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26 April 2010

What if the Teabaggers weren't White?

Imagine that white members of Congress, while walking to work, were surrounded by thousands of angry black people, one of whom proceeded to spit on one of those congressmen for not voting the way the black demonstrators desired. Would the protesters be seen as merely patriotic Americans voicing their opinions, or as an angry, potentially violent, and even insurrectionary mob? After all, this is what white Tea Party protesters did recently in Washington....

Protest is only seen as fundamentally American when those who have long had the luxury of seeing themselves as prototypically American engage in it. When the dangerous and dark “other” does so, however, it isn’t viewed as normal or natural, let alone patriotic. Which is why Rush Limbaugh could say, this past week, that the Tea Parties are the first time since the Civil War that ordinary, common Americans stood up for their rights: a statement that erases the normalcy and “American-ness” of blacks in the civil rights struggle, not to mention women in the fight for suffrage and equality, working people in the fight for better working conditions, and LGBT folks as they struggle to be treated as full and equal human beings.

Depressingly truthful.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

hey, new layout. you know, i liked the old one, but this one's growing on me pretty fast.

Astatine said...

old one got messed up somehow and quit displaying parts despite my defiance and complete laziness. this one was simple. glad you approve, a few weeks after it was changed. :p

Unknown said...

sorry, yeah, i've been doing things on paper more, lately. electronic hiatus. now i'm back. a dinosaur story.

Astatine said...

i was going to come up with something witty about which kind of dinosaurs could be part of the story and i realized i only knew like 3 names. and one was thesaurus. i suck.

Unknown said...

wow.


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