Why do White People Think Wright Scarier than Hagee?
Fox News appears to have put the “Worst of Wright” tape onto a continuous loop. Right now, they have two pretty white sorority girls clucking their tongues and oh so unctiously sympathizing with the political problem it's created for Obama. The other news organizations appear to have moved on.
So now we know what the next round of emails is going to be about and what the wingnuts will be ranting about for the next five months. Unfortunately, the contradiction between their old programming re Obama being a Muslim and their new programming informing them he is a member of some dangerous heretical Christian sect full of scary black men, won't even cross cause a blip for most of them.
And, of course, Hillary's more robotic supporters now have an extra syllable to add to their Rezko Tourette's syndrome. Most of her online supporters have, for months now, been fervently wishing for, and ominously predicting, some bolt from the blue that would salvage Hillary's candidacy and elevate her to that which she is due. But then, these people have greeted every bad news cycle for Obama as the beginning of the end since the day after Super Tuesday. The fact that they've now reached the point of saying, “hey, this Hannity guy is making sense” shows they are beyond the reach of reason, though one hopes it is a temporary affliction.
In the meantime, here's the question a lot of white people who still have some measure of control over their mental faculties ought to be pondering.
Why is it that when a black preacher who supports a black presidential candidate is discovered to have made some crazy-ass, angry, over-the-top comments from the left over the course of a 40 year career, white people of all political persuasions, go absolutely batshit insane,
. . . and yet . . .
when white preachers who support white presidential campaigns are shown to have consistently been saying crazy-ass, angry, over-the-top things from the right, day in and day out, year after year, sermon after sermon, white people of all political persuasions are, at worst, mildly offended and just shake it off with a "well, you know how those guys are, no real harm in it" and move on to the next thing?
Seriously, why does the former induce such outage, while the latter gets nothing more than a furrowed brow?
Many have said, “but, but, but, this is different- - twenty years, actual pastor rather than a mere supporter, that's what makes all the difference.” Okay, fine. I think that is a transparent rationalization, but let's take it as true. Even if true, it is merely an argument for why Wright is a bigger political problem for Obama than Hagee is for McCain. It is not responsive to the question I asked. My question is this: why are Wright's comments are so much more upsetting to white people than Hagee's?
You've probably guessed I have a hypothesis.
Fear.
A particular kind of fear. The special fear people experience when they see people who look like themselves crapping on people who don't. It is, at some level, quite a rational fear rooted in basic human empathy. Your brain sees people being who are down and subconsciously performs an empathic calculation: “how would I feel if that was me getting crapped on? Pretty pissed, I bet.” Anger equals threat. And, unfortunately, here's the part where the f**ked up way the human brain works screws us up. Because this calculation is performed subconsciously, we are aware of the threat—creatures that cannot perceive and act upon threats do not live to reproduce—but we are not consciously aware of the cause of the threat. Lacking conscious awareness, we instead seek to couter the threat while simultaneously constructing myths to protect ourselves from the harsher truth of where that threatening anger comes from.
Thus begins a vicious cycle. Injustice leads to anger, those who are the target of the anger respond with oppression, oppression leads to more anger which leads to more oppression and so on and so on and so on down through the ages. At a certain point, the original injustice fades into the mists of history, and all that's left is the cycle of anger and repression.
By day, slaveholders talked among themselves about their childlike, contented slaves singing songs and cheerfully working their lives away for ol' massa, but, at night, rhwy filled the roads with bands of drunken heavily armed crackers who had a pretty much an open writ to commit whatever mayhem they wanted upon any black person they found out at night without a pass. Much has, of course, changed, but the cycle of oppression, causes anger, anger causes fear, fear causes oppression, oppression causes anger continues down to this day, our ancestors' poisonous bequest to their posterity.
White people have gotten their panties in a bunch over the compilation of Jerimiah Wright's worst five minutes, and eagerly leap to the conclusion that those five minutes are the essence of his entire ministry because, at some level, they know that if they were treated the way African Americans are, and have been, treated in this country, they'd be angry all the time. That anger scares them in a way that the looniest ravings of John Hagee never could. They can't consciously accept that there's a reason for that anger that has something to do with themselves, so, instead, they become outraged about the outrage.
The incessant demands by people like Hannity, Limbaugh and O'Reilly that African Americans constantly prove their undying, unconditional loyalty, display mindless patriotism and feel immense gratitude is the defense mechanism by which they shield themselves from their fear that some blacks might be a little angry at them for crappng on them all the time. When actually confronted with an angry black person, they pee their pants and become hysterical. Hagee? Sure he says repulsive things about Jews and Catholics, but its not like they have any reason to actully fear him given that they've done nothing to him.
And, therein lies the irony. The white outrage over Wright's comments is born of fear which, in turn, is the product of subconscious awareness of having some resposibility for the creation , or at least redress, of the sources of that anger. And yet these same who are loudly expressing their fearful outrage say that anyone who tries to explain or understand the causes of Wright's anger is merely acting on the basis of white guilt.
Great post.
March 15, 2008 5:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
So, having looked this over, I am again compelled to ask: Christamighty, TPM guys, could we please have an edit function?
March 15, 2008 5:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Please email Andrew Golis on needed features---
andrew@talkingpointsmemo.com
March 15, 2008 6:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think we should collect the craziest white preacher stuff altogether, label it as the "previously unknown sermon by Obama's Imam.. I mean pastor Wright" and see if we can get FOX to bite.
Sadly, I think our target audience would probably not get it and think it really WAS Wright anyway.
March 15, 2008 6:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
Lol!
Seriously, somebody does need to do that mashup. Its beyond my skill set, but it needs doing.
Meanwhile, someone needs to send an army of janitors, a pallet of saline drips and a case of Kaopectate over to Fox. I've been checking in for five second doses all day and the way they've been continuiously crapping themselves over this thing makes me suspect they've had an outbreak of dysentary.
March 15, 2008 6:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Please, somebody do it!! It's a great idea!
I want to add Parsley's name to the list of criminally insane white preacher that the Right courts. The huge difference between Wright and Hagee/Parsley is of course the latter has politically influenced WH policies and have a direct impact on politics. This madness to annihilate Muslims and end Islam will bring us armageddon indeed, and the "white crusaders" are allowed to get away with this shit because the "progresives" aren't really outraged, not as outraged as they are now.
March 15, 2008 10:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree with MsJane, great post. I think you are absolutely right... fear is the lowest common denominator.
I happen to think its only the white people who watch FoxNews that have their panties in a bunch, they like fear because coming up with ideas or god-forbid CONSENSUS is just too hard.
The few who claim this Rev. Wright stuff was a 'deal breaker' were looking for Obama's 'too-black-for-me' smoking gun anyway, trying to get out voting for him without dubbing themselves anti-black.
By the way, I'm getting really sick of CNN's protrayal of 'white voters' as being fearful of Wright's statements.
I'm not scared of a fiery black preacher, but I will admit to being scared of Hagee's absolutism and fervent wish for WWIII.
March 15, 2008 6:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Main point is you are surely right that it is scary to hear the slaves planning insurrection.
Hagee can say completely demented stuff, but Wright is mainly exaggerating. And more than one white cracker preacher looked for reasons to blame some parts of the US for 9/11. The difference is that those guys were blaming distant denizens of NY, while Wright was blaming the power elites and crackers together. Too close to home, and too close to the truth.
March 15, 2008 6:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm sick of hearing creepy preacher talk from everyone. I wouldn't vote for anyone who is endorsed by Hagee. I was disgusted when Obama let some homophobe preacher do a campaign tour through the south--that, and the idea that white people invented AIDS to kill black people, bugs me a lot more than saying "God Damn America" for its racism. But it doesn't take a political strategy genius to know that "God Damn America" is a pretty bad phrase to have pinned on your candidate during a campaign year. Gosh, why are people so upset?
March 15, 2008 7:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
Interesting post, but no, I think you're wrong. It isn't fear. It's something far more basic. It's identity.
Whites don't normally think of themselves in terms of race. If they see a white man, they think 'man.' If they see a white woman, they think 'woman.' But if they see a black man or a black woman, they think 'black man' or 'black woman.'
When Barack Obama started campaigning, most people saw a candidate, not a 'black candidate.' In fact, there were questions about whether he was 'black enough' to appeal to African-Americans. His Republican opponents - and the Clinton campaign, which has become increasingly Republican - have struggled ever since to get white Americans to see him as a 'black candidate.'
This is similar. When white Americans see Hagee, they see a loony preacher. But when they see Wright, they see a loony BLACK preacher. And though they might be used to the idiotic rantings of someone like Hagee, and so easily dismiss it, they aren't used to the idiotic rantings of someone like Wright. It's alien to them, and it helps them see Barack Obama as alien, too, as a 'black candidate' and not just a candidate.
It's not fear, really, it's just reminding white Americans that he's different from them. I think Barack Obama can get past that, but it's not helpful for any candidate.
March 15, 2008 8:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
Excellent points and you're quite right, but I'm not sure we're saying different things.
March 15, 2008 9:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
That was a very thoughtful post; must less infalmmatory than mine. Thank you.
March 15, 2008 9:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
I am a white, 60 year-old woman, and I think they are both disgusting! I despise screaming hate-speech, whether it is based on past wrongs, or just plain stupidity.
I personally think you have to be intellectually vacant in order to voluntarily go to listen to people screech their thoughts (?) out in order to get inspiration. Those who joyfully float along with mass hysteria can be pushed in any direction that their leader chooses.
You want irony? Whites, blacks, muslims and all who think their religion is what makes them better than everyone else, actually is what is poisoning our world.
March 15, 2008 9:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wright isn't scarier than Hagee. Both men are entirely insane.
March 15, 2008 9:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
I note that the Inside Washington show had Colby King (I think that's his name) the WaPo columnist.
He said that he's heard this kind of thing many times in black churches -- America being the most segregated on Sunday mornings.
I wonder if Fox and ABC would ever bother to talk to some preachers to see what they think. Can anyone well respected and established vouch for Wright? Does he fly off the handle sometimes, or is he usually like that? Or was it taken out of context.
Not being religious or a member of a black church, it's hard for me to say. But I wonder why the media never bothers to actually add to context.
I do know that I've heard some of those conspiracy theories from black friends, so I am not shocked. I think history creates some paranoia, and I can understand that. eg. Is it a stretch to think that the government created AIDS to hurt black people when the government gave black people syphilis on purpose during those Tuskeegee experiments.
My view is that some of the rightwingers get their panties in a bunch on this just don't know any black people and are indeed afraid.
March 15, 2008 9:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's what I've been saying for the past few days. Wright...that type of speech...you hear in black churches and masjids all over the country. It's nothing new or interesting. Yeah, everyone once in a while a preacher/imam goes over the line--even in mosques full of Middle Easterns/Arabs/Asians some of our imams would cross a line knowing that the place was bugged.
My grandfather was a preacher, my daddy is a preacher...some of the sermons they've given would make the people crying over Wright's comments just up and die. Like I posted earlier, these Wright clips are tame compared to some of the stuff I've heard.
This drama is actually a giant yawner. The only thing funny out of it are the people who are like, "How dare he!?!?" Even though they said some of the same shit last year. Liberal drama is almost as boring and stupid as curling.
March 15, 2008 10:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
As someone who's never been in a black church and avoided white churches as well, I've been wondering about this.
Who else here has been or are members in a black congregation?
March 16, 2008 4:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
No. As usual you are incredibly wrong.
There are two things at work here. FOX news-type people because they are hypocrites. They are simply incapable of criticising their own (Hagee) and cannot wait to attack people that are on the other side (Wright).
We on the left are not averse to criticising people "on our side." And therefore it now appears that everyone in the world is after Wright.
Destor23 is right...both men are insane! It's just that Hagee isn't Clinton's or Obama's mentor. And most in these pages are more concerned with our own. If McCain wants to hang himself with Hagee...fine with us.
So sorry to disappoint you and ruin your oh so clever theory, but nobody is afraid. (Unless you're just projecting.)
March 15, 2008 9:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
Excellent post. You're two for two and are on somewhat of an intellectual roll. Keep up the good work and thinking Steve.
One point that I'd like to reiterate where I think that this Wright situation has actually helped Senator Obama is in helping dispell the muslim question and in bringing him back to message and focus as a unifying leader. Fox, who along with Bob Kerrey's muslim rant last year and HIllary Clinton's 60 Minutes hedging hesitition on Steve Kroft's religion question, has really helped all of the conservatives see that he is actually not only Christian but quite religious-certainly much more than John McCain or Hillary.
He has also taking advantage of the opportunity to play uniter and speak about the religious and race divides in the U.S.
Your points are right, but I think that Barack Obama is going to remind voters and superdelegates how he can fight without resorting to the bullying tactics of Fox and the Clintons.
March 15, 2008 10:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
Bravo. Beautiful. You - made - my day!
Another feature I would like to see here is:
either a signup for daily newsletter,
or
a way to subscribe to some of the commentators like "The Commenter Formerly Known as NCSteve".
Thank you thank you!
March 15, 2008 10:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Why when a black preacher .. white people of all political persuasions, go absolutely batshit insane,
. . . and yet . . .
when white preachers ... just shake it off with a "well, you know how those guys are, no real harm in it" and move on to the next thing?
Seriously, why does the former induce such outage, while the latter gets nothing more than a furrowed brow?
Many people don't realize their double standards. "Unconscious bias" is how we view "our in group" compared with "an out group". "Our in group" who show up late for work "must have had traffic problem" and the "out group'rs" are "lazy and can't get themselves going." It shows up at work, in the criminal justice system, in schools and everywhere.
March 15, 2008 11:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
Both Wright and Hagee say some really off the wall, insane things. I am horrified by both of their comments and would never attend either church. The difference I see is that this is Obama's pastor at the church he has attended for years. I do not buy the response that Obama missed these services. Perhaps he missed some, but if he missed every single instance where Wright was delivering these types of messages, he was not a very committed attender. My point is, it is impossible to regularyly attend a church with a pastor giving these kinds of messages and never once to get the gist of them. I have been in a church like that. After voicing my concern to the pastor and the church office, I left the church when the messages continued. Yes, pastors regardless of color can get off track. It's time to call them on it and stop following immediately if they do not respond. That Obama stuck around is what's scary to me. Or it's possible that he didn't regularyly attend services but claimed to be a member. Does that seem hypocritical?
March 15, 2008 11:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
You're missing the biggest DUH of them all: Wright doesn't talk like that every week. As I mentioned above my father is a preacher, my grandfather was a preacher...even though they delivered much harsher sermons than these little clips, they didn't do it weekly or even monthly. The other big DUH is that, even when my father gave his huge anti-war sermon in late 2002, the blustery parts that would make someone like you faint, were only 2 minutes out of the entire 93 minutes sermon. Before that, his most recent political sermon was in Dec. 2000 when the Supreme Court gave Bush the presidency.
My grandfather gave a sermon in '93 warning his congregation to watch and be wary of Bill Clinton. IIRC, that sermon was a little over an hour and he spent 5 minutes on how much trouble Clinton will get into because he's an adulterer. That came almost 3 years after his last political sermon.
March 16, 2008 1:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
Very few people go "congregation hopping" in their lifetime. For most people I know, the congregation you join in your youth usually becomes a part of your identity. There are friends, family, co-workers you see every week or maybe every day for 20 years. It becomes a part of your extended family.
Unless there is something fundamentally wrong with the principles the congregation or community is founded upon, I believe its actually more ethical to stay and change things from within that community when you notice something you disagree with. Just picking up and abandoning your community and the people within it is not only irresponsible, it is also cowardly.
In a lot of ways, I think I probably feel the same way about the U.S. as Obama feels about his church. I was born and raised in the U.S. There were some things I disliked about growing up here as someone with yellow skin and slanty eyes, but there are so many more things I love about being American. Its a part of my identity. Its a part of my being. I am appalled by my country's illegal invasion and torturing of Iraqis and its oppression of brown-skinned people. I am also quite thoroughly disgusted by my current government and some of the people who represent it. I am deeply saddened that half of my country willingly gives power to these charlatans.
Anytime I wanted to I could just "quit" America and move to Japan and live a just as fruitful, if not more fruitful life. Yet despite that fact, I choose to stay here and change our current situation from within my community. Everyone I love lives here, everything I have ever known since I was an infant exists on these soils. I choose to take responsibility to change my community rather than run away from it. Do I agree with everything that my country does or says? No. But I love it for what its founded upon and the spirit of what it represents. It is who I am.
If all parishioners believed every word their pastor said, the world would still be mired in the Dark Ages. Barack isn't a fricken zombie. He's educated and intelligent and can filter out the jewels from the flack. Obama is looking to change the direction of his nation. What better place to start than with the congregation he was brought up in.
March 16, 2008 7:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
I admit I overreacted to Wright's rhetoric.
Personally, I was afraid for Obama.
But now I'm afraid for Rev. Wright. For a man's entire life to be reduced to a 30 second smear...
could any of us handle it?!? I know I've said some crazy shit I'd hate to see shown on continuous loop.
March 15, 2008 11:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Dr. Wright has been preaching for 36 years. 48 out of 52 Sundays..what, 40 minutes at a time...not including guest speaking engagements....and, they're trying to say that his entire career are those few minutes?
Hell no.
White people think Wright is scarier, because he's a Black man telling them the unvarnished, unapologetic truth about this country, and that, is indeed scary to a lot of White folks. That he refuses to put a happy face on it, also scares a lot of White folks to death. He's a Black man who has no intention of kissing White ass; he's an ANGRY Uppity Negro, and they are always dangerous for White people.
Keep on, keeping on, Dr. Wright. We know you speak the truth.
March 16, 2008 2:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
What are white people?
Best, Terry
March 16, 2008 6:26 AM | Reply | Permalink
Good question. Damifino what the answer it. I'm of far less than pure European descent myself, yet, when I have to check a box on the form, I check "Caucasian."
March 16, 2008 9:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
The Commenter Formerly Known as NCSteve,
Have you considered that Caucasians inhabit every continent and may have been the first inhabitants of the Americas?
Caucasians have skin with all ranges of pigmantation. The racism that equates Caucasian with light skin and European is simply factually wrong.
These are some of my indigenous European ancestors. They look "white" to anyone?
Thank you for your comment, Steve. The determined ignorance of most posters on race is much like the Victorian view of sex.
Best, Terry
March 16, 2008 12:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
The difference between the Hagee comments and the Wright comments, is that at least Obama has a relationship with Wright. When he joined the church 17 years ago, I doubt he joined specifically because the pastor sometimes said some inflamatory stuff.
In McCain's case, he had absolutely no relationship with Hagee, had to know everything Hagee had said in the past, and STILL actively seeked out his endorsement, and stood on the stage with him.
March 16, 2008 6:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
The difference is that you can't expect a comparable presentation of Hagee's and Wright's statements by the mainstream media.
First, take the worst thing Hagee said and put it under a picture of McCain. Then take "God Damn America" and put it under a picture of Obama.
Which one will resonate with voters? They'll look at the McCain poster and be puzzled, or think it unfair; they'll look at Obama's and say, "Oh yeah, I remember that."
March 16, 2008 10:06 AM | Reply | Permalink
http://youtube.com/watch?v=bOOL3BYaIEQ
"Don't let anybody make you think God chose America as his divine messianic force to be a sort of policeman of the whole world. God has a way of standing before the nations with justice and it seems I can hear God saying to America "you are too arrogant, and if you don't change your ways, I will rise up and break the backbone of your power, and I will place it in the hands of a nation that doesn't even know my name. Be still and know that I'm God. Men will beat their swords into plowshafts and their spears into pruning hooks, and nations shall not rise up against nations, neither shall they study war anymore." I don't know about you, I ain't going to study war anymore."
Martin Luther King Jr.
Address to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (1967-08-16)
March 16, 2008 11:26 AM | Reply | Permalink
The MSM tone about Wright is fundamentally prejudiced. We have white pundits gets all huffy and scared because a popwerful black preacher is angry at American arrogance and racism. I note that the MSM doesn't invite any black commentators to give THEIR view. It's only the white perspective. (And of course, conveniently, white fire-and-brimstone preachers get a pass -- why? because of the white comfort level) The response to this is totally irrational. Wright is proudly black and indignant about Americas failings. BO aside, I think the MSM is, to borrow a phrase, truly engaging in a "high tech lynching" here.
As an aside, the WaPo columnist Colby King, a black man, said he has heard preachers like Wright many times before. He said it is a way for the black community to vent their frustrations. And he pointed out that the most segregated day of the week is Sunday morning. Apart from him, I haven't seen anyone ask a black person for their perspective on this. Just whites talking about white's feelings.
March 16, 2008 11:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
It deeply bothers me to hear Wright called insane -- unless it is insane to tell the truth in our culture of ignorance and selfishness. He tells the truth. I would appreciate it if someone who calls Wright insane would critique Wright's sermon line by line and explain what is insane about it.
Does anyone who calls Wright insane have the honesty to do this?
March 16, 2008 12:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hannity probably has a conservative white preacher. Wonder if he's ever said anything controversial? Nah. Hannity would have left the church if he did.
March 16, 2008 1:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
We keep responding to his poor choice of words/language and not to his message. Is his message inflammatory or scary?
March 16, 2008 1:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
WRoss,
It is generally more effective to attack the speaker than his ideas.
Wright is simply wrong claiming that the AIDS epidemic was engineered to kill "black" people. The suspicion that the development of the Salk vaccine was responsible has been refuted but the myth lives on.
The idea is no more insane than the myth of black and white races or the ludicrous apotheosis of its reverse that race is a social construct. All are motivated by anger and superstition that care little for the facts.
I once knew a nice lady that thought Martians lived among us.
She was as unshakable in her belief that those Martians lived among us as Chris Matthews is in a white race. Neither are insane. Neither cares much for the truth of matters.
Best, Terry
March 16, 2008 1:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Terry,
I hadn't heard the Wright sermon in which he said that AIDS was deliberately designed to kill black people. If Wright believes that, he is a fool; if he doesn't believe it but said it anyway, he is a liar.
Sorry I missed that.
March 16, 2008 9:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good points, all around here. I don't think you can separate fear from identity, and this has become truer now that identity is a more fragile thing than ever before.
The fact is that people actually care more about families (or tribes) they've chosen than the ones they are handed. But then there's that whole guilt thing driving their behaviour. And that's the denominator connecting fear and identity here: guilt. That's why Wright makes fright.
March 16, 2008 2:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
I am amazed that Obama didn't put more distance between himself and Wright ages ago... It's a no brainer. To me that is the big mystery: why wait until now?
http://seaton-newslinks.blogspot.com
March 16, 2008 2:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've been trying to balance the trashing of Reverend Wright with the hagiographic gushing about Bill Buckley. WFB was a racist wingnut and it seems like everyone wants to excuse that flaw in how he viewed the world.
In the clamoring rush of Whites to the right -- I have yet to hear one wingnut pundits EVER acknowledge that the conservative movement is based on a conflating economic concentration and white privilege with a solid dop of imperialism.
The end result of this latest piece of Know-Nothingism has been "W's" presidency. As the right stampeded this country into a lemming-like dive into history's dustbin.
Ah sic transit gloria!
Frankly Wright's been kinda prophetic -- and the sad part is that when white folks hear his words they don't seem understand. The problem is not in Wright's words -- instead as the poets said: "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, But in ourselves."
March 16, 2008 3:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
March 16, 2008 3:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, just because the white flight went even further down the rabbit hole than WFB wanted it to go doesn't let him off the hook. But at least he noticed in the end.
March 16, 2008 7:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
Why do Hillary's concern trolls always phrase this as "when the GOP uses this stuff..."
The swiftboating is not later. The swiftboating is NOW. And the swiftobaters are HRC and her concern trolls.
There's something strange about how attacks on Wright are generally phrased as "when the voters learn about this guy ..."
I wonder if the MSM will wake up to its utter hypocrisy on Wright. His HIV theory and 911 conspiracy is wrong. So what? Lots of wrong ideas out there. I think his ideas are in fact not anything like Falwells, which are based on an unjust hatred and intolerance of gays, women, minorities. Wright's righteous anger is directed towards slavery, oppression, discrimination. Wright is wrong only in tone and degree. The myth about Wright seems to be a rightwing generated piece of "outrage" and sustained by ignorant and prejudiced white pundits.
And believe me, I am white, and I know the deep-seated reaction of whites to Wright. It makes me cringe. But when I read it on paper, although I disagree, I think he is not crazy and certainly not hateful.
March 16, 2008 3:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Loki, here's the short answer. Diagnosing someone as "insane" on the basis of five minutes of soundbites strung together by some network news asshole strikes me as kind of like Bill Frist diagnosing Terri Schiavo's mental faculties based on an hourlong tape of specially chosen moments assembled by her family. Except that Bill Frist was at least a doctor and the tape he was watching was twelve times longer.
Everyone says some crazy shit from time to time. Doesn't mean they're actually insane.
Additionally, labelling both of them as "insane" is dismissive because it implies that each is just sui generis and, therefore, not indicative of any larger pattern. Several posters here have pointed out, the kind of over the top rhetoric you're hearing is pretty common in black churches. It was news to me and given my background, it shouldn't have been.
We all would do well to reflect upon what it means that a) we white people didn't know that--are totally taken by surprise by that, and, b) that it is that common. But then, for that matter, since this came up, I've been surprised by the number of anecdotes I've seen on the web from Jews talking about how they dealt, or did not deal, with rabbis given to occaisional bouts of kooky-talk at temple.
I do know for a fact that Hagee's crazytalk isn't just the talk of one crazy guy with a few thousand followers. That kind of stuff that gets said or implied in thousands of supposedly "mainstream" Southern Baptist Churches here across the South--churches that almost invariably have their own schools attached to them incidentally.
March 16, 2008 4:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
I really don't know why I have to do this, but...it seems importaqnt that I clarify my every word. When I say "criminally irresposible" or "that guy's insane!" I'm being hyperbolic. I don't actually tink anyone needs to be arrested or committed to an asylum.
If we're really going to have to rate the men side by side, then OK Hagee wins. He's the nuttiest. But the rest of my point above remains. I think we on the left are much more willing to distance ourselves, even openly criticise someone from "our side" more than the conservatives are. I think that aspect of it has a lot to do with what is going on here.
I honestly do not think it has anything to do with fear.
If Geraldine Ferraro said she thought GWB was instrumental in bringing down the Twin Towers I'd be all over her like stink on poop. And so would you and you'd right!
I just grew tired of people trying to defend the indefensible. At least that was my impression of what many wre doing. As you may or may not know, I'm a new convert...Obama is my man. I'm happy to vote for him in November. I'm glad about how he's handled this situation. But commenters in these pages keep trying to salvage Wright. I'm just can't get behind that.
I'll try to tone it down in the future.
March 16, 2008 5:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
Jesus...sooo many typos! Forgot to proof read before hitting "send." Sorry.
March 16, 2008 5:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
Nobody's defending. Explaining, understanding and seeking context, yes.
March 16, 2008 6:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
"...His HIV theory and 911 conspiracy is wrong..."
Maybe, but it might be an idea to give him a break? Ever heard of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study what the American government did do to the African American community and the understandable mistrust it created.
http://www.pagesinblack.com/cgi-bin/african-american.cgi?Operation=ItemLookup&ItemId=1588380890
March 16, 2008 5:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
"...His HIV theory and 911 conspiracy is wrong..."
Maybe, but it might be an idea to give him a break? Ever heard of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study what the American government did do to the African American community and the understandable mistrust it created.
http://www.pagesinblack.com/cgi-bin/african-american.cgi?Operation=ItemLookup&ItemId=1588380890
March 16, 2008 5:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Right there with you, brother.
March 16, 2008 6:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
http://youtube.com/watch?v=bOOL3BYaIEQ
"Don't let anybody make you think God chose America as his divine messianic force to be a sort of policeman of the whole world. God has a way of standing before the nations with justice and it seems I can hear God saying to America "you are too arrogant, and if you don't change your ways, I will rise up and break the backbone of your power, and I will place it in the hands of a nation that doesn't even know my name. Be still and know that I'm God. Men will beat their swords into plowshafts and their spears into pruning hooks, and nations shall not rise up against nations, neither shall they study war anymore." I don't know about you, I ain't going to study war anymore."
Martin Luther King Jr.
Address to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (1967-08-16)
March 16, 2008 7:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
Steve,
Wright told his congregation that the government had invented HIV to kill off people of color. And rather than condemn it you want everyone to "understand" or keep it in "context" while you and other overly guilty white folks try to "explain" it. Do you really not see the condescencion here?
It sounds kind of like, "That's OK, he's black. He can say these ridiculous things because "his people" have been descriminated against. Nothing to see here. They're just poor put-upon black folk, they don't know of what they speak."
Do you really not see this?
March 16, 2008 8:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Loki,
I get your shock. When I found out, back in the 90s, that a large percentage of black people, including well-educated black people, believe this with all their hearts, I was shocked too.
Then I got over it. Yes, its irrational, but, damn, irrationality is the human condition. Half the people in this country don't believe in evolution or the Big Bang. Uncounted millions believe that what cards have fallen in the previous poker hands in a session have some effect on what will happen in subsequent hands. Millions believe the government was behind 9/11. Millions of Hillary's supporters believe she can catch up in the delegate count. Tens of millions believe that the government has computers that read every single email sent in the country and listen to every single phone call with a foreign origin or termination. (Oh, wait, that one's true.)
We can't make people stop believing stuff that isn't true just by telling them it isn't true. The comments section of the TPMEC's blog is a monument to that truism. Getting upset about it is unproductive. What is productive is to ask this question: Why do so many black people believe this AIDs myth? Is there, perhaps, something in their life experience that makes what's seems so incredibly implausible for us seem so credible to them?
March 25, 2008 10:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
"Do you really not see this?"
Do you really not see that what you are really doing is simply beating up on a minority group? They are scary, they are wrong. Not only has Wright been smeared and tarred and attacked for being angry and black (unlike Falwell and Robertson and Graham and Hagee) but indeed all black people have always been smeared for hundreds of years as inferior and dangerous and suspect.
The adults among us recognize the dangers of kneejerks attacks on black people because of all the baggage we have.
This has been a hightech lynching -- just like the lynchings of old, this has been a rush to judgment, where the black man is guilty until proven innocent.
March 17, 2008 9:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
On the typos, I mean.
March 25, 2008 10:02 AM | Reply | Permalink