By Anna Zeigler
Monday, March 11, 2019
It would do wonders for our political discourse if we
treated people as individuals rather than running down a checklist of the
various groups to which a person belongs before deciding how we feel about him
and how we respond to his words and actions. Wouldn’t our lives be simpler if
some things were always wrong regardless of who says or does them?
As recent events have demonstrated, the web of identity
politics and intersectionality carefully woven by the progressive left is a
labyrinth not even the wiliest of Democrats can successfully navigate.
I was twelve and sixteen on the days Bill Clinton was
elected then reelected president. The infamous blue dress became a national
topic of conversation when I was a senior in high school. All my life I’ve
watched with interest as the label “Democrat” has insulated individuals from
reprehensible behavior. Women who claim to care about women and their struggles
as a sex rallied around Clinton for years, knowingly protecting a
womanizer––and, more importantly, a man credibly accused of rape––because he
was a warrior in their crusade to continue killing the unborn.
My interest in politics emerged and blossomed when I was
in my twenties. At that time, two men sat in the Senate chamber whose pasts
should have, and would have, prevented them from being elected to public office
had they not had a (D) attached to their name. I am speaking of former senator
Ted Kennedy and former senator Robert Byrd.
Kennedy had been dead for nearly a decade before anyone
dared tell the truth about Chappaquiddick via film. He was a Kennedy and a
Democrat, and thus he had a long career in the U.S. Senate pretending,
alongside Clinton, to be a crusader for women despite having left one to drown
in his car while he scurried away to craft a story that might save his
political career.
Byrd was, of course, a former member of the Ku Klux Klan
(KKK). Both of these men happily sheltered under the umbrella of safety the
“Democrat” label provided them for years and years. They were a member of the
right group, and thus their sins were washed away, scrubbed by a media all too
eager to stuff their misdeeds down the memory hole. Democrats are quick to
offer grace to those who belong to the right group.
More recent examples of grace-by-group-affiliation are
the curious stories that emerged from the state of Virginia during––of all
months––February, Black History Month. On the heels of his infamous comments
advocating for a practice that can only be described as infanticide, it was
revealed that Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam has a curious past, to say the least.
Northam’s response to a photo on his medical school
yearbook page depicting a man in blackface alongside another man in a KKK hood
(presumably he was one of them) was a complete debacle. He apologized for it.
He then said he wasn’t in the photo, oddly enough, but had at another time worn
blackface. He seemed to indicate there had perhaps been an error by the
yearbook staff.
He claimed he would embark on a “listening tour,”
although to whom he would be listening was never defined, and I believe he
canceled the first stop. He remains the governor of Virginia, and there is no
doubt the D after his name as well as his willingness to do Planned
Parenthood’s bidding helped him weather the storm over the blackface photo and
his bizarre, flimsy pseudo-atonement.
Identity Groups
Now Matter More Than Character
Prior to Rep. Ilhan Omar’s emergence on the national
scene, the message was already clear, and tragic: It matters not what you say
or do, but rather to which groups you belong. A “D” after your name buys you
cover from your own party and from most of the national media. Not one of the
Virginia politicians whose questionable pasts came to light in February have
stepped down, despite the women who accused Virginia Lt. Gov Justin Fairfax of
sexual assault stating they are willing to testify about their experiences.
I have watched with intense curiosity (that quickly
turned to deep sadness) as Nancy Pelosi, other Democrats, and many in the
national media scrambled to figure out how to handle blatant anti-Semites in
their ranks. Omar is a member of a handful of coveted victim groups, after all.
She came to this country as a refugee from Somalia. She is a non-Caucasian and
a Muslim. She drips of every label for which the Democrats routinely go to bat.
She is featured, alongside Pelosi, on the cover of this
month’s Rolling Stone magazine. She is literally their new poster girl (or at
least cover girl), and they have ultimately decided they will provide her the
cover they provided Clinton, Kennedy, Byrd, Northam, and others. They will
excuse her anti-Semitism because she is a valuable commodity to them, and
because they fear the wrath of their rabid base.
The tricky part for Democrats is that Omar’s remarks are
highly specific and target a group whose population was literally reduced by
six million not so long ago. While, for example, Kennedy’s victim drowned in
his car, silenced forever, there are a great many Jewish voters living in the
United States who have, perhaps until recently, considered the Democratic Party
their home. Consider that Andrew Gillum, who recently lost Florida’s
gubernatorial race due in part to his inability to shore up Jewish votes in
that state, is steadfastly defending Omar.
Omar presents quite the case of cognitive dissonance for
Democrats because many in the party do not assess people as individuals but
rather via a lens of group membership, of victim status. Many of them refuse to
admit that a member of a victim group they lionize (a Muslim woman who fled
Somalia) should be assessed as an individual who deserves reprimands for
repeatedly making anti-Semitic statements.
In their dogma, a victim is always a victim and thus
cannot be an oppressor. As we’ve learned recently, there is a victim hierarchy,
and the “Jewish” label does not trump the “Muslim woman of color” label for
Democrats. It is truly an absurd way to approach life (and politics).
There are no winners in the Victimhood Olympics. These
games force you to support vile people and vile statements when those
statements are uttered by a member of a highly sought-after victim group.
The Apostle Peter explains that the Lord is no respecter
of persons. This is the best way forward for American politics, and this
applies to both sides of the aisle. Stripping people of the many labels we use
in our quest to categorize everyone, instead treating them as individuals and assessing
their behavior this way, is the only way for us to untangle ourselves from the
ridiculous web of intersectionality in which we are currently snared.
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