Speaking Treason Fluently: Anti-Racist Reflections From an Angry White Male

Tim Wise is at it again. Not since "White Like Me," has he launched such a spirited attack on what he has euphemistically called "Racism 2.0," the latest more stealth but no less potent version of the old brutal version of Racism 1.0. Here he marshals all of the statistics for those who care, of how the racial chips are still stacked heavily against mostly black Americans, but also against any Americans of color, including Asians, who tend to do better than whites on all of the parameters that racists whites consider determinative, including on standardized intelligence tests. But rather than get into the statistics of the racial politics Wise uncovers, (I notice that other reviewers have covered them well in any case), I want to suggest to the author that as one of only a handful of remaining active and vocal white anti-racists, that he did not go quite far enough. The real price of racism (which incidentally is also the real reason that it remains so persistent) is that white humanity remains so heavily invested in, and dependent on, its not so well-hidden but cross-generational benefits. It is with a combination of denial, tribal bullying, skewed laws (and even more skewed law enforcement), thinly veiled racist justifications for continued racial discrimination, as well as informal "white only" tribal networks, that whites continue to maintain the fiction of racial superiority, a fiction that helps to maintain the ideology of racism in the present steady state. But also, as this author has been the first to point out, it is "pandering to white racism" that keeps the light from shining on the true source of America's racial problems: continuing white comfort with, and confidence in, the present fragile social arrangements. Arguably, it is as much "professional blacks from the "Uncle Tom Nation," like our biracial president, and his millionaire supporters like Oprah, Bill Cosby and the president of BET, Bob Johnson, as much as the racists themselves, lean over backwards to continue to accommodate the "latter day racists" and thus continue to enable and assist the installation of Racism version 2.0. Were this cadre of enablers able to muster the courage to stand up on their hind legs and use their "always accidental success" not as an example of how "fair" the American system has been, but as what their success really means: that they are but the tokens that disproves the much larger rule of racism as usual,then the vast majority of racist whites would no longer be so smug in declaring Obama's election the beginning of a new "post-Racial America." How can this be when every objective indicator of black progress except a few tokens here and there, has turned decidedly for the worse, and is doing so at a faster and faster rate? As Wise shows here, the proof is always in the pudding, and the facts continue to show overwhelmingly that even in post-racial America, blacks are falling behind at a rate so alarming, that arguably, it is faster than

A real education about America and the real intelligence of it's people. While it's now to be read in a humorous way, as that was not the intention of the author, there are many elements of humor as one recognizes the absurdity in the thinking of it's "citizens." Unfortunately, those who should read it, most probably won't. Their mind is already made up, please don't bother then with the facts. Remember, most people who are among those getting screwed, have no idea that they are getting screwed, and believe it's only the other guy. Then again, hopefully this review will entice them to actually read this book for the betterment of America.

This book gets you thinking. My favorite of wise's books because of how many areas it touches on.

This book contains Mr. Wise's wonderfully cogent essays on race going back 7 or 8 years. The essays are well written in a calm, logical manner. White people are 70 percent of drug users yet are only about 10 percent of persons imprisoned for drug possession in this country. At the same time black and latino folks are 25 percent of the drug users in this country yet make up close to 90 percent of the people imprisoned for the crime. Wise notes that in spite of spite of such a reality, citing a Journal of Alcohol and Drug Education study, around 95 percent of white people believe a typical drug user to be black. It is true, he notes, that African Americans commit a higher rate of some street crimes than their percentage of the total population of this country. That is to be expected for folks who grow up in the terrible conditions of the inner city. But blacks only commit about 3 percent of the violent crimes each year, according to Wise. On the other hand white people commit a disproportionate share of the serial killing, child molestation and drunk driving in this country. Young white college students disproportionately make up our country's binge drinkers. White men are two thirds of our rapists. Wise talks a little about the crimes of white collar white folks. It was old white dudes who deliberately bombed Iraq's electrical grids in 1991, knowing full well that such actions would shut off electricity to Iraq's water and sewage treatment plants and so cause tens of thousands of deaths from epidemics. It was white Republicans who oversaw US aid to the death squad democracies in Central America in the 1980's, causing hundreds of thousands of deaths. It was white men who cut funding for the levees in New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina or diverted such funds to build freeway off-ramps for casinos. It was white guys who caused the Bhopal horror. It was white guys who used the sexual organs of Native Americans they murdered as souvenirs as our brave troops did at Sand Creek Colorado in 1864. One of my favorite points that Wise makes is that while many white folks tend to picture blacks as dangerous criminals, they don't similarly racially categorize crime when white kids from "good families" go on rampages. Almost all school shootings have been conducted by white kids. Hundreds of thousands of dollars in damage have been caused by beer riots at universities. During a riot at Michigan State University in the late 90's, white students were seen trying to pry a rifle from a police car and at Washington state University in the same period, 23 cops had to be sent to the hospital. Now if these youth trying to steal the rifle were black, you can imagine that police would have shot and killed them. At Michigan State in 2002, white students launched a premeditated riot, threw rocks and bricks and bottles at cops and chanted "f--- the police." At Woodstock 1999 young white people trashed the place, looted ATM machines and young white ladies were r

Tim Wise, a white southerner, takes on all the shibboleths about race, and jousts with all the chimerical contenders. His insight, and his challenges, will move this country to a better comprehension of SELF and the OTHER, as we wade into the murkiness of race relations today.