Yesterday, I asked: Why do we fight? Further, I suggested that maybe that that portion of “the 1%” who enrich themselves in nefarious ways at our expense are much happier when we focus our wrath on each other rather than at them.
I’m sure there’s some truth to that.
On the other hand, it’s not like our species isn’t expert at hating each other for stupid reasons. Often we don’t need a conspiracy of cronies to set us at each other’s throats. Often we do it to ourselves.
We do this in all sorts of stupid and destructive ways. Today I’m going to show how we are taking something awful (racism) and working furiously to make it even worse.
Smart, right?
Racism sucks. Watching one person treat somebody else like crap is bad enough when we encounter it. It’s worse when it’s not because of any bad behavior, but rather because of some immutable characteristic like skin color or the like.
And when you see such behavior, you should call it out, right? Shame the person a little. Encourage them to quit being stupidly nasty and reacquaint themselves with their better nature.
That’s a healthy instinct.
But here’s a pernicious truth that we desperately need to learn (or re-learn) here in 2024. If you run around calling people racists and bigots and accuse them of having racial hatred in their hearts when in fact they aren’t and they don’t, you increase racial division, not lessen it.
Don’t believe me?
What do you think is happening right now in the minds of average, unassuming, non-racist white people when they see talking heads on the media and the authors of best selling books calling them all guilty of perpetuating “systemic racism” and possessing “white rage” and being passively guilty of “white privilege”?
I don’t need to cite all the examples of this out there. It’s impossible for you to have not witnessed them yourselves.
So what do you think happens when you accuse someone of racist guilt when they are innocent of it? Think that makes racial tension go down?
Of course not. Call somebody a racist who isn’t and it’s going to piss them off.
Or here’s an even more recent example: My favorite current US Congressman is Thomas Massie of Kentucky. Like me, he is a libertarian on most things, including his foreign policy.
He doesn’t think American taxpayers should be fleeced to enrich the leaders of foreign countries (along with crony US weapons manufacturers) and he thinks the US empire should be dismantled, both for economic and humanitarian reasons.
I love it.
Recently, in response to a proposed bill to send a massive pile of our money to Israel, Massie posted this on Twitter(X):
“The Speaker just announced that next week the House will vote on a clean bill to send Israel $14.3 billion.
Israel has a lower debt-to-GDP ratio than the United States. This spending package has no offsets, so it will increase our debt by $14.3 billion plus interest.
I'm a No.
And in another post:
Most of this money will go directly to the U.S. Military Industrial Complex (MIC), which, if you’re keeping up, prefers to be referred to as the Defense Industrial Base (DIB) now. Watch for those stocks to go up Monday.
One clarification: the bill will spend over $17 billion, but some goes to replace weapons we’ve given to Israel, and some goes for other random costs in the Middle East. In addition to this $17+ billion bill, we will probably give them the customary $3+ billion in the omnibus!
Some well known but unimpressive neocon shill named John Podhoretz responded:
Of course you’re a no, you disingenuous piece of anti-Semitic filth.
Undeterred (and with amazing restraint) Massie's replied:
So now if I don’t vote for massive foreign aid that goes primarily to the military industrial complex, I’m anti-Semitic filth?
Your unfounded slurs will not change my vote because America is broke and my constituents can afford no more.
Thomas Massie is the furthest thing from an antisemite one could imagine. This slur against him is absolute garbage.
And this isn’t a one-off. Since Hamas committed their despicable and murderous attack on October 7, 2023, we have heard similar vile and completely unfounded cries of antisemitism from Ben Shapiro, the Anti-Defamation League, and other many prominent Jewish and neocon voices - and of course 1,000-fold more from people influenced by these thought leaders.
Racial hatred is, of course, real. Antisemitism is real. But we humans keep on proving that there isn’t any problem we can’t stupidly make worse.
Calling a good person a racist or an antisemite doesn’t make them like you. It makes them despise you. Hurling racist insults at people creates more racism.
Please stop it. We have enough problems without your blind hatred making things worse.
Naturally,
Adam