“It will be refreshing to have a classy, beautiful, dignified First Lady in the White House,” a white woman in a place called Clay County, West Virginia, wrote in a Facebook post the other day.
I assume it was her way of finally seeing the brightening light at the end of the tunnel in white people’s slow, long march back to the White House after eight years of political and racial consternation. What with the darkness that has permeated the White House that the slaves built centuries ago, and where come January 20, a Black family having occupied the place for almost eight years will have to leave. How un-American!
Then that white woman’s coup de grace, “I’m tired of seeing an ape in heels in the White House.”
By the way, she had a high profile cohort, none other than the mayor of the county who, once she got wind of the Facebook posting, contacted her colleague to congratulate her. “Just made my day…”
Apparently, after much pressure from oppositional forces, the women buckled and were forced “to stand down for the remarks, which many called “vile” and “racist.”
One of the women in question said, “My comment was not intended to be racist at all. I was referring to my day being made for change in the White House!”
Really!
The other one stated (on Facebook), “I am truly sorry for any hard feeling this may have caused! Those who know me know that I’m not of any way racist! Again, I would like to apologize for this getting out of hand!”
Reacting to the vileness, one Owens Brown, director of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People West Virginia chapter, said, “Unfortunately, this is a reality that we are dealing with in America today. There’s no place for these types of attitudes in our state…I feel it’s so unfortunate that people still have these racist undertones.”
Of course they do. Then some simply apologize.
Saying “sorry” for any reason is always so easy, but one can never discern the genuineness of the offender. More often than not it’s merely a lie to put the “matter” to rest
Notwithstanding their apologies, including issuing public statements that their “actions were not intended to be racist…” But in the context of the unfolding toxic political climate and presidential campaign at the time, the damage had already been done.
Just another example of America’s institutionalized racist ethos and [some] white people allowing their innate, irrepressible racist miasma to bubble to the surface. This has become more evident since the political Trump era, crawling out of the woodwork across America.
Those two women are simply a glimpse of the racist iceberg in America. Call it the President-elect Donald Trump effect.
Supporters and adherents of his political campaign mantra have awoken from their slumber and are emerging from the racial woodwork to “[…] take back and make America great again.”
They’ve been emboldened and empowered by the campaign rhetoric of the U.S. President-elect.
So much so that last weekend I saw, quote, “a white nationalist” president and director of The National Policy Institute speaking at a Washington, DC venue. According to him, the outfit is an “independent organization dedicated to the heritage, identity and future of people of European descent in the United States, and around the world.”
[Those who produce arms, the primary means of protection in America and, one imagines, Europe and other parts, feel threatened? Go figure.]
That man concluded his speech with a “Heil Trump! Heil our people, Heil victory!”
And some of his acolytes stood and, arms outstretched Hitler-style shouted, Heil Hitler! White power!
But saying “sorry” for any reason is always so easy, but one can never discern the genuineness of the offender. More often than not it’s merely an insincere act to put the “matter” to rest.
MCC was invited by the late Bob White to observe (in a ‘flies on the wall context’) the Ways and Means Committee in session. On one occasion, after U.S. President-elect Donald Trump announced his intention to throw his hat in the ring for the Republican presidential nomination, Bob White said he likes Donald Trump. I asked him why?
He answered, “[…] because Trump is a racist and America is a racist country.”
Well White’s man won. Two weeks on, to the surprise and chagrin of millions of Americans, Donald Trump is in the process of finalizing plans (with a coterie of his racial and ideological ilk) to move into the White House to do the unthinkable: be the man at the helm of what many call the most powerful country on Earth.
Bob would be glad to know that not everyone is happy with what transpired, as evidenced by the spate of blatant racist, ethnocentric incidents that continue to take place since Trump trumped all the pundits.
And the ever-present reality of America’s historic vileness is emerging from the woodwork.
Here’s another example of the racist fallout, in a place called Bullitt County, Kentucky, a Republican candidate defeated the incumbent Democrat in a race for the state House of Representatives, despite a series of posts he (the Republican) put on Facebook depicting President Barack Obama and his wife as monkeys.
White people, white people… can’t you be more imaginative?
Even in Canada, the Trump message is resonating. So excited is she with the outcome of the U.S. presidential election and the ascension to power of the Republican Party Conservative leadership candidate Kellie Leitch says Canadian refugees will be screened for Canadian values.”
More than that was the racist, ethnocentric, anti-immigrant overflow across the border the morning after the Republican win, with Swastikas, anti-immigrant, Nigger graffiti showing up across the country, in addition to reports of the physical harassment of certain people. Just to illustrate and remind those who care to know that bad apples fall from the racist tree on both sides of the border.
According to Leitch, “Canadians need to follow the example set by the Americans who elected Donald Trump as president and throw away “the elites.” She also said she wants to “bring the same exciting message as those who threw out the elites in the U.S….”
She also proposed screening prospective immigrants/emigrants to Canada for Canadian values and said she looks forward to working with Trump “on issues of common concern.”
“I’m the only candidate who will ensure that every visitor, immigrant, and refugee will be screened for Canadian values…”
Here’s hoping the Trump miasma doesn’t waft across the border.
And now, amidst the post-election protesting, racist, anti-Muslim, ethnocentric maelstrom comes word that President-elect Donald Trump, in addition to telling his acolytes to “Stop it!” has now disavowed them, particularly the so-called white supremacist “alt-right” outfit, which sees his elevation to the highest office in the land as their “coming of age and legitimizing of their existence,” into the socio-political mainstream as it were.
Come January 20 the collective racist, ethnocentric, xenophobic constituency across America—especially those two women—will be in a celebratory mood knowing that white people finally got the big House back after eight (interminable) years of primate occupation…
And I bet the new occupants will be doing much washing, sterilizing and air freshening… in their valiant attempt to eliminate all traces—visually and otherwise—of the former residents. Once done, the White House will have returned to normalcy, putting all the haters minds at ease knowing that the keys to the House the slaves built has been handed back to its deserving and rightful owners: an intelligent, wealthy real estate mogul and former reality show host, along with his wife, “a classy, beautiful, dignified First Lady.”
That will surely make the approximately 454 days of the new president and First Lady, as well as those two white women and others of their ilk very, very refreshing and happy ones.
