Tim Scott's Rather Effective Political Trap
The rebuttal to "America is not a racist country" is not "America is not a racist country"
Publisher’s Riff
Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), representing the state that sparked the Civil War, laid one of the most successful political traps of 2021 thus far: "America is not a racist country."
Not only did this virtually overshadow and distract from a really significant announcement from President Biden last week about what amounts to a historic $6 trillion human investment, but it further obfuscated needed discourse on racism in America. While the justifiably enraged - but, always misled - social media space immediately lunged into "Uncle Tim" caricatures (which only led to a predictable knee jerk from faux-outraged White conservatives who accused them of being "racist" and bullying Scott, and it's been a cafeteria food fight ever since), we're still light years away from that essential first ingredient: an established, universal definition of racism.
What is racism, anyway? Well, it's not what pop culture distorted it into for the past few decades: that it's, simply, people saying or doing impolite, slanderous and bigoted things we see in public. A diet on seasons of White dude sit-coms and sloppy reality TV conversations showing kids calling kids racist for saying the dumbest and most offensive shit got us all fooled into thinking racism is just when people call you "the N-word" and if you happen to catch them on smartphone either kneeing, shooting or baton-cracking a Black man. We accepted the lazy, half-baked definition of racism to lead us into believing that "yeah, you tell 'em, Tim: America's not racist. We don't use those words anymore!" We’re more concerned about hurting people’s feelings when they get called “racist,” rather than sorting out why they’re doing racist things in the first damn place.
But, racism is actually much, much worse than sticks, stones or words. Webster dictionary explains …
[A] belief that race is a fundamental determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race; the systemic oppression of a racial group to the social, economic, and political advantage of another.
Legendary racism de-coder Neely Fuller, Jr., however, presents a much more forceful - and accurate - definition in his unmatched classic The United Independent Compensatory Code/System/Concept: A Compensatory Counter-Racist Code …
Racism is one or more White people using deceit, direct violence or the threat of violence, to promote falsehood, non-Justice, and/or incorrectness against Non-White people in every area of activity (Economics, Education, Entertainment, Labor, Law, Politics, Religion, Sex, and War/Counter-War).
Still, we don't have a universally or widely accepted definition, yet. Which makes Scott's trap more effective - because, hint: you don't respond to "America is not a racist country" by repeating the exact same thing as a rebuttal. But, that's exactly what Vice President Kamala Harris did, President Joe Biden did and Black political Godfather Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC) all did. Republicans, knowing full well that Democrats are always too afraid to rock a boat when the water gets choppy, masterfully laid the trap by using Scott - all too eager to do it - as the perfect and polished Black bait.
There's a better way to manage that situation rather than getting your ankle caught in the rabbit trap. Just go honest. Knowing corporate media would play its game, Democrats should have simply decided to shut it down by doing the exact opposite of what Republicans, reporters and seasoned political observers expected them to do. Just say, in the most matter-of-fact way, that "yeah, of course America is a racist country. Is that a trick question? Or: What rock you've been living under?" Biden, Harris and Democrats could have spent an entire weekend disarming media, Republicans and their detractors through rhetorical bravery … that wouldn’t have cost them anymore than, perhaps, a week of controversial media cycle (at best) until the next news flash. Then quickly add: "But, hey, listen: that's the reason why we have a workable agenda to fix that once and for all. Our first step was $2 trillion in pandemic relief, and we've got another $2 trillion in direct investments in the America Families Plan to address these constant inequities and $2 trillion more to close the economic divide created and aggravated by racism."
Instead they self-muzzled the message in a bid to placate White voters. They took the safe route, too scared to get blunt because they felt they'd lose voters they didn't have anyway in 2016, 2018 or 2020. They missed, again, another chance to push the country towards an honest conversation about race and energize and earn the trust of their base heading into 2022. That continues to look bleak and Democrats, barely hanging on to the House, Senate and many state legislatures, really don't appear to give a damn.