Why Race Matters

Is it racist to discuss race in the 2008 campaign for the presidency? I think this is utter nonsense, but there are many Americans and some in the media who apparently believe this is so.

In articles dealing with race, Newsweek’s Howard Fineman talks about how he “frankly blanches at the race-based” discussions led by many television pundits, even as he writes about race, and Juan Williams of NPR and Fox News indicates that there are voters and journalists alike who think it is inappropriate to discuss polls or other data that attempt to measure racial attitudes of voters and their possible effect on the election. See (http://www.newsweek.com/id/136991 and http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2008/11/2008-05-11-face_it_democrats_barack_obama)

Perhaps we shouldn’t track either voters’ education and income because it might imply class differences of voters, or discuss the role of religious or geographical affiliation because these, too, might imply a slight of some kind.

Or maybe it does make sense to ignore such things, at least, if you are the same people that are questioning whether it is patriotic to criticize the Iraq war and its conduct or one of the folks that says we should happily cede our rights and freedoms so that we may be protected through the provisions of the cynically named Patriot Act. If the media had not placed its collective man/womanhood in a blind trust after 9-11 and literally “embedded” itself with the Bush administration, and instead looked critically at Bush’s motives and, most important, his evidence for going to war in Iraq, perhaps Democrats and Republicans would not be apologizing for their bone-headed decision to support Bush, burying the thousands of American soldiers killed in Iraq, or puzzling about how we can get out of the morass that is Iraq War.

While there are many in the media who are skittish about talking about race at all, just as nefarious are those who desire to ascribe everything to it.

Remember when many in the media accused Bill Clinton of racism in the wake of the South Carolina primaries when he had the audacity to make a comparison between Obama’s victory in the state and Jesse Jackson’s victories there in 1984 and 1988?

How about the uproar over Michelle Obama’s statement, following her husband’s successes with white voters, that she was for the first time truly proud to be an American, the racial gloss being that she was undoubtably some kind of black nationalist?

And former VP candidate Geraldine Ferraro’s statement that Barack Obama, as a black man, had some advantages that Hillary Clinton did not?

While all of the above can be faulted for not understanding how such statements would play out in the crucible of the 2008 Democratic campaign, it is very difficult to take exception to any of them.

Ironically, by branding all of these as somehow inappropriate, by, in other words, either not looking at the accuracy of the statements but simply taking offense at the fact race is mentioned at all, the media have helped fuel a kind of hypersensitivity to race, ensured that it isn’t possible to think critically about its effects, and, most unforgivably of all, given the focus of their profession, haven’t provided the real story or even considered it as a possibility.

So, what about Bill Clinton’s remarks? Who will deny that an increasing Balkanization of white and black voters has occurred since South Carolina, and that there is a real question about whether Obama can get the white Democrats he will certainly need in the general election?

And while there may be those who still take issue with Ferraro’s assessment that Obama does enjoy some advantages as a black candidate, Obama certainly is relying on black voters not only to vote for him nearly en masse but to prevent superdelegates from voting for Clinton even though neither he nor Clinton will likely achieve the number of pledged delegates necessary to win the nomination. Could Hillary Clinton or any other white candidate so count on the outrage of one group of voters that she or he could make this a crucial part of a strategy to win the nomination?

No different than these are Michelle Obama’s remarks concerning being truly proud for the first time about being an American as they, too, have been mischaracterized and dramatized so much as to be unrecognizable. Her comments, including the hyperbole about being proud for the “first time” to be an American, were understandable given the exhilaration of the moment, the racist past of this country and the unfair and unjust treatment of blacks that frequently continues today. That Obama has made it this far has made more than a few people proud of their country in a way they haven’t felt for some time. There are a lot of people, black, white, and Hispanic, who love their country but aren’t proud of its racist past, that it puts so little stock in providing health care for its citizens, or that it supports the death penalty, one of the only countries in the West who still believes this is appropriate. For some in the media this issue, though, was an opportunity primarily to suggest that Michelle Obama was herself racist.

It may be ugly to measure or assess the campaign based on race, gender, class, age and the other demographic information that candidates and pollsters, alike, are using on a daily basis and even making fundamental to their campaigns. And, if nothing else, this campaign, in which race, gender, and class so clearly are playing a role, as evidenced in advance polls, exit polls, polling by the candidates, and the like, is a measure of how far we are from the color blind society towards which Martin Luther King so brilliantly and courageously helped direct us. No doubt about it.

King knew better than anyone that we were a long, long way from the promised land of equality that he envisioned and that this country would not get there without much heated discussion and probably worse. He also knew, though, that we are never further from this goal then when we do not acknowledge the problem at all. If we were to continue to ignore race, blacks and whites would continue to have separate “but equal” educations, an eyebrow would not be raised at an all-white jury sitting in judgment of a black defendant, and there would be no such thing as reasonable affirmative action measures, to mention just a few things that are bringing us closer to something like the equality any reasonable person desires for all Americans.

Race has played a larger role in the Democratic nomination then it will, ironically, in the general election where, instead, all of the issues that generally haunt liberal candidates, such as security, taxes, guns, perceived lack of patriotism, and the like, will be most important. There will be people who won’t vote for Obama simply because of the color of his skin to be sure but these are the issues, such as they are, on which he will ultimately be judged. The real story, yet to be written, is how Obama got to the general election in the first place. And that story, too, will be sorely lacking if it does not include race.

In the end, race is a pretty big story in the Democratic campaign, as are gender and class, just not in the way most people think, thanks to the convoluted, awkward, and, at times, malicious discussion of race that is a legacy of our past. Democrats, with more than a little help from the media, are on the verge of learning this, and recognizing that the presence of race, like the 800 pound gorilla in the room, has shaped reporting of the campaigns and, indeed, pretty much made meaningful discussion of matters such as the implications of demographic data and electability taboo, mere racist claptrap, even if, ultimately, the issue of electability has less to do with race than other things.

Unlike the Republican Party, whose notion of an appropriate candidate comes in one color, one gender, and pretty much a one-size-fits all philosophy, the Democrats do at least deserve credit for giving us the opportunity to talk, no matter how awkwardly or haltingly, about matters of race.

We aren’t anywhere near getting it right yet, as the 2008 campaign makes painfully clear, but it doesn’t hurt to know this either.