I have a theory as to why we are trapped in this repetition compulsion or Groundhog Day of racial trauma, and why it is so difficult to achieve legitimately transformative advancement. It’s actually kind of simple.
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I think some middle- and working-class whites are caught in a sort of double bind: they have become accustomed to thinking of themselves as “white,” which in the United States (and through much of Western civilization) has come to signify accomplishment, power, and most of all, superiority. And for a certain segment of whites in America and the western hemisphere, that is certainly true.
For less accomplished, impoverished, or disenfranchised whites, it must be a terrible psychic burden to carry mental expectations of, shall we say, supremacy while not in any fashion being able to experience its material or experiential dividends. For me, this is a significant portion of the energy driving the phenomenon now known as Trumpism.
If you believe that your natural patrimony is to be economically on top and you are not, someone must have robbed you of your birthright. Who could that be?
Part of the diabolical magic of Donald Trump is his ability to assure a crucial portion of the white community that they have in fact been robbed of their patrimony—their just deserts, economic and cultural—by Blacks, by Mexicans, by Muslims, by gay and transgender people. It has been his genius to articulate, with brutal simplicity, what has been assumed for decades, if not centuries, if not since the beginning of European settlement and Manifest Destiny: We are destined to achieve our city on a hill and to be recognized for our moral election and material power.
Part of the diabolical magic of Donald Trump is his ability to assure a crucial portion of the white community that they have in fact been robbed of their patrimony.
But someone has interrupted that reign for whites who do not find themselves living atop that hill, and Trump, like Hitler, offers them scapegoats with force and entertainment. He’s allegedly a tough guy but also a hoot—a bankrupted charlatan turned reality TV star.
Finally, I also think a certain number of whites are acting from fear. To put it simply, they see the demographic numbers changing and worry about being outnumbered and overpowered—at the ballot box, in their neighborhoods and workplaces, in society at large.
Also, I think in their darkest imaginations they are aware of how people of color, Blacks especially, have been treated throughout history and up to this very moment, and they worry that they will be treated in the same detrimental ways that they have treated (and often still want to treat) Blacks.
They see themselves in an existential conflict and view those of us who still value Dr. King’s vision as mortal threats either consciously (as in white nationalists and white supremacists) or unconsciously (as in certain evangelicals, MAGA revelers, and QAnon conspiracy adherents). But it all comes down to which Americans have their patrimony and hard work stolen from them.
And this leads me to a different formulation: What if our racial conflicts and misunderstandings are rooted in theft? What if contemporary whites who feel cheated of economic superiority are in fact “innocent” in a certain way?
I do think millions of white Americans are not necessarily guilty of the crimes of the past. If you are a contemporary white Oklahoman, or to be even more specific, a white Tulsan, of course you did not perpetrate the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre—but you are living with the ill-gotten gains of it. You are, as they would say on Law & Order, an accessory after the fact.
Think of it this way: your grandfather had in his possession a very special car, a bitching cherry-red 1965 Corvette (or a Shelby Mustang, or a 2002 BMW, or a 1950s Ford pickup—take your pick), and he loved it and transferred his love of the vehicle to you. You and he rode around town in that car, ate ice cream in it, and maybe he even taught you to drive in it.
Those wheels were part of your life, even part of the family. He had it for most of his life, and he promised it to you. And he kept his promise: in his will he left his beloved car to you. This is, so far, a very lovely story.
Then, years later, you find out that your grandfather, whom you worshipped and thought was the best man you had ever known, had, in fact, stolen that Corvette. He never owned it because he and his friends robbed a Black man, or a Native American, or a Latino, or an Asian, to steal it.
This is the ethos of Calvinist election and the prosperity gospel, and like most feel-good mythmaking ideology, it is self-justification—an enabling fiction that flies in the face of fact.
This happened in the past, during an era in which law enforcement was known to look the other way. In your case, maybe law enforcement, in the shape of one of your grandfather’s closest friends, helped him steal it. Perhaps they—or he—even killed the rightful owner.
Suddenly, you learn that you have been driving a stolen car, one that has a history not only of theft but of murder.
Now, what do you do?
Do you give it back?
Do you say, Well, that’s unfortunate, but that was a very long time ago?
Do you let the descendants of the unfortunate rightful owner of color drive it once a month?
Do you stand on a street corner downtown and proclaim your innocence because you didn’t know the provenance of your cherished car? Do you claim that even if the story of its illicit theft is true, it doesn’t change anything?
Do you go to court and sue, arguing that giving it back unfairly infringes upon your property and opportunity rights?
Do you argue that laws must be passed demanding that unlawful generational theft not be discussed and that anyone who brings such things up is looking backward and trying to make your kids feel poorly about themselves, and as such they should be silenced?
Do you insist that only your version of events, which implies that the larceny and homicide never happened, can be discussed? Do you argue that if this theft did, in fact, happen, you don’t know anything about it and therefore have absolutely no legal, moral, or ethical responsibility?
‘Cause, man, that is one beautiful car, and it’s great to be the one that gets to drive it, and you know you’re very lucky, but like your grandfather said, the Lord rewards those who deserve to be rewarded. The fact that you have it means you are supposed to have it, and the people who don’t have it are just undeserving sore losers.
This is the ethos of Calvinist election and the prosperity gospel, and like most feel-good mythmaking ideology, it is self-justification—an enabling fiction that flies in the face of fact.
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The End of Respectability by Anthony Walton is available via Godine.