the hilt.
It does raise a question, what is the difference between minority identity politics and a soon-to-be-minority white identity?
I also ask myself, how can the Supreme Court uphold race-based affirmative action policies when the beneficiaries all of a sudden are in the majority? Doesn't that just contravene the purpose stated in the famous caroline products footnote 4 regarding
"the review of statutes directed at particular religious... or nations... or racial minorities...: whether prejudice against discrete and insular minorities may be a special condition, which tends seriously to curtail the operation of those political processes ordinarily to be relied upon to protect minorities, and which may call for a correspondingly more searching judicial inquiry."
28
@Mmm
1) White women have always been the main beneficiaries of affirmative action, not people of color. Check out the history of affirmative action legislation and US DoE college enrollment stats since 1965;
2) White men, while making up only 31% of the population, still hold the vast majority of power across American institutions (60-95%). They don't need affirmative action. This set up is also highly undemocratic.
3) The struggle for racial justice is not identity politics. It is a call to perfect the union. As Dr. King once said, to ensure America is who she says she is on paper. We have yet to fulfil that vision by any measure. Racial inequity persists across the entire spectrum of American society. Politicians must speak to that vision to win our vote.
4) There is no comparison between racial justice struggle and White supremacist terrorism. There is data that suggests every time the president ups his racist rhetoric, there is an uptick in actual racial violence. Standing up for the rights of children locked in cages is wholly different than standing for the people who burn Black churches to the ground.
Stop the false equivalence.
25
The in between attitude is over. Trump is forcing America to be openly for the haves, rich white people, and the have-nots, former white middle class, blacks, browns. Let's hope History will tell story of how America was pushed to have cristal clear political positions.
5
The obscene levels of inequality happened as a continuation of the past thirty years, under Obama.
1
I'm an outsider. I don't fit in. I'm white (northern european) but I'm weird and quirky. I get along with other outsiders and minorities because i'm different. Yet I still don't want white people to become a minority in my college, my town, my state, or my country and would never favor non whites over whites if I HAD to choose one over the other...
That being said everyone here gives way too much credit to politicians because we as individuals create our own lives and are largely responsible for what happens to us and our reaction to what happen to us...
Politics is mostly entertainment and I don't give any politician or person dominance over my life....
14
I am a life-long 71-year-old) Democrat, never having voted Republican. I am a liberal, but not a progressive (because they aren't really liberals).
My opinion is that Trump voters have a point. They have been ignored, especially by Democrats. They see things, like Affirmative Action, and, in the words of Mike Royko, wonder "where's mine?"
And it is a good question. Why are black Americans given preferential treatment over their children? And of course the wealthier whites don't react that way because their children get the jobs they want anyway--Affirmative Action doesn't affect them as much. It's an easy thing to be in favor of when it is other people who take the brunt of it.
What I now see is that there is little difference between the two parties. In fact, they should change from being called Democrats and Republicans to being called Grievance 1 and Grievance 2 parties.
90
@Travelers - if Trump voters had any sense of history, they would see that black children have been confronted with larger obstructive issues than the white working class.
That said, your moderate Democrats had better pay more attention to working class voters than they have been for a long long time.
12
Any similarities to Germany just before the war...?
4
@Travelers you are not a liberal. When you say trump has a point that uppity black folks have already gotten enough free stuff, you out yourself. This is called concern trolling.
7
Some see the problem as discrimination against white males. Perhaps if they were to consider that for the the first time in our nation white males may be facing true competition from others, they would have better insight into their situation.
16
@Frances Menzel, um, yeah. White men want all the pie all the time, and if dark people get some crumbs sometimes, they had better be grateful and quiet. How understanding do we need to be about this? We scratch our heads endlessly, wondering how to appeal to misogynist racists who want no competition.
5
@Frances Menzel
There is no fair competition here - it’s preference for less skilled minorities just because they are non white
5
@Shorty, whites just want the rules and standards to be the same for everyone. Hire and admit based on metrics that don’t include race, and apply those metrics to everyone equally. No discrimination for or against anyone.
5
And the willingness of the media to stoke fear into white people instead of promoting that we are all human beings and how we need to set our differences aside and work with our similarities to co-exist on the planet.
10
President Trump got Democrats to hate being told to leave America after they said they would leave America if he got elected.
24
Donald Trump is anti-immigration, and then says that people who don't like their home country should leave it.
8
@Dr. John Good response. I recall several actresses saying they would leave the United States if Donald Trump was elected. None have gone so far.
5
So several actresses wanting to leave the country to escape a racist and autocratic president is no different from said president telling any minority who stands up to him to go back where they came from.
Are you sure that's a great response Chris? I shouldn't really have to explain the difference between leaving and being thrown out.
Openly politicizing white anxiety is exactly how Trump dominated the GOP primaries. There wasn’t a lot to argue about in the GOP debates, not a lot of policy differences on stage.
But Trump stood out from the minute he rode down the escalator in Trump Tower with his message of fear and bigotry.
Trump merely screamed what the GOP has been whispering for years. Hence the GOP silence when asked about Trump’s obvious racism.
And sadly, bigotry and fear are working for him. Again. His approval numbers in the South shot up this week.
8
When workers were struggling in the "Gilded Age" they recognized that the ones with power were the Oligarchs, the Carnegies and Vanderbuilts among 400+ others. Today our Oligarch have destroyed the working class with outsourcing manufacturing and labor. It is rather amazing that the working class would pick the least powerful upon which to vent their anger and fear when the real enemies are the greedy.
48
@Sarah - not so surprising as the least powerful have been deliberately targeted by the greedy to use as a scapegoat... and it works all too easily; it's how they have always maintained their power.
14
@Sarah
I read this quote somewhere:
"The problem with America is people that make $700 per hour have convinced people that make $25 per hour that people who make $7.25 per hour are the problem."
17
Narratives are powerful, sophisticated tools of psychological control.
6
I remember growing up in the 50s and 60s and being told about Willie Mays, arguably the greatest centerfielder ever to play the game of baseball (sorry Mick) that “he could have been so much better if he had only practiced hard. Too bad he relied on natural talent alone.”
It was all of course a big fat lie. Mays was one of the hardest working athletes in the game, on TOP of his natural gifts.
White anxiety?
I think if you look it up in a dictionary the definition will be: “Comes from the Old English word “prejudice.”
17
Nothing new about any of this.
In the latter part of the 19th century when a populist movement started gaining steam and began to present the idea that poor blacks and whites had far more in common than poor whites did with their wealthy fellow whites.
Those wealthy ones, fearing their power could be overturned by the coalition, started campaigns each time the populist movement started to gain momentum in politics telling whites that just based on the color of their skin, poor whites would always be better than blacks.
Every time the wealthy have feared blacks and whites getting together for common economic interests, they've simply dusted off that old racial trope and watched with glee as those lower down on the SES fight for the crumbs they're willing to throw them.
And when blacks haven't been sufficiently frightening, they've thrown in immigrants, especially those who aren't WASPs.
11
So, according to The Times, white voters have anxiety about their standing in an increasingly diverse U.S. Really?
In case you missed it, NYT, white voters continue to call the tune. And given the sturm and drang among non-white voters any time their interests are compromised, it's hard to see how that dominance is in any way diminishing.
The reaction to The Squad and their ilk has nothing to do with race, and everything to do with their loyalty.
Any credible research of the origin of "Love It Or Leave It" will bear that out.
8
@John And South Africa was ruled by a White minority for decades.
3
@Cee Williams
And Saudi Arabia is ruled by an Arab minority. The vast majority have no rights. We are their allies.
1
Please provide some links to this “credible” research. Peer-reviewed articles published in highly rated academic journals preferred, please.
4
This nation could never lose it's identity because of foreigners, our nation is and has always been a nation of foreigners.
When foreigners come here they bring with them their culture and incorporate it into America and as new generations are born that culture becomes a mix of what they had and what they learned about this country's culture.
This is what makes America great, the ability to grow and become stronger from immigrants that for the biggest percentage are glad to be here and are law biding citizens, don't let DJT stop that.
10
Democrats need to stop chasing their tail, resounding with multiple voices to Trump's tweets. When multiple Democrats respond to Trump they just amplify his voice. Try this: designate one person to respond to Trump. Make the message coherent, pithy and hard hitting. Maybe give the job to James Carville or Paul Begala. They will drive Trump nuts. No one else says a word about any Trump tweet. No one! Instead, talk about health care, climate change, Trump's love for the 1% and his coziness with international thugs. Stop letting Trump set the Democratic agenda.
20
@J. Colby Precisely. Every time the NYTimes and other outlets run a story on his latest tweet or vendetta, I despair - and wonder what else is happening in the country that they don't have the staff assigned to cover.
1
The Times needs to make very clear who the sources of funding of the newest conservative weapons introducing supposedly neutral 'nationalism'. We now read about 'conferences' at which speakers appear seemingly debating about capitalism and where discrediting of the free press and scholarly research dominates. The most important spokespersons (e.g. Carlson, Bannon, etc. ) and editors of supposed non-partisan publications connected with these people are associated with 'think tanks' - new and old - that are corrupt political weapons disguised as neutral scholarly organizations working to educate the public. They are actually speaking for the anti-liberal autocrats such as the Koch networks who pay their way, working to end governmental support for the poor and to support lowering taxes for the rich, ending social security and medicare/medicaid and other health care programs as well as free speech in educational institutions.
7
“[White voters] might even resent that there’s no ‘white history’ month, something that 29 percent of whites say they support.”
As a middle-aged white guy, here’s an instance where I’m finally willing to reach across the aisle. I’m 100% down with one month dedicated to “white history” if that means we get to have the remaining eleven months free of it.
6
It's quite remarkable to think how many people apparently believe that white people have been unfairly overlooked by mainstream history.
11
@Anthony Flack, the point is fairness. If every other group is eligible for a special month, then straight white males, who are explicitly excluded from those other monthlong celebrations, should get one too. To do otherwise is blatant discrimination.
Note: Few are actually asking for a real “ White History Month”; they’re just trying to make a point about equal treatment.
4
@me
Who said anything about having to hate themselves? Nobody, that's who. Stop raising straw men.
These discussions, while well meaning, are part of the problem we have in reconciling human differences in our society since uniformly they proceed from a flawed premise. To be clear: there is no such thing as "white people." Or African American or Hispanic or Asian people. There are, rather, many individual persons who may or may not think and act like others of whatever background. Glib use of these false categories is part of the poison of identity fixation and identity politics. Admittedly, since the beginning of the Republic we've utilized these kind of identity tags, only then one was a free white, or simply free, or a slave. So, while we've progressed some, we still have some way to go. We need to abolish the concept of race, essentially, rather as we have sought to eradicate small pox. It needs to be consigned to the category of historical curios The sooner the better.
4
@Frunobulax, there are many people whose genetic ancestors came primarily from Europe, Africa, Asia, or South America. In most cases, any laymen can tell who came from which continent just by looking. DNA analysis of continental ancestry correlates with self-reported race 99+% of the time. What we describe as “race” has a solid biological/historical basis. That some have used these labels to discriminate against others does not render them invalid, nor does genetic fuzziness around the edges of some continental groupings.
12
Never enough but a start. The perpetuation of false categories only reinforces the status quo.
@Frunobulax Race is a biologically false category but racism & White supremacy are very real social conditions. Saying abolish the category doesn't abolish the 500 year history that got us to our present state of global White dominance and reflexive oppression anytime this hegemony is threatened. It's never enough to say we're all human when some of us being dehumanized.
3
Many of us see the problem. We just don’t see trump as the solution.
6
"A different politician at the top of the Republican Party — one focused, say, on tax cuts rather than immigrants — might have left these white racial anxieties more dormant, or less clearly linked with partisanship."
But there were over a dozen 'different' politicians who ran for the 2016 GOP Presidential nomination who were focused on tax cuts for the rich, and they all lost to the racist in chief.
You have it backwards, for the wealthy power elite, racism is a means to an end - it's a feature, not a bug. They don't care how you win the office as long as their taxes are cut and their needs are served. If white people think that the wealthy power elite are going to care about their status or economic well being, then they are easy 'marks' for a con job. Oh, I guess they have already shown that?
For example, "They [white people] saw Mr. Trump as far more conservative on immigration." What does that mean? The Trump GOP is going to enact effective measures (like national E-Verify and prosecution of illegal employers) to reduce illegal immigration? No, of course not. You will get phony walls and revolving door deportation, but the Trump GOP is not going stop the flow of cheap domestic illegal labor. The wealthy power elite would no more allow that then they would allow Trump to close the southern border or cancel NAFTA.
https://whorulesamerica.ucsc.edu
8
This is exactly what I hear from friends and family out here in the Midwest. These are the people who will say "I'm not racist". And this is not simple "I hate black people" racism. The are mostly all for equal rights but they feel, rightly or not, that everyone else is getting break, free health care, welfare, preference in hiring, college acceptance and that they (white people) are the ones paying for it. It is the revolt of white people with a job. The powder keg had been brewing, Trump lit the fuse and is happy to ride the wave. It is going to be hard to counter. The key is to make the case that the 1% and powerful corporations are the enemy not the poor and minorities.
56
They should be thinking about that MASSIVE (trillions of dollars) of free handouts that Trump just gave to the rich, which the country absolutely cannot pay for, currently running up a massive government deficit.
It's funny how the country can afford to bankrupt itself giving trillions of dollars to the people who need it least, but middle-class white people's resentment only kicks in when they see some poor desperate minority in far worse circumstances than themselves receiving a pittance of the most meagre assistance.
12
This has been brewing for a long time. Look toward the university and colleges. White students have been squeezed out by Asians at some of the top schools. Suddenly white legacy students weren’t being granted “automatic” admission to the schools their families attended. Add this to the large number of H-1B visas granted by many US companies. Toss in the immigrants flowing across the borders early on and displacing white and black workers in industries like construction and landscaping. Democrats always played the numbers game. Betting on the immigrants to vote Democrat to win elections. But here’s the problem. They often don’t vote, and white folks do. Especially when they’re angry. The talking heads and coastal elites are blind to the issues. So are the elected officials that represent these elite communities. They are not like middle America they seek to represent. Congress has the Cadillac of benefits and most are financially set for life. The progressive talking heads like to talk about diversity, but their kids go to elite schools with the Congressional kids and don’t have to deal with the educational inconsistencies that exist in a number of cities. But the elected officials in the middle of the country know what’s happening and the Democrats will ignore their pleas to stay in the middle at their own peril. Veterans are in need of adequate healthcare, yet some Democratic candidates want to give it out for free before fixing it for our Vets. This is 2016 all over again.
10
@The Truth from the Left Coast - I don't understand the connection you are drawing between diversity and "dealing with educational inconsistencies". Does ethnic diversity lead to educational inconsistency?
I don't understand your point about veterans either. Surely if everyone had free healthcare then that would take care of the veterans too.
4
"...white voters without a degree swung toward Mr. Trump, but white voters with a degree did not."
And there you have it. Educated people know that America isn't a set prepackaged customs and values; it transcends race, religion, language, gender, heritage, or birthplace. Uneducated people believe that America comes in a box with a flag, a religion, and an ethnicity.
The US is not a set of customs or values. It's not even a place- it's a philosophy. It requires that we embrace diversity, cultivate it to make our nation stronger. Anyone who prefers a more homogeneous country can leave- there are plenty in the middle east to choose from.
11
@R Mandl, actually we do have a set of customs and values, just as any place that has been a functioning country for 200+ years does. Despite waves of immigration over those centuries, we remain a culturally Christian, English-speaking country, with shared assumptions and celebrations. We are open to others joining us but most want those others to assimilate to our larger culture rather than remain strangers living amongst us.
6
@R Mandl
The supposedly ignorant uneducated whites who voted from Trump were smart enough to figure out how to register to vote -- which is more than can be said for large parts of the Dem base.
5
Gee, Sam Finn, maybe the laws republicans have been passing to mandate voter IDs, to mandate a street address for Native Americans who don’t have named streets, being purged for not voting 2 years ago, etc., etc., have something to do with those Democrats you think can’t figure out how to register to vote? Add in having a fraction the number of polling places in minority areas do there are hours-long waits to vote...you’re right, they must just not be too bright.
1
In thinking about this, it’s useful to compare the Times with the WSJ. Literally daily the Times portrays the features and news in terms of racial, sexual, and ethnic identities, while somehow the WSJ manages coverage - and a larger circulation - without that “perspective.” At this point the Times - and most of those commenting - have made “whiteness anxiety” a non-falsifiable hypothesis; if one has it they are guilty of “white anxiety,” and if they don’t have it they are in denial and are also a problem. This world view simply ignores the possibility that for some people everything is not viewed through the lens of identity politics.
71
If it weren’t for the Times crossword, I’d have cancelled this digital subscription at least a year ago.
19
@LTJ. Nope everyone that reads the wsj is nothing but about IDENTITY politics. Whiteness, power and greed. I laugh when democrats are accused of identity politics. That accusation, as almost all by repubs and dumpster fire, are sheer and massive projections. So sing that somewhere else.
Until people get that drumpf and crew are shrieking about the :other: in order to grift, maintain power and shaft everyone else including his culty supporters, we will get worse as a country. Hard to believe I know as the wealthy and corrupt and white have descended into the gutters to hold onto power and money. They use racism and fear as a distraction How do people not see that?
Oh that’s right, the vast majority of us do, just vote in millions upon millions to throw these hideous grifters out! Don’t let these carnival barkers ooze their way through ever again. Resist and persist!!
8
@LTJ
Thanks. It may be time to switch my subscription to the WSJ.
1
With the constant promotion of diversity; you have culture that aims for quotas in every organization
Diversity over merit is not healthy.
48
Look around you. Where is all that diversity? Consider history. Truly. Just for a minute or two.
8
And yet white males still dominate most organisations to a statistically aberrant degree. Are they naturally superior? Or perhaps this system of judging people by "merit" is not quite as unbiased as you'd like to think.
Quotas would not be needed if hiring practices were fair. And we know hiring practices are not fair when white males are statistically over-represented.
7
@Renee, consider history. Yes, whites have traditionally been in charge in the US, but then again, they were the ones who turned the landmass into a successful modern country, one that is safer, healthier, more prosperous and with greater concern for human rights and the rights of minorities than any other society, past or present.
Their numerical dominance is largely the result of group merit.
That doesn’t mean that others should be kept out; just that they must live up to the same standards of intelligence and competence as their non-diverse peers. It is unjust to do otherwise.
11
We can't call this anxiety anymore - it's a hatred so cheap that it's a mere boost for petty egos, nothing more, nothing less.
10
This horrible turn in the outward expression of racism wouldn’t matter so much if the electoral college was not skewed so much toward rural America. It also will matter more now given that political parties can gerrymandering congressional districts with the approval of the Supreme Court. Politicians, mostly right-wing, are hungry for power and often don’t care about who they hurt.
8
His fear tactics don't work on this white voter. I embrace diversity and the richness of brings our culture, workplaces, social connections. Voting on unfounded fears got us to this place but it's time to vote it out.
7
The Republican party increasingly relies on racism, gerrymandering, and electoral college imbalances to win undemocratic elections.
We're veering dangerously close to a 21st century apartheid, where a racist minority of the country imposes its will on the rest of the nation. It scares me, and I'm a white man.
5
Not that surprising, sadly, as it's not so long since America left 20th century apartheid behind. American segregation was a direct inspiration to all the white racist movements of the 20th century.
1
If the crowd at the Greenville rally typify Trump voters, then it really is time to turn the keys over to newcomers.
5
I think for the "white" elite in our country to be honest they would have to face what their ancestors did to African Americans and Native American Indians and recognize that maybe one reason some of them are so ignorant and racist is because it allows them to avoid facing that truth. On some level - they hate those they have hurt the most. By hating and being angry - they avoid coming to terms with our American history and what has really happend here that allowed for many of them to have the privileges they have. The laws and rules and justice system needs to be fixed so that everyone has a fair shot of the American dream. You can't change peoples' attitudes and behavior over night but you can change the laws and enforce them so that everyone is treated fairly under the law and rules of the work place.
Trump, for example, would not have survived and become the evil person he is if it had not been for his vast inherited wealth to protect him from life's lessons that most of us learn growing up.
7
The article fails to mention that "white supremacy" has been embedded in the population since the slavery and the Colonialism days, in both the western and Asian mentality as well as in history lessons.
With Trump coming out in open and coining it in the sense of losing the control of "white nation", he wakes these people up and allows them to speak openly about it, and have them channel their fear into political activities.
This is a natural reaction for them as they saw U.S. elected the first non-white president in the history. Also, now it appears that in 2020 there could be a female or/and non-white presidential candidate for the Democrats.
All stars are aligned for a fight between a "white male" and "non-white, non-male" in 2020, unless Joe Biden comes out ahead in representing the Democrats, which I doubt.
2
“And yet, for all its size and all its wealth and all the “progress” it babbles of, it is almost as sterile, artistically, intellectually, culturally, as the Sahara Desert. There are single acres in Europe that house more first-rate men than all the states south of the Potomac; there are probably single square miles in America. If the whole of the late Confederacy were to be engulfed by a tidal wave tomorrow, the effect upon the civilized minority of men in the world would be but little greater than that of a flood on the Yang-tse-kiang. It would be impossible in all history to match so complete a drying-up of a civilization.”
H.L. Mencken writing on the American South in “The Sahara of the Bozart” in 1917.
True then, and still in much of its politics and racial fears still true today.
http://writing2.richmond.edu/jessid/eng423/restricted/mencken.pdf
5
In the WEST white people feel increasingly disowned and betrayed by politicians who have opened borders to milliond\s of muslim refugees without sparing one tiny thought about the social consequences of their negligent axctions. I refer to the German government. Now since 2015 they have 1.8 more mostly Muslim people of Arabic descent in the country and the problems show up everywhere. Be it that these people are mostly unemployed and depoendent on government and social security money. Regardless of their economic situation they continue to have at least 3, but sometimes 6 to 7 children to boost their entitlement money. Sexual assaults on young women have skyrocketed. Drug dealeers and other illegal actions do not lead to expulsion But the most frustrating issue in Germany is that people are afraid to voice their concerns publicly.And Merkel is still in power. People should be in the streets to demand her immediate departure. Europe has become the dumping ground for economic refugees and public safety is no longer assured.
Trump has recognised this anxiety among Whites and as long as he expells criminal refugees I strongly support this!
We should let only people in who can support themselvers. Any crime or violation of laws should lead to immediate expulsion. And having 6 children who have then to be funded by the government should not be allowed just to reestablish a sense of fairness among the White majority.
34
@Tom Baumeister
In 25 years Germany will be a Muslim majority country. Take a look at any school. Those children are the the future hope of Germany just as the brown children in US schools are the future of the US. After WW2 the white population worldwide was 22 percent. It is now 4 worldwide. In 25 years the Han Chinese and Japanese will exist as a identifiable type but not European whites to any significant degree and most minorities think that is a good thing. And I am a dark minority from a despised part of the world.
2
@Tom Baumeister...master of the bum....
the history of Germany is in stark contrast to your narrow vision and memory. History is indeed repeating itself......suffering of the middleclass is being plaqueted with hatred for minorities who contribute far more in taxes and ingeniuity than native born. Delusion and thievery are the results which have quilched higher thinkers of all races.....hitler lost this argument in spades !
1
@AS, if most minorities think that ridding the planet of whites is a good thing, then why do so many want to immigrate to white-run countries?
Also, think about the historical resumes of each group. The modern world, with its medicine, technology, and ideas of freedom and equality, not to mention the concept of foreign aid, was almost entirely created by white people. No other group has a resume that even comes close. The Far East Asians or high caste Indians might be able to step up to the plate and keep progress going. No other group has demonstrated the capability, either in America or in their homelands.
1
As is intended, Trump directs "white anxiety" towards minorities, rather than the real villains--the wealthy plutocrats, such as his Cabinet members, who are destroying the USA.
7
One of the sources in the piece expresses surprise at how fast the change to overt racism evolved among Trump's base.
It happened fast because it was always there!
Trump just lit the flame.
Racist attitudes are almost impossible to eradicate. We just have to hope they die out demographically over time without a complete conflagration.
I have hope in the younger generations.
4
“White anxiety”? Is that when a person is afraid that their insurance deductible is rising while Democrats are proposing to give illegal immigrants free insurance and pay fornitnout of middle class taxes? You could call that “black anxiety” too. In fact, why not just refer to it as “American anxiety.”
68
@XLER
Except my friend you don't see blacks screaming about immigrants, do you?
I bet you know why? Nah, you probably don't.
Maybe it's because they've been treated like immigrants in their own country for 400 years.
5
Deductibles are rising bc insurance companies are profiting.
Hypothetical: Is a country allowed to try to preserve its culture? How is it ok for Japan to want to remain Japanese but Americans are not allowed to want the country to stay the same? Every other country is allowed to preserve their identity. What if a person does not “hate” people of other races and loves traveling to other countries and experiencing foreign culture? Should all countries be forced to mix and let in poor foreigners at high rates or be called “xenophobic”? People have a right to want to live a certain way without being called racist even if it is provincial and antiquated.
91
Our identity is that we are a nation of immigrants, diverse, multicultural, and, in better times, evenhanded despite ethnic origin.
21
@Allright I have no doubt Native Americans felt the same way.
14
@Allright
How do you define American culture?
6
One can criticize but not ignore this inconvenient truth. That's the country we have and it won't change the next year. The candidates who talk about reparations, grants for housing to black families (like we don't have whites living in trailers), busing, decriminalizing unlawful entry, comprehensive health insurance for undocumented aliens (like we don't have millions of US citizens without affordable insurance) are doomed in 2020. IMO it will take a white man from (or connected to) mid-West to unseat Trump.
28
“...pointing to the cultural stigma in America against public expressions of anger by African-Americans and other minorities...”
What cultural stigma? The Black Lives Matter movement was an expression of black anger and it was highly praised by most media outlets. The Ferguson riots were explained and excused despite their destructiveness. Contemporary art and theater are filled with expressions of black (+ some Muslim and Hispanic) anger. There is no white counterpart. The closest is the white nationalists, who are a fringe group that talks to each other online and occasionally marches. They are loudly condemned by everyone.
29
@Z97
I agree. I’m not a fan of outrage on either side of the widening divide that has become a chronic feature of American discourse, but this article’s point about societal acceptance levels for white and black anger seems a gross distortion of reality.
8
Trump just let the Genie out of the bottle. He was always in there. Every now and then, he would poke is head out then retreat. He would see the Justice Spirit and went back into hiding. Trump put the Justice Spirit in the closet and locked the door. Then he ripped the cork off of the bottle and the Genie ran amuck.
We all knew that there was a strong racist component in America. Most of these people were disconnected from each other. Through the internet, cable TV, and social networking, they have all found each other. All they needed was a central figure to unite and focus their efforts. All they needed was official justification for their animosity. Trump gave them both.
Trump has skillfully used his media savvy and manipulative skills to harness this racial animosity and and rode it right into the White House, and without any concern for the damage done to this nation.
What I fear is that Trump will continue to fan the flames of these divisions long after he leaves office. Trump can make a fortune hosting rallies and speaking events all the while basking in the glory of the crowds' adulation.
I also fear that we may not be able to get the Genie back in the bottle. Just as the Civil War didn't change attitudes for nearly a century, we may be stuck with this one for another.
8
Napolean was sent into exile, first to an island Elba off Tuscany.
After his escape and after Waterloo, he was sent to a different island, Saint Helena off the coast of Africa.
I am thinking this would be a good place for our ex-President when he achieves that status, if the good folks there would allow it.
3
@Richard
Guantanamo is far more fitting for a traitor like trump!
1
Right now, today the population demographics of the United States is approximately 84% Caucasian, 11% Black and the remaining 5% all other races.
This is based on history. We can't change that.
(btw, the mexican-Americans in the country are Caucasian. Spain killed off the majority of indigenous people thru murder, disease or military campaigns. Spain is a European Caucasian country that settle mexico.)
So what are we supposed to be guilty of?
10
Excellent summary of the symbiotic relationship between a demagogue like Mr Trump and the tribal grievances of white people. Yes, white tribes do mirror how minorities have long thought about group identity. Yes, white tribes have views of minority value systems that do not correlate well with how minorities see their value systems. Oh by the way, the same is true in reverse.
The most salient point is that we now live in an era where the politicians have raised the tribal race baiting to levels not seen since the early 1960s. That is really all on the republicans, their saint Reagan, their clown prince Trump, their propagandists and their apologists.
Maybe not all. Maybe 70% or 80%.
Just maybe the incessant cacophony of noise that all whites suffer from privilege, are unconsciously racist at best might have something to do with it. Oh, and maybe linking that to political demands for reparations and to closing down ICE etc might have something to do with it. Oh, and maybe mandating that poor African American kids who cannot get a useful education because of the dysfunctional culture that surrounds them might.
There is zero question that Trump and his fellow republican travelers deserve most of the blame for the state we're in.
There is also zero question that white tribes do not respect the value systems of poor urban black folk as described by the pertinent data.
Lying about either leaves it to the individual to come to his or her own tribal conclusion
6
I’m nominally a white male, but I have never considered myself to have a “white identity”. I’m an individual. I’ve always considered a racial or ethnic identity to be a refuge for the weak.
I understand better minority identity because they have been reminded through policies and behaviors of the majority culture that they are considered inferior or underserving.
Donald Trump is just the most brazen of the Republicans who have appealed obliquely to this white racial identity for decades. It’s an ugly picture and has probably shocked many middle class people who would like to believe we are in a post-racial era.
Today’s Republican Party is the 21st century version of plantation owners who appealed to the “whiteness” of their working class white neighbors by elevating the above their slaves.
Democrats should give up on most Trump supporters. They are stuck in a time warp and what it would take to get their support would be unacceptable to the overwhelming majority of their voters. They should focus on turnout of their voters and on reducing the power of the federal government to take blue state money to finance this fascist enterprise that Trump and his ilk are constructing.
6
Everyone understood this racist dynamic back when Hillary Clinton was talking about "deplorables". But the reluctance of "leaders" and the media to confront racism head on meant that, at best, we talked about "having a national conversation about race" every February. And the "smart" people in charge of the Democratic Party have been saying "don't make Trump the issue, focus on health care."
We need to confront this head on. For instance -- we need to say to Asians -- "Do you really think that you're immune? Do you think Trump won't scapegoat China if the economy goes south -- and that chants of "send them back" won't be directed at Asian Americans? And we have to ask Jewish Americans, "When you said 'never again' did you mean it? Because Jews know better than anyone how quickly racist demagoguery can go from national embarrassment to disaster."
Pretending this will go away if we ignore it won't work. And while there is no guarantee we'll succeed, not trying means things will keep getting worse.
2
I am exhausted since this malignant sociopath took office.
Yes, all he is doing is exploiting unrest and bias that was already there. And nobody with a brain would ever suggest that racism is not insidious and not a reality. (I used to thinkk we were making progress)
But unlike what white man John McCain famously did at his campaign event - when some ignorant racist accused Obama of being a terriorist - he called her out directly and threw water on the fire- this malignant POTUS throw gasoline onthe fire - over and over. And over.
He could have used the power of the sacred office over the last 2 1/2 years to help bridge and build.
Instead he has chosen to divide and enflame.
The collective "whiteness" of millions can maybe be blamed for many things, but not for the clear, repulsive and sick dereliction of duty of one horribly unhinged and hateful man.
6
A question not addressed at all is what role are Facebook and Google playing in supporting Steven Miller’s futility of evil campaign against Central American refugees? And, why is the press giving Steven Miller a pass? Isn’t this complicity according to the Nuremberg trials?
3
Gaslighting is a common autocratic leadership style practiced by abusers, dictators, narcissists, & cult leaders. The term comes from the movie “Gaslight” (1944).
Donald Trump has always been a gaslighter:
1. He lies blatantly. We are unsure if anything he says is true.
2. He denies his actions, even when video proof is shown. The more he lies & denies, the more we question reality.
3. He appeals to fear, attacking the foundation of our being.
4. He wears us down over time. He lies constantly & Fox News & his WH sycophants echo his lies.
5. His actions never match his words. Deflection is his forte. His words are meaningless diversions.
6. He uses positive reinforcement to confuse us, to keep us with a sense of uneasiness.
7. He sows confusion, to weaken us. He uproots & make us constantly question everything.
8. He projects his faults on us. He believes this distracts from his own wretched, disturbing behavior.
9. He aligns others against his detractors. He is a master manipulator. He is pathological liar who needs mob rule.
10. He is dismissive. He attacks our sanity or patriotism, so others will not believe us when we tell them that he is abusive & out-of-control.
11. He cries “false news”. By screaming that everyone else is a liar, it again makes us question our reality. It's his technique.
The more we are aware of Trump’s techniques, the quicker we can identify them & avoid falling into his trap.
7
Stop calling these bigots anxious and fearful, they are hateful and proud of it. True, Trump gives them license to spread their philosophy but, as Michelle Goldberg pointed out in her recent Op-Ed about conservative firebrands who use Jewish people as human shields by decrying antisemitism, so too do these people use their emotional handicaps as cover for their virulent racism.
5
It used to be, if you did something racist or said something racist, you were a racist. Not any more. No, the woke definition of what is a racist has changed. Now, to be white is to be racist. Just BEING white is racist. White people are guilty of "white privilege" and are all racists. THAT is a new definition of racism. Yes, white people recognize that the definition of racism has changed. So do others. A racist is now not only someone who does something racist, or says something racist. It is enough to be white, and that makes one a racist. White people are beginning to understand that this is the new definition. The author either totally misunderstands today's woke definition of racism, or chooses to obscure what is happening through blaming whites for being "sensitive" about their own racism. White people, so it says, are racist because they are guilty of fearing to lose their status. Yes - another article attacking white people for being white. Well - No race is racist by itself. Articles like this one encourage racism. I used to ask my students - "close your eyes and imagine an American. Now, open them. OK, what color was she?" The correct answer was that that "American," the imaginary American, was any race, gender, any kind. That is who we are. A new nation. A nation of people of all kinds. We are one. E pluribus unum. Get that? ONE people .
34
@Francis Walsingham
I disagree with your concept that being white makes one a racist. I don't know where you're getting your allegedly "woke" ideas but please consider the possibility that there are diverse views on the subject.
I'm considered white and I don't feel personally attacked as racist when racism is being criticized. Racism is wrong. If you're sensitive about being accused of racism, or feel guilty about it, that's your personal issue. That's separate from the general idea of racism being wrong.
5
@sfdphd Of course, you misunderstood. I did not say that being white makes one a racist, but that others are saying that and it is wrong. Please reread.
8
No, you misunderstood. No one is saying this.
Threaten American customs and values? Is this a joke? Let us leave aside the fact that all people in the Western Hemisphere are “Americans” and that the United States has stolen the appellation. The strength of this nation has always been its pluralism, people of all races, ethnicities and religions arriving to enrich our polity. Just look at our diversity of meal choices alone.
I grew up in Northern California coming of age in 1968. You can guess how I view traditional customs and values. They just do not exist. Here is the truth. The resistant white voters profiled here are virulently fundamentalist so-called Christians. I personally do not care what nonsense and superstitions they choose to embrace. I care a lot about them trying to force their views on everybody else. So Here is my message to these flaming hypocrites. You can be a decent and moral Christian or you can be a supporter of Donald Trump. You cannot be both.
7
One thing for sure --
people vote with their feet.
And their feet bring them to the USA --
in overwhelming numbers,
from all over the world.
Yes, to white-run USA.
And the only serious alternatives to white-run USA
are white-run Europe, Canada and ANZ.
Asians and Africans are not crashing the gates to get into Latin America
--even though many of the 20 or so Latin American countries have just as much land and natural resources as the USA.
Nor are Asians crashing the gates to get into Africa.
And Africans are not crashing the gates to get into Asia.
And Latin Americans are not crashing the gates to get into Asia or Africa.
What they all want is a white-run country.
So, when the USA tips non-white,
it will be interesting to see what happens to
world-wide "migration" patterns.
So, whites need to keep their cool.
The cream always rises to the top.
15
@sam finn
As a dark skinned immigrant from a despised country I can say that we migrate wanting to be away from cultural diversity and to be in a land that looks like what we have seen in the movies from the 50s and the 60s. In a way Donald Trump with his coterie of gorgeous blondes is what struggling immigrants see as a role model.....not Bernie Sanders or Eliz. Warren. After spending 20 years riding in an oxcart a Mercedes riding on streets of gold is the goal. Cultural diversity is something New York Times readers may want to see but sure would not want to live in it.
6
No rain in Central America, North Africa and Syria. These people are fleeing catastrophic climate change and the conflicts it engenders as much as anything else. It is only natural that they would try to come to more temperate areas. The last thing they are worried about is skin color.
2
Non-Hispanic whites number a little under 1 billion globally, about 15% of the global population. It is only natural that North America, which belongs to all the human population, should have 15% whites. It is bound to happen, sooner rather than later.
2
@Indian Diner, why does North America belong to all the human population? Do all places belong to everyone? Or just North America? Should India have 15% white population and very large percentages of Chinese and Africans too? Or does India belong to Indians?
6
@Indian Diner
Pretty remarkable that 15% of the global population created the only nations that are actually successful and peaceful - and are the only ones that everyone wants to emigrate to....
3
@Indian Diner wrote: "It is only natural that North America, which belongs to all the human population, should have 15% whites."
If that is the outlook of the human population, that would go a long way towards explaining the disappointment of foreigners when the US finally started screening H-1B visa applicants for actual talent.
3
I am a 75 year old male, Caucasian. I see Donald Trump as a superb salesperson but I am not buying (never have and never will) what he is selling. Fear. I worked in New York City in the early 80s and got to know him (well, his type) well. It did not surprise me to learn that, in the election of 2016, 89% of his neighbors (Queens, Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn) voted for 'other'. After all, who knew him better? Sad. The gullibility of the electorate never ceases to amaze me. For the record, I voted for Bush '41 and Bob Dole. Not so much because I liked their policies but because they were running against a draft dodger. As a Viet Nam veteran, that was a non-starter for me. There were many other reasons to choose 'other than' but that was enough.
8
No comments are showing at this article seen at 14:13 GMT in Linkköping, Sweden by a dual citizen - USA SE - who has lived in a country fro 23 years where much more care is taken in the use of terms having to do with human difference and attitudes and behaviors concerned with human difference.
That preface to provide context for discussion of these three words as used by American columnists and Times readers:
White: throughout this column it is evident that white does not at all refer to all people listed as belonging to the US Census Bureau's so-called white "race" but only to a subset most easily identifed, I believe, by adding Christian as in White Christians. At The Guardian writers make this distinction but not here. The USCB white "race" includes all Americans with lines of descent traceable to the Middle East and North Africa. These Americans are mostly Muslims and abhorred by the President.
"racial" as in conservative racial views: The issue always concerns racism, not racial views, so why not say so. Racism is discrimination based on any one of a number of factors - religion, nativity, skin color, cultural practice.
The president rarely if ever says he is opposed to someone because that person belongs to "race" x but he makes clear that nativity and religion especially are key roots to his racist remarks.
It is the rising salience of racism that matters, not of "race".
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
Citizen US SE
12
@Larry Lundgren
"The president rarely if ever says he is opposed to someone because that person belongs to "race""
beg to differ w the facts: donny and father guilty , twice, of refusing black apt applicants access to apartments https://www.politico.com/blogs/under-the-radar/2017/02/trump-fbi-files-discrimination-case-235067; trump telling his executives he doesn't want black counting his money he wants short white men in yamakas " The only kind of people I want counting my money are short guys wearing yarmulkes. ... And it's probably not his fault because laziness is a trait in blacks." ; he telling NBC he is concerned if a black man (allegedly he used the N word) to win the apprentice Pinkett told a reporter for The New Yorker: "The only conclusion I can draw is that he [Trump] didn’t want to see a black man be the sole winner of his show."[8]- my fingers are aching so i won't go on.
https://www.vox.com/2016/7/25/12270880/donald-trump-racist-racism-history
2
How am I missing this - that minorities are consuming all of the assistance, handouts, outstretched hands, job opportunities and leaving white people to some miserable existence as a shunned and maligned tribe of innocents? The statistic don't support this. In those regions of the country where white anxiety is most pronounced you'll find the highest rates of white poverty and government assistance as well as substance abuse. They don't look at Republican policies that place the satisfaction of the wealthy over the security of the less-well-to-do, they don't see that the so-called level playing field is run by corrupt referees and that the pressures of the world go in cycles organized by those in power. Perhaps it's human nature to blame the "other" for their woes but the racism that seems to have been bred into these Americans has always been a form of intellectual laziness - encouraged by a rich, right-wing elite - all brought to a boil now by a master of manipulation. (Note that those in the past with this mastery have largely been demagogues whose histories ended badly.) The rot of institutionalized racism has made a healthy society unimaginable and so long as cult figures like Trump (or anybody else with money and power) can stampede the crowds. safe in their packs, we're unlikely to see the change necessary to bring about justice and liberty for those whites who feel left out in the rain, let alone the rest of us.
106
@JDStebley Yes, I totally agree. The disenfranchised whites are failing to recognize who has the power to change their lives. Certainly not the immigrants whites aspire to the bottom of the barrel.
4
@me, Perhaps. But they are disproportionately in red states that take in more federal dollars than are returned to the fed. In other words, our taxes. I believe in providing for the general welfare. They do not and so much of their fury over immigrants and others of color is springs from inherently racist hostility, not on any proven loss of face or opportunity or demonstrable favoritism towards the other. Most economic realities they face are simply from failed economic policies, those of Republican admins.
5
@JDStebley. Thank you. Economic insecurity is due to rise of the billionaire class in the US. The wealth gap is the culprit. But the GOP keeps giving away the store to the wealth while telling the poor that it is the fault of the minorities and the immigrants.
“To me, the mystery is the speed with which what seemed to be a set of well-established norms crumbled,”. Why is this a mystery? After the Civil war over time the Republican party became the party of the conservative establishment. They were able to stay in power until they blundered the country into the depression. They then became the minority plutocrat party and would have remains so except for the fallout from the Vietnam war and Nixon’s realization that he could win by exploiting racism in the south. Ever since then the Republican party has used appeals to racism, misogyny and religious extremism to win elections. Trump has simply taken it to the next level. The rest of the Republican party has gone along with his xenophobia not only because they are afraid of Trump’s wrath but because they know the party will go back to permanent minority status if they don’t. There are really very few people who believe that billionaires should get huge tax cuts and that the government should not guarantee access to health care. If the Republicans maintain this strategy they will have to continue to destroy our democracy to stay in power to overcome the ongoing demographic shift that will otherwise overwhelm them. We are now in a race against time to see which side wins. Ironically, if Trump, the brilliant exploiter of hate and white supremacy, were not so erratic and needy democracy would already have lost. In the end his narcissism may be what defeats him and saves our democracy.
28
@JSEvery Republican President since Nixon has employed a racist strategy to capture the White House. Lee Atwater was the doyen of Republican racism and St. Regan and his epigones have faithfully followed his strategies while asserting they were color blind. Trump has simply made explicit what was cloaked in the cloth of American exceptionalism and benign internationalism capitalism. The "black" cat has been let out the the Republican bag of political tricks. How long they can successfully continue to employ it, undisguised, in future elections remains elections remains to be seen.
3
Democrats started identity politics and it has now come back to bite them.
The immanent question now is, to get rid of Trump and start the decline of Trumpism, will they choose a candidate who also eschews this poisonous view of the world?
63
@joel bergsman. When did Democrats start identity politics? And what is a poisonous view?
6
@joel bergsman. You call it identity politics. A more balanced description would be policies that give everyone including women and persons of color a fair shake. It is that which the president’s supporters object to. In their own words, they want him to hurt the people he is supposed to hurt.
9
@joel bergsman this must be a favorite Fox talking point. I've seen it over and over again. And it's spelled imminent.
1
There's no mystery here. The Republican party is without principal and will opportunistically adopt whatever position installs or keeps them in power. Now they see that Trump and racism serves them, so that's where they're at today. Their raison d'être is serving the rich, period.
93
Given Trump's heritage, is anyone surprised. Germany went through this same convulsion in the late 19th into the 20th century.
12
Ha! Mr Trump is a New Yorker, through-and-through.
4
@Cassiopeia
I want to know if Fred Trump was an admirer of Hitler. His son sure seemed to be, only more like Mussolini.
1
This kind of reminds me of the first child getting angry that the parents chide him for not letting his little sister go first on the amusement ride. As an adult, you would see the wisdom of that, but as a child you become petulant, you were the fist born after all. What kind of maturity does it take to smile, back off and say "Sis, your next, let me help you"? But we are all adults. So if a T appeals to some lower motive, that has been lurking in the background of your psyche, a visceral feeling, what do you do? what do the rest of us do as the guide of our behavior? And is this racism or fear of loss of privilege and position, insecurity?
I read comments to articles about "bad T" and there are many vindictive, and angry comments about those bad people who voted T. I suspect that as correct as we believe we are, it is our culture that must reign in this behavior, and is is still there too. Perhaps (29% want a white history month?!?, they really didn't pay attention in class!) some sort of mirror to show how hateful some of this is, but we should not stoke it with complete rejection. "Honey, your sister is smaller than you and you will get your turn, don't worry, you're a good boy".
7
This article legitimizes and foretells the rising division of this nation, once again. There is no end to this tale; whether political or not. The United States of America will never be the same and the irony is that male minority rule, as evidenced by red states, is everyone's shared future. We will all descend to the stricken and diseased status of Mississippi and Arkansas and stay there for the next century; turning a blind eye to poverty, injustice, and corruption. As long as Emily and Nate capture the twisted thoughts of our neighbors and leaders, we will also begin to accept the futility of countering political initiatives. No one cares, and worship of an all white, male cult is much easier than solving problems. Pointing blame at all people of color, enriches the 1% but feels good. Like lynching; caging toddlers, red-lining, and criminalizing black and brown bodies; this unleashed sadistic, group eroticism intoxicates Trump voters, and the entire Republican Party. Cruel power is extremely effective and will dominate the next four years.
17
@purpledot
No, we won’t. This too shall be overcome.
The real fallout of the current whiteness backlash will be the realization by progressives and liberals that the federal government must be substantially reduced in power and federal revenue must be reduced and returned to taxpayers to support state governments.
The structure of the US federal system is being abused to make the majority pay for their own subjugation. That can’t last. We may not be able to reverse the policy degradation, but we can put much of its power out of business and govern ourselves at the state level. That involves using our “minority” status to block their agenda.
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@Jazz Paw
Are you suggesting we return to the Articles of Confederation? Because that didn’t work the first time we tried it and it sure as heck isn’t going to work now.
3
I feel like I am witnessing a continual daily and never ending destruction of a Country I once felt very pride of. These times feel truly surreal...like is this really happening in 2019?...Oh, how we have sunk to the lowest levels of civil discourse and engagement.
I miss the Presidencies of past that led by always elevating the masses with civility. Employing measured and well thought out responses to crises that encouraged peace and a coming together of ALL peoples to collectively heal our Nation. Now we have a divide and conquer hate fueling Maniac at the helm and our children are witnessing the vile words of a complete BULLY in the schoolyard of America...Sad! Please VOTE this HATRED out of office!!
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@Maggie
When Trump says "many people" as he is doing, he is referring to the pundits at Fox. He wants their approval beyond that of his party. It would be interesting to hear what the other "squad" - Hannity, Ingraham, Carlson, Judge Jeannine, and the rest - said after he claimed to have not liked the chanting. I bet they jumped on him.
I think Trump's view of the Republican Party is like that of Groucho Marx. He has no respect for a club that would have him for a member.
Our country is run by a criminal gang at the direction of a media outlet. We elected none of them.
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Pardon the Harry Potter analogy, but they remind me of a bunch of Slytherins yelling "pure blood," demanding that admission be determined by family and status rather than talent.
11
@M.
Umm M., I'm confused; which side are you on?
Nailed it. Perfectly explains why Trump continues to fan the flames of racial/ethnic and religious hatred.
13
I have white anxiety....about all the white people that believe the evil that Trump promulgates. I worry not only about the environment -- big time -- but about a country that countenances Trumpism.
218
@TR
Trump rants at his rallies are fascist dogma. His views are racist, misogynist, elitist, sexist and based on lies. That is the Republican party in 2019. The cameras should do close ups at his rallies and his weekends playing golf at the taxpayers expense at all his fancy golf clubs. The tab on these jaunts must be close to a million dollars by now. He has no shame, no conscience, no humility, no compassion, and no empathy. He is in it for his personal aggrandizement, personal enrichment, and personal power.
11
exactly
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Let's call white anxiety what it is--fear and delusion. Every politician wants to tell black Americans what is wrong with them. No one wants to get real with white Americans. White fragility is real and it is destroying us. It's not helpful to be constantly lied to and told you can get by through blaming others.
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@kim, you say white fragility is destroying us. I assume by white fragility, you mean the tendency of white people to get defensive when charged with being “racist from birth”. How exactly is that doing damage to the nation?
Perhaps the damage is actually being done by people who take a word for deliberately mistreating others on account of their race, actions we have all been successfully trained to abhor and avoid, and change it to mean someone who was born white. They then accuse white people of “being racist”, something we’ve all been taught is horrible, and, when the white person defends themselves against this untrue charge, they’re told they’re being fragile and proving their own racism. Maybe it’s those people who helped elect Trump. Maybe the fear isn’t of minorities but of the Maoist left.
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This article really hits the nail on the head.
Fear,fear of change, difference, assimilation, and of loosing an established way of life.
Trump stokes these feelings, the Old Alamo mentality. What i love about Zombie horror entertainment ex (Walking Dead) fascination is there is No descrimination once your bit. And you can pass on your in discriminatory Love to your fellow ma with a simple bite of your own.n
4
Four minority congresswomen were elected by their districts. That should never be forgotten. Instead, it should be respected.
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@pointofdiscovery
AOC amassed the votes of 9 percent of registered Democrats in our newly half Hispanic district. That’s not a typo - 9 percent.
1
I always appreciate pieces like this, putting context to what I had already imagined. Trump uses white fear to attract emotionally dependent voters. Die hard Trump supporters don’t care about policy or economic growth, only vapid promises and boisterous personality. It’s incredibly depressing.
11
I've never understood the tendency of the "Manly-Man" to claim the title of victim.
Our nation is based on a set of ideals, not on geography or some origin story of a particular people from the same gene-pool. Americans serving this nation only pledge loyalty to the constitution and it is that document that makes you American.
Of course, we don't really teach American history with all of the details that show that some of our ideals come from other cultures or that the people who were integral portions of the nation were not from European genetic stock. We don't look at the atrocities that our forebears committed either. We present a bland idea that our nation is great only because of the melanin-deficient people and their grand ideas.
We claim ownership of this nation while a large proportion of our native-born (and melanin-deficient) children cannot pass the citizenship test given to those becoming naturalized citizens.
But, the melanin-deficient claim both to be the robust leaders and pathetic victims of those who have more melanin than they do. Eugenics is just so easy - all our problems are them, never us.
8
“We don't look at the atrocities that our forebears committed either. “
I suspect you went to school a long time ago. For the past 30 or so years, the whole focus has been on bad things white people did - slavery, Trail of Tears, WWII internment - even the industrial revolution, the inventions which raised our standard of living so far, is presented beside child labor and slums, with the emphasis being on the latter, not the former. Nothing is written about the founders without them being ritually condemned as slaveholders.
So, history and literature in education have changed dramatically since you were young. Many young people grow up believing that the US is a bad country rather than understanding that it has a cleaner, more self-correcting history than most.
14
I'm begging The New York Times to please do a story on Trump's background polling, focus group efforts, etc. There's gott to be an incredible trove of insight there, as Trump is clearly not doing this just because he's a political genius. Everything he says has to be poll- and focus-group tested. Who's doing it? Please get the story and let us know!
10
@JTS wrote: "I'm begging The New York Times to please do a story on Trump's background polling, focus group efforts, etc."
For months, I have been begging the New York Times to cease doing any stories about Trump. It's like watching a dog chase its tail, day in, day out.
This article is incorrectly titled, it shouldn't be "White Anxiety, and a President Ready to Address It" but rather "White Anxiety, and a President Ready to Exploit It".
Trump doesn't want to mitigate or correct the things that might make white Americans believe they are losing some valued position in society. He doesn't want to improve the quality of life for all Americans. No, he wants to exploit the differences and animosities that have always existed. He wants to magnify them. He wants to turn suspicion and hatred into a political tool so he can retain power.
It is depressing to think of how many Americans have completely bought into his demagoguery. How many think that he has even a passing concern for their wellbeing. That he actually cares about anything other than himself.
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To the degree this article is right, and it certainly partially is, it shows the awful direction the country is going: a worsening, undeclared civil war. I wish I knew the solution, but see only a few parts of it. The standard responses should be continued, but they all have limits, at least as practiced. These include diversity, fairness, finding merit, but with more use of: "We have more in common than what we differ on." But we need more recognition of nuance, including distinguishing for which issues and parts of issues it exists, and where it doesn't (i.e. where things really are black-&-white). This can be hard to do as under most circumstances our nuance-detectors aren't easily activated. For instance, whatever you think of abortion, you have an op-ed today by the former head of Planned Parenthood arguing that most people hold a nuanced view. She decided to focus on that. Doesn't mean she doesn't see black-&-white elements. Similarly, the implicit assumption of this article is that anxious white people are both racist (and certainly some are) and have no other reasons for their complaints. Say you beat them politically in the next Presidential race. It doesn't make the deeper problems of a torn nation go away. We saw that when Obama was elected. Continuing the nuance theme, one aspect of Biden's message makes sense, even if it rubs some the wrong way, and it's not clear how: try to connect with Republicans. I wish other candidates would swallow hard and pick up on it.
8
@Matt Polsky
I'm afraid that ship has sailed. Obama tried to "reach across the aisle" and was told to go pound sand. The only Republicans willing to compromise these days are those about to retire. All the rest are too afraid of being primaried from the right.
5
The way Republicans have evolved so rapidly isn't the only surprise in our recent political landscape. It feels like everything about American politics is dramatically different today from what it was just 5 or 10 years ago.
Then the left/right split was defined as support for workers' interests vs. support for business interests. Now it exclusively seems to be about diverting resources to minorities (including illegal aliens) vs. consolidating as much wealth as possible in the hands of the uppermost 10%. And anyone who tries to point out that both sides ignore the interests of over half the population is dismissed as a white supremacist! (And yes, Times, I'm looking right at you.)
No! We can be progressive about health care, housing, taxes, and business regulation, and that will help minorities, too. But we can't be progressive just by helping minorities because that doesn't help anyone else.
Democrats, you're going to carry AOC's district even if you never campaign there. But you won't win Wisconsin and Pennsylvania without campaigning in them, and you won't win the election without Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.
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@Green Tea thank you for articulating this! Precisely! The elites keep the focus on ethnic based solutions so CLASS is never addressed.
9
@Green Tea
Exactly. It's about class and that crosses racial and cultural boundaries.
The Alt right and activist left are completely bonkers
2
“polls show that a substantial number of white voters believe they face discrimination. They appear to be concerned that employers and schools may give preference to nonwhite candidates.”
Fact: Many employers and most schools DO give preference to non-white candidates. It’s called “affirmative action” and is intended to get all environments to be “diverse”. Since white applicants generally tend to have higher test scores (for schools and many jobs), it requires active discrimination against more competent whites to get the numbers “right”. So yes, discrimination against whites in hiring and education is not a belief, it’s a fact. You may argue that this discrimination is righteous because it is designed to right historical wrongs, but it is nonetheless discrimination.
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@Z97. If it was true, no whites would be admitted or hired which is clearly not true.
11
@Z97 That's not discrimination. Discrimination would be saying "We will only accept a maximum of 5% white students at our school, because white students are inferior to students of other colors."
I imagine that you also think it's "discrimination" that we don't have a White History Month too, right? As if EVERY month isn't White History Month.
16
@Z97: You may call it discrimination a but it's also called evening out the playing field which was do heavily tilted to whites. Maybe you need to.look at this from those that could never breakthrough to the other side due to skin color, and yes, sex.
13
It should be obvious to everyone by now that that the most important issues to voters in the red states, who effectively control who wins in 2020, are cultural and not policy driven. People form beliefs emotionally then try and justify them with logic. It is no coincidence that Trump's base consists of less educated white males. The same white males who in polls honestly believe that the biggest discrimination problem in the US is discrimination against white males. The media (as opposed to conservative trolls) is made up of intelligent, highly educated, generally well off individuals who live in well off coastal blue states. Many of whom literally do not know any Trump supporters. They have excelled their entire life educationally and in business, where things like facts and logic are valued. They don't understand and can't believe that hypocrisy,, facts or logic have no influence on or value to the Trump supporters. The Art of War says that every battle is won or lost before it is even fought. And the Democrats have already lost the 2020 election. Most all people look at any situation and say, quite logically, what's in it for me. The Democrats main focus in their debates on helping immigrants, reparations, trans rights, free student loans, etc do not speak to most voters and will guarantee failure in 2020. Democrats need to understand that the choice is between being "right" or winning. And until they value winning over "purity" are destined to lose in 2020.
53
Great article. This issue is why Trump got elected. Democrats need a very smart counter-strategy or this same issue is going to get Trump re-elected next year.
9
Thank you for a thought provoking article. I've been a voter for many years, savoring the experience of voting for George McGovern when I lived in Massachusetts. It was also a time when racist candidates like George Wallace preyed on the fears of white voters.
As a candidate, Mr. Trump was very perceptive of a cultural change underway, which is outlined in this article. He made the most of it. He ridiculed his Republican opposition and intimidated Ms. Clinton on his path to victory.
As a white person, I voted for Mr. Obama twice and did not regret it. I work with a racially diverse population and I am familiar with the opinions of both the far left and the far right.
I will vote this time for whomever the Democratic party nominates. I'm pretty independent in my political choices, but I've not been this convinced to vote for someone since 1972, when I voted for McGovern. At the time, I felt that Mr. Nixon was a horrible president and a dishonest person.
I feel the same way about our current president. It's a toss up about who's worse. I'm afraid that Mr. Trump will somehow pull out another electoral college anomaly and we just can't let him have a second term. He does not deserve the opportunity to continue to be our nation's leader.
I'll do my part to help Pennsylvania go Democratic for the next presidential election!
19
@DB
Fanatical focus on identity politics made my Democrats so repellant that voters preferred a psychopath. Nowadays, it’s even worse.
Can open borders, sanctuary cities Democrats be properly labeled anti-American? Is putting the welfare of alien lawbreakers above that of fellow Americans anti-American?
Not two minutes after extolling sanctuary cities my fellow Democrats will be lecturing us over President Caligula’s failure to adhere to the rule of law.
I question the premise that Americans think the U.S. is great as it is and has been. There was euphoria after WW2 and the prosperity that it ushered in during the 1950's. But racism has existed since the Constitution and more or less right up to the present. Poverty has always been an issue as we put our taxes into moon shots and weapons and tax cuts disproportionately to health care and education for our citizens. Financial corruption has always been with us and our representatives because money buys politicians and votes. We call ourselves a democracy but we are a republic and states with tiny populations have disproportionate amounts of influence as to corporations and plutocrats. There is no doubt that capitalism has produced wealth which can be taxed for the greater good but greed trumps good deeds most of the time in today's day and age. My observations of social welfare in the U.S. has been mostly good: interstate highways; fire departments; defense; social security; ssi; medicare; medicaid; public schools etc but few of the haves want to contribute much if anything to the have nots or the have less. And social welfare is needed but fraud must be rooted out and I don't see the government doing enough to vet those who take advantage.
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@R. Anderson Amen.
4