Racism Gets Redefined

By Madeleine Kearns

Sunday, May 28, 2023

 

Apparently, every negative social interaction between a white person and a black person can be explained by racism.

 

Take the case of Sarah Comrie, a physician’s assistant at Bellevue Hospital in New York City, who was branded a “Karen” (a racist middle-class white woman) after a disagreement with a group of young men over a Citi Bike. Comrie, who is six months pregnant, had just finished a twelve-hour shift at the hospital and was trying to leave on a bike that her lawyer has since produced evidence showing she rented, when a group of young men confronted her, claiming they had rented the bike. A struggle ensued during which Comrie called for help, expressed distress as one of the men brushed against her baby bump, started crying, and dismounted the bike.

 

If any characteristic was relevant here, it was sex — not race. Women are physically vulnerable around men and acutely aware of that fact. And perhaps none more so than small, tired, pregnant women. Comrie may have gotten emotional, but her response was also rational. Outnumbered by a confrontational group of men, she felt intimidated as any woman in her situation would. No wonder she gave the bullies what they wanted.

 

But that’s not how others saw it. Benjamin Crump, a trial lawyer, accused Comrie of “trying to STEAL” the bike from young black men and then endangering them by trying to “weaponize white tears.” The hospital, meanwhile, released a statement calling the video “disturbing” and emphasizing their commitment to fighting “discrimination” and placed Comrie on leave.

 

Or take another recent controversy. Earlier this month, Jordan Neely, a 30-year-old homeless man, got on the F train and, according to a witness, began harassing and threatening fellow passengers. In response, Daniel Penny, a 24-year-old Marine veteran, restrained Neely using a minutes-long chokehold that tragically resulted in his death. Penny is now charged with second-degree manslaughter and, if convicted, could face up to 15 years in prison. There is a serious debate to be had about whether Penny’s risk assessment was accurate, or his use of force proportionate. But once again, an outrage mob formed with little interest in the facts.

 

Perhaps naively, Penny told the New York Post, “I am not a white supremacist” and expressed admiration for other countries and cultures. But white supremacy no longer means what Penny thinks it does. White supremacy is an “invisible evil” that anyone can fall into, even “well-meaning liberal types, even people of color,” according to an American Medical Association–affiliated doctor. Reni Eddo Lodge, author of Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race, has called for “a collective redefinition of what it means to be racist and what we must do to end it.”

 

If this is effective, it is because human beings are moral creatures whose consciences are informed by external standards. Traditionally, informing consciences has been the role of religion. But whereas a Catholic following his church’s teachings knows when he has committed a sin and has a means of atonement, with “white guilt” there is no specificity in the offense and no way to make up for it. You are predestined to be an oppressor or victim based solely on characteristics you did not choose and cannot change. Under this definition, every encounter a white person has with a non-white person is potentially racist.

 

Because this is impossible to put right, the best you can do is signal your self-loathing. In 2018, a New York Times reader wrote to advice columnists, asking how he could cure his white guilt. The reader, who went by Whitey, said he felt “riddled with shame,” specifically “white shame,” “like my literal existence hurts people, like I’m always taking up space that should belong to someone else.” The responding columnist, Cheryl Strayed, who is also white, advised: “You’re feeling the full force of what it means to be white in a white supremacist culture and it makes you feel uncomfortable because up until now, in some unconscious way, you’d exonerated yourself from it.”

 

Prince Harry signaled similarly virtuous self-realization on his Netflix series, saying he’d lived with “unconscious bias” for years: “The thing with unconscious bias is it’s actually no one’s fault. But once it’s been pointed out or identified within yourself, you then need to make it right. It’s education, it’s awareness. And it’s a constant work in progress for everybody, including me.” This may sound more forgiving, but it operates by enlightened white people scapegoating the unenlightened white people.

 

The message is clear: All white people are racist, at least subconsciously. In any circumstance, neither motive nor evidence matters, only the privilege status associated with a person’s skin color. Anyone who challenges this new and expanded definition of racism can expect to be accused of it.