Andrew Golis

John Skrentny at Cafe.

Fallacy of Racial Continuity:

This is the idea that because races–or what Americans call races–exist unceasingly over time, then the injustices that one race can be said to commit or have committed against another in the past can be attributed to the component individuals who make up that race today. This is the basis of an idea that lies behind much race conversation in America: whites dominated, exploited and committed atrocities against nonwhites, especially blacks, and thus owe reparations, affirmative action, or some other compensation.

Advocates for justice for African Americans see a lot of sense in racial continuity arguments because so much of black inequality, as Ta-Nehisi points out here and Glenn has written about extensively, is the result of accumulated disadvantage with origins far back in history. But Obama pointed out that as a rhetorical strategy, or moral argumentation, emphasizing racial continuity does not work because whites are very sensitive to the Fallacy of Racial Continuity: because whiteness existed does not mean that today’s whites existed when the worst oppression or crimes were carried out. First, there is the simple matter of generations: no whites today were alive during slavery and those alive during Jim Crow are passing on. Second is the matter of immigration: millions of whites came to America after slavery ended and, as Obama noted, have their own narrative of overcoming oppression. A final factor–and one that Obama seemed to gloss over– is that many of the current injustices that blacks or other nonwhites face, and the ways whites now benefit from past injustices, are simply invisible to whites.

Fallacy of the Racist Mind:

This is the idea that everyone falls into two categories–either non-racist or racist–and the latter minds are either ill or incorrigibly evil or both. Racism in this view is thus the defining and all-consuming quality of the afflicted Racist Mind, and good people never say racist things.

Obama’s first striking move here was to not run from Reverend Wright while screaming that Wright is a racist. Instead, Obama endeavored to make White America understand where Wright and other blacks who think like him are coming from. He did not justify Wright’s outrageous comments, and he specifically stated that they represented a tragically wrong path. Wright’s comments were wrong, Obama explained, but they were not the product of a racist mind. They were wrong, but these comments could be put in an historical context, and Obama, speaking as an African American, explained how a history of racial injustice could make Wright say the things he did. As other commentators have noted, Obama humanized Wright rather than demonized him.

Most remarkably, Obama then spoke as a white man. He reminded whites that they have loved ones to whom they extend a moral generosity and acceptance because, as with Wright, there is far more to these individuals than some racist comments they might make. His arguments were powerful because Obama the white man could then talk about his beloved white grandmother. Obama could convincingly invoke the Fallacy of the Racist Mind because he is black and white, and he knows that both blacks and whites everyday forgive family and friends for racist words just as we forgive each other for other hurtful words or wrongs that we might commit.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 31st, 2008 at 6:33 pm and is filed under politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.