Well, well, what do we have here? The Nation magazine anguishing over “The Unbearable Whiteness of the American Left.” Memo to lefties everywhere: when you make everything a matter of race, don’t be surprised when it comes back on you like a boomerang (oh, wait–can’t use the boomerang simile: that’s racist). Some samples:
In the United States, campaigns for social justice are always “a racial thing.” That doesn’t mean they might not be about other “things,” too. Indeed, they invariably are. Race does not exist in a vacuum. But in a country that has never considered equality beyond its most abstract iterations and that has practiced slavery far longer than freedom, race is never entirely absent. . .
Those born white and wealthy should not be slammed for developing a social conscience, becoming activists and trying to make the world a better place. But neither should the nature of their involvement be above critique. When their aim is to fight alongside low-income people and people of color as brothers and sisters, real advances are possible. But when they look down on these people as younger stepbrothers and stepsisters to be brought along for the ride, precious few gains are made.
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