The ongoing kerfuffle about Barack Obama and his controversial pastor made me realize something: Among intelligent people, there are two basic camps when it comes to race relations. The first group, consisting of most whites and conservative blacks, are uncomfortable talking about race for several reasons, including the fear that they’ll be labeled racist and the suspicion that blacks get preferential treatment because they’re black. The solution to racism, they believe, is to ignore it. They are for treating people equally regardless of their race, which means no affirmative action, no quotas, no special treatment. This, they believe, is the true fulfillment of Dr. King’s dream that people “will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”
The second group consists of most blacks and white liberals, and they can’t help but talk about race. For blacks themselves, it’s their very being, their very self-identity. What’s more, the solution they advocate is a full accounting of America’s past racism by means of affirmative action, slavery reparations, etc.
Thus, the cause of much tension in American race relations is the conflict between these two groups–one of which doesn’t want to talk about race and the other of which can’t stop talking about it.
This sort of ties in to what Shelby Steele wrote about in WSJ today. His interesting theory is that there are two kinds of black public figures: “challengers” (such as Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton) who, similar to the second group mentioned above, “intimidated whites and demanded, in the name of historical justice, that they be brought forward,” and “bargainers,” who “make the subliminal promise to whites not to shame them with America’s history of racism, on the condition that they will not hold the bargainer’s race against him.” The bargainer allows himself to become a conduit of the white’s guilt being expunged by getting behind the black figure. This helps explain why black candidates (especially in the GOP) become overnight celebrities (think J.C. Watts). This is not to say, as Steele does, that being black is the main reason for their success. It is a big part of it, but Steele fails to realize that the main source of Obama’s appeal is his promise to end the endless political bickering that poisons so much of what Washington does.
Obama’s speech today was a mistake, I think, because by giving it he clearly identified himself with the second group, the “challengers.” The problem is that the more he talks about race, the more he becomes “the black candidate” and the more whites become uncomfortable with him. Of course, this plays right into Hillary’s hands, as it is exactly what the Clinton campaign tried to do in South Carolina.
So if Clinton and McCain are smart, they will try to figure out ways to make Obama talk about race. If Obama is smart, he will resist the temptation.
