Jan
16
The Racist Boogeyman
“It is impossible to forge ahead while walking backward.” — Candace Owens, political commentator and podcast host
Few people in America get as much flack from their own “community” as Candace Owens. But, this brave, young black woman is awake, not “woke”. She has a passion for speaking out against the political Left, who promise the world for black and brown people while only contributing to their problems, and for teaching and encouraging those same people to think for themselves and leave the Democratic Party. #Blexit
What follows is an excerpt from Owens’ recent book, Blackout:
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“There is an endless stream of faux outrage, a constant manufacturing of nonexistent hurdles, rooted in some flawed concept of our society’s perfectibility. There are those in black America who use charges of racism as a social handicap. With the expectation that the mere utterance of the word will vindicate them in every scenario, we have arrived suddenly into an era of more insistence on rather than actual resistance against racism. And the Left, always happy to exploit our victimhood, urges us on. Many times, in fact, white liberals join in on the game, alleging that they see instances of discrimination and microaggressions everywhere, as proof of their commitment to our cause.
The personality complex of a liberal savior is one that fascinates me, as I believe it to be centered on extreme narcissism. I imagine them to be addicted to the feeling of accomplishment that is derived from helping someone inferior to them. I’d imagine it’s something like the feeling most get when they drop off items at Goodwill: a sense of charity, overridden by the more likely fact that they spend in excess of their needs. Standing up for inferior blacks must liberate liberals from having to assess their own flawed characters. Or perhaps, as in the case of Democrat politicians, they will simply say anything to garner our support.
While it is well within reason to remark at injustice, the immediate claim that every moment of our temporary discomfort is due to inherent racism is as insane as suggesting that the solution to such discomfort is segregation. It is impossible to forge ahead while walking backward.
And consider the drama if it were white people who made such recommendations, accusing blacks of racism and calling for separate (but equal!) dormitories to quarantine themselves from such offenses. We would be utterly outraged, so why is our response any different when members of our own community author such proposals? I have given consideration to the idea that recognizing our equality might make some black people uncomfortable, because with no one to blame but ourselves for failures, the weight of our own irresponsibility may seem too heavy a burden to bear. It is much easier to go through life with a white supremacist boogeyman.
And so we become willing participants in the Left’s sport of identity politics, despite the perpetual outcome of our defeat. So comforted are we by the ease of the progressive path laid beneath our feet, that we ignore that it’s a path to nowhere.
But what would our ancestors think?
What would your grandmother, your great-grandmother, or your great-great-grandmother say if they saw you now? Better yet, what would you say if you were transported back to their upbringing, and made to endure the reality of what they lived through to grant you the opportunities that lie just beneath your feet? It was my grandmother’s unexpected death that forced me to harvest the seeds of her legacy. My hope is that the thought of your ancestry inspires you to do the same.
Never should we set ourselves on a fruitless quest for an imaginary utopia. Rather, we ought to commit ourselves to the steady remembrance of the sacrifice and hardship that came before us, so that we may appreciate the many blessings of our circumstances today.”
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If I hadn’t already had to return Blackout to the library, I’d be tempted to post another citation or two. As with any such book, there were a couple points where I might partially disagree or at least take a different approach. But, there was lots of good material, and I definitely recommend it.
