THIS WEEK'S Non-Racist: Economist Arnold Kling

Long-time readers of TWIR will recall that we occasionally point out protests from folks whose racism has surfaced. Because we do not subscribe to conceptualizations of racism that involve intent, it should not necessarily be seen as an insult when we point out racism. From the standpoint of critical race theorists and others who are thoughtful about the complexities of race, denying our racism is, in fact, part of the reason we continue to struggle with race in America. If we would all own up to what is really going on, we would be much further toward getting to the root of our racial problems.

What is frustrating to us is the degree to which people go out of their way to explain away their racism so that they do not have to deal with it. To be fair, it is part and parcel to the system we have allowed to perpetuate. Specifically, since we have reduced the term "racism" to individual-level acts of prejudice, folks are understandably not comfortable with the label. Accordingly, when racism is "charged," the offending person feels that he or she must deflect the label. It's unfortunate. We have often joked to audiences during our events that we are going to have "I am racist" t-shirts made up for folks to wear so that they can instigate discussions about the differences between racism and bigotry (or prejudice).

So while we are sensitive to the reality that racism is a pervasive part of our culture and, as such, will surface from time to time, we have been particularly hard on folks who go out of their way to explain how their racist behavior or language was actually anything but racist.

TWIR readers will recall our treatment of Joe Biden's reference to Barack Obama as "clean" and "articulate" and Dog the Bounty Hunter's comfortable use of the "n-word." They will remember our analysis of Don Imus's explanations about how he meant no disrespect by referring to members of the Rutgers University women's basketball team as "nappy-headed hoes" or Fox News's John Gibson's reference to Iraqis as "knuckle-dragging savages." And they'll think about how we joined in the criticism of Michael Richards's bigoted insults against Black hecklers and Clint Eastwood's ignoring of Black Marines in his film about Iwo Jima.

We have a new one this week.

Vanity Fair's James Wolcott nicely covered everything we would have, so rather than plagiarize or re-hash, we reproduce the text from his blog:

A few days ago notice was taken (I'm practicing my passive voice) of economist Arnold Kling's contention that the Obama stimulus plan was actually "reparations" in disguise. Given the complexion of our new president, this was interpreted as injecting a needless bit of race-baiting into the economic debate, raising the specter of a million Jeremiah Wrights marching on the capital mall with outstretched hands, demanding their cut of the action. Oh dear me no, protested Kling. No coded race talk was intended. He was actually thinking of the Treaty of Versailles, as reflected in the sentence "To the Democrats, the Bush tax cuts were a heinous evil, comparable to Germany's violation of Belgian neutrality in World War I." Idiotically hyperbolic and baseless as Kling's caricaturing is (seriously, name me one frigging Democrat who invoked violations of Belgian neutrality in railing against the Bush tax cuts), it did open the door ajar to possible acquittal on the racebaiting charge. To cool things down, Kling (an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute, which has been taking out all those big ads) closed off comments before the mosh pit got any gnarlier.

Wolcott is referring to Kling's turning off the comments feature of the blog in question because, as he put it, "some other blogger decided that my reference to 'reparations' was a reference to reparations from slavery and hence a reference to the color of President Obama's skin."

While it is true that Wolcott was a bit more accusatory in terms of intent than we generally are ("coded race talk at least implies that the speaker was pro-actively coding and therefore did so with intent), the fact of the matter is that he pointed out that Kling's racism was driving his analysis of Obama's stimulus bill, which is right on point. Even if Kling did have the Treaty of Versailles in mind, as he claims, the word "reparations" clearly connotes reparations for slavery in our current political context. As a writer, he is responsible for being aware of that -- being insensitive to that reality is an example of racism.

But wait: there's more. From Wolcott's same blog:

And there the matter might have rested had not Kling surrendered to heat of candor today at a Heritage Foundation/Club for Growth confab and decried, "Barack Obama is destroying my daughter's future. It is like sitting there watching my house ransacked by a gang of thugs."

Now if Kling can't comprehend the implication of racial menace encoded in daughter-gang-thugs/home invasion, he's either fatuously clueless--too innocent for this wicked world--or weaselly disingenuous, and a drama queen either way. Did he feel the sanctity of his home was being violated when the costs of the Iraq war shot into outer space? Did he picture marauders smashing cherished mementoes when Hank Paulson introduced TARP? Anytime Obama's name and "thug" are thrown in close proximity, it's a pretty sure bet that the speaker or author intends to fan the anxiety and animosity of those who think Obama's presidency represents black grievance gloved with the iron fist of the state--and out to punish whitey. No wonder so many would-be Wolverines in the right blogs are talking about stocking up on assault rifles and ammo--they've got ransackers running wild in their imaginations too. I urge these people to confront their racial fears, think of Scarlet Johansson and strawberry snowflakes and the musical numbers in Rent, and join the rest of us in Matisse's dancing daisy-chain of eternal spring.

Wolcott's observation is confirmed, as he nicely notes, by Kling's invocation of the word "thug" to refer to Obama's plan in a way that he would not have (and has not) referred to the "destroying" of his daughter's future by the White men who are largely responsible for the economic recession in the first place and who ran up a the national debt by spending hundreds of billions on the war in Iraq. It is true that a thug can be White and that in other points in our history, the word would not have had a clear connotation of members of Black street gangs. Today, however, it absolutely does. It is considered to be "thuggery" when tax money is spent to build and stimulate job creation; when it is used to destroy or to provide tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans (most of whom are White), there is no street-level-crime metaphor used.

It is a classic example of implicitly racist thinking. It is possible that Kling was, as Wolcott alleges, "race baiting," but even if he was not, his subconscious use of racist imagery -- remember that Rush Limbaugh repeatedly referred to Obama as a "street agitator" and a "thug" during the presidential campaign -- is revealing of his racism. If he meant to do it, he's a bigot; either way, he is racist. We do not fault him for the latter, as it is a characteristic of everyone who has been socialized in America. The fault lies in his inability to reflect on it and accept it, which would then put him in a position to serve as a leader to those millions of us who are similarly dismissive of how much race matters in our culture.

In short, another teaching moment has been missed. One of these days a closeted gay fundamentalist Christian minister or a racist political conservative will be caught in one of these situations and, rather than try to wriggle out of it, embrace the reality and serve as a catalyst for honest discussion about the realities and complexities of oppression in America. When that happens, we will title that week's blog: "THIS WEEK'S Racist . . .," and we will mean it in the most complimentary way.