The Worst Woke Attacks on Whiteness Come From a Comfy Perch

(Picture by Emily Molli/NurPhoto through Getty Pictures)

The ugliest feedback about white folks in America come from these in probably the most comfy positions in society right this moment. “Inflammatory rhetoric” exited the stage a while in the past. Credentialed inhabitants of the progressive cultural hierarchy are actually overtly dehumanizing a gaggle of individuals in ways in which surpass even probably the most elastic requirements of primary decency.

Morgan J. Freeman is a B-list Hollywood and TV producer and director, to not be confused with the well-known actor from The Shawshank Redemption and different hits. This Morgan Freeman brought about a stir Might 16 when he posted a scurrilous message on Twitter. “Being ‘anti-racist’ begins by admitting ‘whiteness’ is a illness,” Freeman wrote.

After being hit with a extreme backlash, Freeman doubled down on his slur in the best way woke progressives usually do by turning to what he believes is an authoritative supply that shares his outrageous views.

Institutional Backing

Freeman quoted extensively from The Smithsonian’s Nationwide Museum of African American Historical past & Tradition’s “Whiteness” web page in its “Speaking About Race” part on the establishment’s official web site. Enjoyable truth: The Smithsonian is supported by US taxpayer {dollars}. Right here is how your hard-earned cash is being put to make use of. From the “Whiteness” web page:

“Since white folks in America maintain many of the political, institutional, and financial energy, they obtain benefits that nonwhite teams don’t. These advantages and benefits, of various levels, are often called white privilege. For a lot of white folks, this may be laborious to listen to, perceive, or settle for – however it’s true. In case you are white in America, you may have benefited from the colour of your pores and skin.”

Being white is certainly seen because the “illness” Freeman labeled it as within the eyes of The Smithsonian:

“In the event you determine as white, acknowledging your white racial identification and its privileges is a vital step to assist finish racism. Going through your whiteness is difficult and can lead to emotions of guilt, unhappiness, confusion, defensiveness, or concern….

“The sentiments related to white fragility usually derail conversations about race and serve to assist white supremacy. Whereas these emotions are pure human reactions, staying caught in any of them hurts the method of making a extra equitable society. The defensiveness, guilt, or denial will get in the best way of addressing the racism skilled by folks of coloration.”

Treating “whiteness” as a scientific pathology can be wholly accepted throughout the ranks of one other cultural touchstone of the progressive left: academia.

White ‘Pathogen’ Handed on to Offspring

The College of Minnesota’s Institute of Little one Improvement runs a “Whiteness Pandemic” venture that focuses on the methods Caucasian mother and father unfold their racial traits to their offspring like a toxin.

UM’s web site’s primer on the venture closely quotes Dr. Gail Ferguson, an affiliate professor who spearheads the trouble. On April 11, Ferguson wrote a surprising essay for The Society for Character and Social Psychology, during which she unflinchingly asserted:

“The central pathogens of the Whiteness Pandemic are color-evasiveness (avoidance or denial of race) and power-evasiveness (denial of racial oppression), that are handed on intergenerationally, particularly in White households….

“The intergenerational transmission of the Whiteness Pandemic in households helps to clarify why U.S. racism is so intractable. Coloration-evasiveness and power-evasiveness are particularly widespread within the racial socialization method of White U.S. mother and father….”

(Picture by Emily Molli/NurPhoto through Getty Pictures)

Think about the repercussions that may include describing another racial or ethnic group on this nation right this moment as a pathogen threatening the physique of the group at massive.

It’s par for the course on the cultural left right this moment.

George Yancy is a professor of philosophy at Emory College and a “fellow” at Dartmouth. Yancy has lengthy surfed the wave of racial discord. He apparently retains up with the occasions. His newest providing finds him embracing the illness narrative.

“‘Harmless” White Folks Are Additionally Complicit within the Anti-Black Murders in Buffalo,” screams the headline of his Might 17 op-ed at Truthout, a preferred leftist web site.

Yancy writes:

“I’m not solely involved in regards to the ‘radicalization’ of white folks that happens inside xenophobic social media echo chambers. I’m additionally involved about far more quotidian and ubiquitous white racist echo chambers — those that exist inside white properties, white locations of worship, predominantly white dorms, predominantly white faculties, and throughout the context of white household dinner conversations. The toxicity of whiteness is bred inside these on a regular basis contexts the place white life occurs, the place white folks love one another, the place they focus on the occasions of the day.”

(Picture by Jonathan Wiggs/The Boston Globe through Getty Pictures)

A sitting college professor decries the pestilence that’s the bizarre white particular person’s each day. Who knew that taking part in Wordle and consuming yogurt had been elementary breeding grounds for reviving the Ku Klux Klan?

From leisure to museums to academia, psychology and past, it’s now absolutely acceptable within the hallowed halls of the cultural left to categorize whites as lower than human. One has to surprise why all this seething hatred of alleged unfair privilege emanates from among the most entitled areas throughout the progressive ruling institution nest.

Portraying whiteness as a illness offers a double win for this comfy class. First, in dividing Individuals alongside harshly delineated racial strains, any real systemic change which may threaten their lofty positions is thwarted. Secondly, in blaming a whole race for each evil underneath the solar, the true beneficiaries of the New Privileges being doled out within the Courageous Woke World by no means must apologize for their very own embarrassments of riches because the wealth disparity hole they like to ramble on about continues to develop.