Word to the Wise (Tim Wise, that is)
By: Shannon Joyce Prince
The author has the greatest respect for Tim Wise, whom she has quoted with feeling in these pages. But she's got a serious beef with the acclaimed anti-racism activist's "This is how fascism comes" essay. "There's no need for me to enumerate all the stereotypical qualities of a fascist that Tim Wise lists: wearing ‘What Would Jesus Do' bracelets, being a Nascar fan, living in a small town, drinking Pabst beer, etc." Such type-casting of people is "hateful and unacceptable - particularly from someone who considers himself liberal and progressive."
"The conflation of aesthetics with morality, geography with intelligence, and class with worth is just as foul coming from Tim Wise as it is coming from Bill Cosby."
In writing to condemn an attitude held by a white anti-racist activist I respect, I must begin with the words of William Lloyd Garrison, another white activist who is his intellectual antecedent. Garrison said, "Little boldness is needed to assail the opinions and practices of notoriously wicked men; but to rebuke great and good men for their conduct, and to impeach their discernment, is the highest effort of moral courage." Tim Wise is clearly a great and good man and one of the nation's foremost anti-racist activists, yet his recent blog post "This is how fascism comes: reflections on the cost of silence" reveals not only a powerful lack of discernment but also an intolerably ugly hatefulness.
I'll address the lack of discernment first. In an election between two men who have voiced smiling, unequivocal commitment to apartheid Israel, who each, while congressmen, voted to enlarge the scale of the war in Iraq, one of whom considers Vietnamese people to be g**ks, the other of whom merrily assures America that racism is 90% over and repeatedly chastises blacks for being lazy whiners who feed their children cold fried chicken for breakfast, Tim Wise claims that fascism will come because of the sentiments of those who support McCain as opposed to Obama. Clearly, when these are the only two viable choices fascism is already here. Indeed, the original definition of fascism was a strong coalition between business and government, yet many labor under the delusion that because we get to pick which of two men preselected by oligarchic CEOs and sponsored by Wall Street's most powerful corporations will run the country, we have a democracy. We don't get to question the system, just who runs it. The media makes so much of this small choice to hide the fact that it is the only choice we are permitted. By portraying voting as a civic duty, as opposed to a quick, infrequent ritual, citizens are relieved of their real, quotidian duties to their society. In such a context, voting for Obama over McCain is not choosing the lesser of two evils, it's simply the perpetuation of an evil system that succeeds as an illusion because one candidate is allowed a more progressive guise than the other.
"To cruelly mock those whose way of life is different from your own and to ascribe to such people all the failings of American society is hateful and unacceptable."
However, what filled me with such visceral disgust at "This is how fascism comes" is the full flowering of a usually subtle prejudice I've tried to overlook in Tim Wise's writings since they are otherwise intelligent, well researched, insightful, and compassionate. This prejudice is the conflation of aesthetics with morality, geography with intelligence, and class with worth that is just as foul coming from Tim Wise as it is coming from Bill Cosby. There's no need for me to enumerate all the stereotypical qualities of a fascist that Tim Wise lists: wearing "What Would Jesus Do" bracelets, being a Nascar fan, living in a small town, drinking Pabst beer, etc. Suffice it to say that almost everything he lists has no bearing on how intelligent, morally sound, politically astute, or racist or anti-racist someone is. Furthermore, the list is unnuanced. No distinction is made, for example, between feeling homosexual acts are wrong and being homophobic, or between being a devout student of the Bible and using distortions of the Bible as a way to mistreat others. To cruelly mock those whose way of life is different from your own and to ascribe to such people all the failings of American society is hateful and unacceptable - particularly from someone who considers himself liberal and progressive.
As someone who lives in a white gated community, grew up surrounded by multi-degreed adults (including both of my parents), and attended a predominantly white, college preparatory, private school from kindergarten through twelfth grade in one of America's largest cities before entering Dartmouth College, an Ivy League university in New Hampshire, America's second whitest state, I can say with confidence that almost all the bigots I've met have been well read, well traveled, and well off. Some of them even voted Democrat and were addicted to the Colbert Report. All of them were too savvy to sell Obama Waffles, too eloquent to use the "n-word," and too stylish to sport a trucker cap, but they were bigots all the same.
"Almost all the bigots I've met have been well read, well traveled, and well off."
Similarly, many of the most articulate (which is not to say grammatical) and radical (which doesn't mean they read Counterpunch) white people I know have been poor and/or religious and/or rural white people like the almost entirely white, rural, lower class non-professional staff at Dartmouth. In discussions I've had with these individuals I've found them to be adept recognizers of non-white disenfranchisement, white privilege, and the classism both whites and non-whites suffer. Many of them regularly engage in activities such as protesting the sexual abuse suffered by migrant Mexican female strawberry pickers. These people are not exceptions to the rule, but evidence of the fact that all communities produce a diversity of good and evil, wise and ignorant. They are people who are always rendered invisible because they have the superficial qualities progressives like to mock despite possessing the moral values progressives claim to honor.
I myself fall into at least one of the demographics Tim Wise attacks - I'm a creationist who believes the world was literally made in six days. Does that somehow undermine my anti-racist activism? Does it make me too stupid to attend Dartmouth? Does it tell you how I treat people, what books I read, how I vote (hint - I'm not a Republican), where I like to travel, or what passions stir me? Nothing unrelated to creationism can be inferred about me from the fact that I'm a creationist - only ignorant people who rely on stereotypes as opposed to deep thinking would argue otherwise.
"All communities produce a diversity of good and evil, wise and ignorant."
It might seem odd that I am defending white people in Black Agenda Report, but I do so because of my blackness. While whiteness was constructed as a way to rob others of their humanity, blackness has never been about acquiring humanity vampire-style by taking it from others. It is an expression of both my blackness and my humanity that I defend the humanity of others.
When Tim Wise, Joe Baegeant, Barbara Ehrenreich, and so many other "progressives" dehumanize those who are different and mock the poor, rural, or Christian and then wonder why the same people they regularly attack as Neanderthals to ignorant to vote in their own self interest and obsessed with values that are hollow at best and sinister at worst won't join their political party, they show that the emperor has no clothes - that the "tolerant" tolerate a very small spectrum of lifestyles. Tim Wise is one of the most heroic and courageous anti-racist activists I've ever had the privilege of reading. In fact, I frequently cite him as a source in my own writings, inspired by his lucid work. Unfortunately, neither his courage nor his heroism make valid or accurate his hate.
Originally Appeared In Black Agenda Report
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