Shannon Prince vs. Tim Wise:
Rebuttal and Response
In last week's issue of BAR, Shannon Joyce Prince, a Black
student at Dartmouth College and frequent contributor to these pages, strongly
criticized anti-racist activist and author Tim Wise for exhibiting an
"intolerably ugly hatefulness" in his treatment of "poor and/or religious
and/or rural white people," whom Ms. Prince charges Wise demonizes and
stereotypes. In the article, "Word
to the Wise (Tim Wise, that is)," Ms. Prince, a self-described
"creationist" whose political views are otherwise decidedly leftist, praised
the moral and political qualities of "the almost entirely white, rural, lower
class non-professional staff at Dartmouth" whom she has found "to be adept
recognizers of non-white disenfranchisement, white privilege, and the classism
both whites and non-whites suffer." Prince described Wise's October 11 article
"This
is How Fascism Comes: Reflections on the Cost of Silence," originally
published on Wise's website, as "hateful and unacceptable - particularly from
someone who considers himself liberal and progressive."
On October 23, Tim Wise posted a rebuttal to Ms. Prince's
critique. We publish it in full, below, followed by Shannon Prince's response.
The
Election, Rural Folk and Fascism: A Reply to Shannon Prince
by Tim Wise
This article originally appeared in the "Red Room" section
of Mr. Wise's website.
"If you can't tell the
difference between an honest to God Hitler worshipper and a typical corporate
shill, then I can't do anything for you."
Being criticized for the things you say, when you're a
writer, is to be expected. It's part of the gig, so to speak, and so most of
the time, when such critiques are offered, I let them pass without much comment.
But sometimes, criticisms can be so off base as to require a somewhat harsher
reply. This is one of those times.
Today I received the link to a piece entitled "Word to the Wise" (where the "Wise"
reference means me), written by Shannon Prince, and published on the website of
the Black Agenda Report, which has run several of my essays over the years, and
for which I have great respect and admiration. Many of Ms. Prince's former
essays on the site have been instructive and thought-provoking, and so I have
long admired her as well. But today's piece, which was a reply to a recently
released essay of mine ("This is How Fascism Comes"), while surrounded by
otherwise kind comments about my previous writing and work, was so incomplete
and distorted that I feel compelled now to issue a reply, and to challenge
readers to read the post that started all this mess for themselves, side by
side with Ms. Prince's critique of it, and decide which version of reality is
more, well, real. Links to both my original essay and Ms. Prince's critique of
it are included in this piece, so that readers can check them out if so
inclined.
First, Ms. Prince suggests that my concern over the coming
of fascism is apparently absurd because, after all, a choice between Obama and
McCain is so pathetic as to render democracy as a concept pretty much
superfluous.
But although Ms. Prince accuses me of lacking the
discernment necessary to recognize this truth, it is she whose discernment
skills are apparently lacking in this instance. That there is hardly a dime's worth
of difference between these two candidates on certain issues is true, and
regrettable to be sure (and worth pointing out). But that fact is simply not
tantamount to the suggestion that there is no literal difference between the
effect that one, versus the other would have on the nation's future. Ms. Prince
ignores history in suggesting otherwise: it really does matter who is elected,
perhaps only at the margins, but it matters nonetheless. There really are
policy differences between these men, perhaps not on Palestine/Israel or
certain aspects of U.S. militarism, but on health care, education, tax policy
and judicial appointments, there most certainly are. And they matter. Those who
cannot discern the difference between what an administration that includes
Sarah Palin would be like, and one that is headed by Barack Obama, are
seriously mired in a cynicism almost too flabbergasting to comprehend. The fact
is, and it is really not debatable: as much as I could not get excited about an
Al Gore presidency (and indeed I did not vote for him) in 2000, had he been
president after 9/11, there would never have been an invasion of Iraq in 2003.
Would he have done substantively what Bush did in Afghanistan? Probably, and
regrettably so. But Al Gore, seeing no need to impress his daddy, would not
have invaded Iraq, and there would be, as a result, several hundred thousand
Iraqis alive today who are not. To suggest that this doesn't matter because
Gore is still a militarist at heart, is to suggest that those dead Iraqis do
not matter. They do, as do the dead Americans whose deaths are the result of
having been sent there to fight. So, elections matter, even when the choices
are, as Ms. Prince notes, pathetic; Goldwater really would have been worse in
1964, Nixon really was worse in 1968 and 1972, and there are tens of thousands
who were killed in Central America in the 80s who really wouldn't have been but
for Reagan's victory in 1980 and again in 1984. These things matter and to
suggest otherwise is to be so cynical as to be of no use whatsoever to the
movement for justice and liberation.
"Those who cannot discern the difference between what an
administration that includes Sarah Palin would be like, and one that is headed
by Barack Obama, are seriously mired in a cynicism almost too flabbergasting to
comprehend."
And to equate the bigotry of McCain, with his common slur
for Asian folks being among the hateful statements he has made over the years
(along with his use of the c-word to describe his own wife), to Obama's silly
and preposterous line about the anti-racism struggle being 90 percent over, is
stunning. Obama's remark was foolish, and demonstrably incorrect of course. But
it was not an act of hate. It is not equivalent to a racial slur. And even as
disgusting as his moral lectures given solely to black men (as with his
father's day speech) are, Obama's attitude towards folks of color is not one of
bigotry. It's not even in the same universe as the things McCain has said.
Furthermore, to say "fascism is already here" is
probably the single most ridiculous statement to be made in a political column
in the past several years. It is precisely this lack of discernment---the
inability to differentiate between a seriously flawed, corporate-dominated
duopoly on the one hand, and literal authoritarianism and fascism on the
other---that has rendered the left so downright stupid in the eyes of most for
years. It's like those fools who march around at antiwar rallies with pictures
of Bush, adorned with a Hitler mustache, and think they're being
"radical" just because they are pushing the envelope of good taste
and style, and using words like Nazi to describe people and policies that, bad
as they are, are not Nazi-ish in theory or practice. Fascism if it means
anything means more than a mere "strong coalition between business and
government." Operationally it is also characterized by nearly complete
repression of civil liberties, and despite limitations on true democracy and
freedom that both Ms. Prince and I deplore, the notion that there is no
functional free speech in this nation is so jacked up as to be unworthy of
serious consideration. In such a place as the one Ms. Prince describes, the
words I have written in the past, and which she claims to have appreciated
despite their "subtle bigotry," wouldn't have been allowed, and would
have resulted in state action. So too her own.
For Ms. Prince to then trot out the shop-worn platitudes
about how voting for Obama isn't the lesser of two evils, but rather, "the
perpetuation of an evil system," is unsurprising, but also disappointing,
again for the lack of discernment such a comment suggests on her part. The fact
is, anything short of straight up revolution is going to perpetuate the system.
Voting for Cynthia McKinney will perpetuate the system too, precisely because
the Green Party is not going to win, and it won't grow one iota if you vote for
her, just like it didn't after Nader's run in 2000. At the end of the day,
McKinney voters will get that self-righteous feeling that comes from any bout
of moral purity---just like the warm, fuzzy feeling some liberals get when
boycotting Coors beer or whatever---but ultimately nothing will change. By
definition elections do not change systems fundamentally: they are operated
within the rules of the existing system. So to lament the fact that voting for
Obama will perpetuate the system (whether one defines it as evil or not) is a
non-sequitur. Of course it will. Ok, now what? So does driving, eating meat,
wearing clothes made from synthetic fibers, using electricity, participating in
the wage labor system and using a computer. Oh, and so too does living in a
"white gated community" as Ms. Prince informs us she does, with nary
so much as a moment's consideration of how such communities perpetuate an evil
far greater than any done by Barack Obama thus far. Elections are harm
reduction: nothing more and nothing less. Just like giving out clean needles to
heroin addicts will not stop addiction (but may save some lives by cutting down
on disease transmission), so too elections, even with less than optimal
choices, can reduce harm. There are a lot of Iraqis who would love to tell you
the same thing if they could. But they can't. Because they're dead. And they're
dead because George W. Bush was President after 2000. Period, end of story.
"To say ‘fascism is already here' is probably the single
most ridiculous statement to be made in a political column in the past several
years."
In the larger part of her critique, Ms. Prince takes me to
task for what she perceives as my classism, because of what she thinks I am
saying about small town and presumably working class folks. First off, I never
specified the class status of those whom I was describing. Many are not the
working class actually, and I know that. Overall, I would suggest that Ms.
Prince did not read my column very closely, but rather, decided to take offense
at what she describes as my stereotypical qualities of a fascist, in part
because a few of them appear to fit her. Let us examine these.
First off, I did not suggest that all fascists wear What
Would Jesus Do armbands, like NASCAR, live in small towns or drink cheap beer.
I said simply that if fascism comes it will be ushered in by folks such as
these, because without the support of the masses---who have often been lulled
to sleep by mass media elites and others---such a system cannot materialize. In
no nation where fascism has gained a foothold, has it been able to do so
without the compliance of the masses, and typically the less-formally educated,
and rural, and more provincial in fact. And yes, rural folks are more
provincial and generally more insular, precisely because of their relative lack
of exposure to others, to those with fundamentally different backgrounds and
cultures than their own. And yes, that insularity is dangerous. Not necessarily
more dangerous than the well-honed bigotry of the elite (which I have attacked
repeatedly throughout my public life), but equally worthy of concern and
condemnation.
This is not a stereotype. It is a truism: to live in a small
town, surrounded by others who are mostly like yourself in terms of race,
religion, culture and worldviews, is, by definition, to live in an insular
bubble. And although that doesn't mean one will ipso facto become a bigot, it
does mean that the likelihood of insular thinking is greater. If one thinks I
am being unfair, please note that the very reason those of us who choose to
live in cities choose to do so (and it is mostly city-dwelling leftists who
have given me a hard time over this piece, rather than folks who live in places
like Hanover, NH for school and/or work) and don't opt to live in small towns
is because we appreciate the cultural dynamism, difference, and fluidity that
such places provide. Yes, some amazingly f'd up people live in such places as
we prefer, but honestly, there is something to be said for living in a place
that is culturally more vibrant and diverse, in terms of the overall effect
that tends to have on one's sensibilities.
I am especially interested in Ms. Prince's attempt to draw
a distinction between "feeling homosexual acts are wrong and being
homophobic." She is right, I drew no distinction between the two because
there is none. Actually, homophobic isn't the word I would use. I prefer
heterosexist or straight supremacist, and yes, if she believes "homosexual
acts are wrong" because the Bible tells her so, then she is guilty of
these latter two offenses to be sure. The Bible also says that kids who
backtalk their parents should be put to death, among other depravities, and so
perhaps attacking the very biblical literalism that she (and wack jobs like
Sarah Palin) seem to embrace should be viewed as an indispensable part of
combatting fascism, truth be told. The people she seeks to defend as "devout
students of the Bible" are no such thing. They are not divinity students
for God's sakes, but religious bigots who believe Jews, Muslims and
non-Christians of all stripes are going to hell, and who think the Iraq war is
a divine mandate. Listen to them Ms. Prince. No, not all rural folks feel this
way, but the ones I was specifically attacking in the piece---the ones who
comprise a huge number of the McCain/Palin faithful at these rallies---do. To
not fear them because you as a woman of color have had some wonderful moments
of cross-racial solidarity with the white classified staff at Dartmouth is
ignorance on stilts. Such anecdotal evidence as this means very little to the
larger social reality, and considerably less than an anecdote I can readily
share and which involves a lot more people.
"In no nation where fascism has gained a foothold, has it
been able to do so without the compliance of the masses, and typically the
less-formally educated, and rural, and more provincial in fact."
To wit, the 1990 and 1991 U.S. Senate and Gubernatorial
elections in Louisiana, in which neo-Nazi David Duke was a candidate, and in
which races he nearly was elected. Duke received 60 percent of the white vote
in the Senate race and 55 percent in the Governor's race. This was because in
rural and exurban areas he received more like 70-75 percent, while receiving a
distinct minority of whites in the larger cities (New Orleans and Baton Rouge).
This did not mean, of course, that whites in the cities were or are less racist
overall than the rural folks. Many of them---the majority indeed---no doubt
harbor negative views about black and brown folks, and probably huge numbers
actually agreed with much of Duke's public agenda, aimed as it was at
affirmative action, welfare recipients, immigrants, etc. But the simple fact
is, at the end of the day, the cosmopolitan white folks, who on average were of
higher income, and greater formal educational attainment, and even the
"elite" among the white community, really didn't vote for the Nazi.
And the rural, less educated and less elite did. And it matters Ms. Prince. It
matters a great deal.
And as a side note, anyone who would suggest (as some in the
white leftist community did at the time) that there was no difference between
Duke and his opponents (a conservative Senate incumbent, and a phony-populist,
pro-corporate, crooked former Governor) would be a stone cold idiot, and yet,
the logic of Ms. Prince's column would have to suggest such a thing, because
after all, voting for the environmentally irresponsible, militaristic,
anti-poor folks Senator (J. Bennett Johnston) would produce many of the same
policy outcomes as if Duke won. But if you can't tell the difference between an
honest to God Hitler worshipper and a typical corporate shill, then I can't do
anything for you. Prozac may be the only remaining option.
Ms. Prince then assures us that most of the bigots she's
known were well read and well off. Well of course they were, because (as she
informs us) that's mostly who she's been around her whole life: growing up and
now in the Ivy League. If you've been around mostly highly educated and well
off folks your whole life, most of the bigots you'll meet will look like the
community you're in, by definition. On the other hand, if you grew up in a
small town, most of the bigots will look and sound like that. And so what? The
question is whether the insularity that comes with living in small, culturally
homogenous communities is correlated with religious or racial prejudice, or
with political conservatism. And the answer to that seems to be yes: not as
highly so as one might think, but higher than Ms. Prince is willing to allow.
And yes, "many" radical and progressive folks live in rural spaces. I
never disallowed this in my essay. Indeed, I noted that such communities grow
both narrow minded folks and very, very good folks as well---as with cities and
all communities. That is quite explicitly stated in the piece, though it is
glossed by Ms. Prince. I must say, however, that having traveled the country
for 15 years, talking to white folks about the subject matter of white
privilege, for Ms. Prince to suggest that rural white folks are highly nuanced
in their recognition of white privilege and the oppression of people of color
is so silly that I hardly know how to respond. It's not that such folks can't
grasp the concept or come to recognize it, but to think that they do now---and
more so than white folks in cities---is just not borne out by any evidence that
I have seen in thousands of such encounters.
"For Ms. Prince to suggest that rural white folks are
highly nuanced in their recognition of white privilege and the oppression of
people of color is so silly that I hardly know how to respond."
But finally we get to the crux of what I think might be Ms.
Prince's real problem with my piece: namely, she feels that I have attacked her
creationist views, and thus her faith. So she notes: "I'm a creationist
who believes the world was literally made in six days. Does that somehow
undermine my anti-racist activism?"
Once again, Ms. Prince has not read my words nearly as
closely as she claims to have read Scripture. What I said about religion was
far more nuanced than that. I said fascism would come from those who believe
the Earth was made in six literal days (as in, on a Gregorian calendar that
didn't even exist yet), less than 6000 years ago. I also noted:
"If fascism comes it will be welcomed, lock stock and
barrel by persons who pray at every meal to a God they visualize as white,
whose son they also think was white, and who they believe is going to rapture
them all into the sky upon the blowing of some heavenly trumpet, after which
point all those who don't think as they think will be burned in an eternal lake
of fire. Their vision and version of God is itself fascistic---to love a God
who would do such a thing is to love an abusive, sadistic and evil deity after
all---so it should come as little surprise that their conception of the state
would be equally authoritarian or worse."
"Would that Ms. Prince had been honest enough to deal
with the full message of the article."
In other words, I was specifically critiquing those whose
literalism is so extreme as to consign others to hell, and to accept a sky God
image (and a white one at that) and which then forces one to ignore all
scientific evidence to the contrary so as to believe in a "young
Earth." Faith does not require such absurdities as these, so my words were
not an attack on faith itself. But yes, if one believes that the Earth is only
6000 years old, and that God lives in the clouds, and is white, and is both so
loving as to create us and then redeem us through his Son, but then burn those
whose faith traditions lead them elsewhere, then yes, one is the very
definition of a fruit loop, and of very little use to the movement for social
justice and liberation. As one who would be consigned to hell by such a God,
and who is in effect condemned by those who believe this tripe, let me be the
first to offer a hearty "f you" to anyone who would proclaim such
spiritual and theistic supremacy. To think that I, or anyone else, should seek
to make common cause with those who believe us to be spiritual
inferiors---ostensibly because we need such bigots to join in the struggle for
human liberation (as if)---is morally vapid. Just as no self-respecting person
of color would want to work with open racists who proclaimed them to be
racially inferior (even if they might have common cause on a given policy
issue), so too, no one who is Jewish, Muslim, agnostic, atheist, or anything
else, should want to work in solidarity with those who think our souls are
empty vessels. Nope, sorry, screw you.
In the end, my original piece was not condemning all small
town folks. I was simply saying that it is those folks---led by those at these
hate-fests for McCain and Palin---who are the shock troops of fascism, the
modern day brownshirts, if there were to be any in the near future. But I also
noted, and Ms. Prince ignored it, that the liberals who do nothing in the face
of racism and hatred are at least as bad, and maybe *worse* for their/our
complacency. In other words, I spread the blame for the current state of
affairs around quite broadly, and that includes to myself and others like me,
who haven't done nearly enough to confront those who engage in these kinds of
hateful and bigoted actions. Would that Ms. Prince had been honest enough to
deal with the full message of the article, and not merely those portions that
offended her particular eschatology.
Writer and anti-racist activist Tim Wise can be contacted
through his web site: http://www.timwise.org/.
Clarifying My Beef with Tim Wise
by Shannon Joyce Prince
"My argument is with Mr.
Wise's claim that fascists can be typecast into a group that can be designated
‘folks such as these.'"
I am deeply sorry that Mr. Wise feels my piece "Word
to the Wise" was "incomplete and distorted." My aim was never to distort the words of someone I so respect,
but I do want to clarify the intents of my piece and the sentiments that
motivated it, for I also feel that my work has been, if not distorted, at least
misunderstood.
First, I stand by my view that, as Mr. Wise paraphrases it,
"a choice between Obama and McCain is so pathetic as to render democracy as a
concept pretty much superfluous." As
John MacArthur, president and publisher of Harper's
magazine points out, it takes $300 million dollars to run for president. The way candidates get $300 million dollars
is through corporate donations. For
example, as
MacArthur states: "Obama's biggest contributors include Lehman Brothers, JP
Morgan Chase, National Amsuements, Inc. which is the parent company of Viacom
and CBS, Citigroup and, Goldman Sachs which is "his number one banking
contributor."
When the Random House Unabridged
Dictionary tells me that democracy is "government by the people; a form of
government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised
directly by them or by their elected agents under a free electoral system" and
"the common people with respect to their political power" and then tells me
that because I can pick which one of the two pre-corporate-selected candidates
I choose to vote for I live in a democracy, then I do say that "democracy as a
concept is pretty much superfluous" - unless we are defining Lehman Brothers
and Goldman Sach's CEO's as "the common people." In other words, our current political system involves a great
deal of fascistic corporatism.
Next, Mr. Wise claims that because I reject the idea that
Obama is the lesser of two evils, I am "so cynical as to be of no use
whatsoever to the movement for justice and liberation." Mr. Wise claims that when it comes to
"health care, education, tax policy and judicial appointments" Obama represents
a better choice than McCain. But I'm
not convinced about Obama's commitment to better tax policy when he has made
Wal-Mart supporter Jason Furhman, the man who said that he would model his tax
policies on Ronald Reagan's, the head of his economic team. As for healthcare, I'll quote Matt Gonzalez's
Counterpunch article that says:
"Obama opposed single-payer bill HR676, sponsored by
Congressmen Dennis Kucinich and John Conyers in 2006, although at least 75
members of Congress supported it. Single-payer works by trying to diminish the
administrative costs that comprise somewhere around one-third of every health
care dollar spent, by eliminating the duplicative nature of these services. The
expected $300 billion in annual savings such a system would produce would go
directly to cover the uninsured and expand coverage to those who already have
insurance, according to Dr. Stephanie Woolhandler, an Associate Professor of
Medicine at Harvard Medical School and co-founder of Physicians for a National
Health Program.
"Obama's own plan has been widely criticized for leaving
health care industry administrative costs in place and for allowing millions of
people to remain uninsured. ‘Sicko' filmmaker Michael Moore ridiculed it
saying, ‘Obama wants the insurance companies to help us develop a new health
care plan-the same companies who have created the mess in the first
place.'"
"Our current political system involves a great deal of
fascistic corporatism."
Ultimately, I don't trust Obama to be a better candidate
that McCain because even though his policies and principles often sound good,
he has a well documented history of not following through, flip flopping, and
veering to the right. For example, if
Obama could claim, "Our campaign has rejected the money-for-influence game and
refused to accept funds from registered federal lobbyists and political action
committees" and then take money from registered lobbyists such as "Sidley
Austin LLP; Skadden, Arps, et al; Jenner & Block; Kirkland & Ellis;
Wilmerhale" (see Martens, "Obama's Money Cartel,"
May 5, 2008), how can I trust that he isn't lying about his plans for things
like education? If Mr. Wise trusts
Obama to keep his word when he has broken it so many times before, that's fine
- I, however, do not. Furthermore,
while I do not consider Obama superior to McCain, Mr. Wise is incorrect to
infer that I reject the concept of lesser evils wholesale.
On the subject of the candidates' racism, Mr. Wise and I
will simply have to agree to disagree, and that disagreement is another reason
I don't find Obama less of an evil than McCain. Mr. Wise may find it merely "silly" or "incorrect" that Obama
presents black men as lazy, absent fathers, black parents as neglectful
guardians who feed their children cold fried chicken for breakfast, black
preachers who present unflattering views of America as dangerously divisive,
black businesses as failing because blacks litter so much around them, black
students as not achieving because they play video games instead of studying,
and the institutionalized racism blacks face as 90% over, but I find such an
attitude to be hateful and bigoted.
Obama doesn't say things such as that racism is 90% over because he is
foolish - he is far too educated and intelligent to not know the depth of
institutionalized racism in America, and the fact that he is willing to lie
about suffering he knows exists in order to seem more palatable is a clear
expression of what cannot be labeled anything other than contempt for
blacks. I do believe that a black man
who offers the same dishonesty about race that white leaders have long offered,
who is willing to offer his presidency as a symbol of change even though it is
a presidency that would have never been possible if Obama had spoken honestly
about racial realities in America, who has plainly shown that he cannot
challenge deep systemic prejudice because he refuses to acknowledge its
existence - indeed - whose presidency will be taken by the masses as proof of
its absence, is especially dangerous because of the illusions he fosters.
"A black man who offers
the same dishonesty about race that white leaders have long offered is especially
dangerous."
My comment that fascism was "already here" was not meant to
be taken literally. While I may have misinterpreted him, it seemed to me that
Mr. Wise was claiming that a good proportion of McCain supporters, if left
unchecked, would usher the nation into fascism. My point was that Obama supporters are not inherently non-fascist
because Obama is a seriously problematic candidate, and the fact that fascistic
corporatism has left Obama and McCain the only two choices our country has
means that "fascism is here" in the sense that neither path is leading away
from that direction. After all, if you
support apartheid Israel, are happy to have a black man who seems to agree with
you that black people are trifling, and are craving a wider war in Afghanistan
are you not fascistic just because you support Obama instead of McCain?
Mr. Wise says, "So to lament the fact that voting for Obama
will perpetuate the system (whether one defines it as evil or not) is a
non-sequitur. Of course it will. Ok, now what?" Well, in my essay I say, "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." The
"now what" is the real quotidian duties, not voting for a third party - an
option I never presented as feasible, or having what Mr. Wise calls a "straight
up revolution." The "now what" is
creating schools like Marva Collins, helping heal addicts like Father George
Clements, and feeding the hungry like Will Allen. Mr. Wise then comments that I am perpetuating an evil system by
living in a white gated community "with nary so much as a moment's
consideration of how such communities perpetuate an evil far greater than any
done by Barack Obama thus far." although later in his rebuttal to my piece he
suggests that one of the things that corrupts white people is being isolated
from people of other races. My parents
certainly thought deeply about whether or not to live in a gated community, and
I firmly believe that the movement of non-whites into white spaces such as my
neighborhood is one way that positive change can be brought about.
Mr. Wise claims that he never specified the class of the
people he was writing about. I want to
say without sarcasm that if Mr. Wise is truly unaware that almost every quality
he lists - from reading romance novels, to liking NASCAR, to drinking Pabst
beer, are commonly associated with working class people I apologize for reading
classism into his imagery. But if Mr.
Wise wasn't making a class-based argument, I don't know why Chardonnay couldn't
have been on the list beside Pabst, golf next to Nascar, Pat Conroy next to the
supermarket novel. Then Mr. Wise makes
the claim that I disliked his piece because I am a creationist even though he
knows I'm a long time reader of his and have long been aware of his attitudes
towards creationism, homosexuality, and other issues, and that has never
stopped me from being a fan of his. I
mentioned being a creationist in my response to his original piece in order to
demonstrate how being a creationist has nothing to do with being a
fascist. As I stated in my article, my
reason for writing my piece was to defend the humanity of a group I felt was
being dehumanized into a belching Joe Sixpack, a romance novel-loving rural
woman, a Bible-toting Nascar fan, etc., and to stand up for the working
class/rural whites who have offered me their friendship during my time at
Dartmouth - a friendship I would not be worthy of if I fell silent when their
demographic was slandered.
"My reason for writing my piece was to defend the
humanity of a group I felt was being dehumanized."
I realize that Mr. Wise did not suggest that all fascists possess the qualities he
listed or condemn all small town folks - nor did I say he did. My argument is with Mr. Wise's claim that
fascists can be typecast into a group that can be designated "folks such as
these" and then to, as I saw it, focus on the superficial characteristics of
"folks such as these" even though those characteristics are shared by many
non-fascists and not shared by many fascists as opposed to focusing on the
fascism itself. In other words, I felt
that Mr. Wise unfairly rendered both rural/white/working class/Christian
non-fascists and non-rural/white/working class/Christian fascists invisible -
and there is no lack, especially, of the latter group.
I take issue with Mr. Wise suggesting that insularity is
something particular to rural whites.
First of all, many cities even when they are "diverse" are highly
segregated. Secondly, many diverse
cities are racially stratified due to class.
The only people of color many educated, urban white people know are the
ones who clean their homes or tend their children. This is true whether or not we are discussing Houston where there
are large populations of whites, blacks, Asians, and Hispanics but each group
tends to live in its own neighborhood and form racially homogenous social
networks, or Chicago and New York where schools, because of housing, are so
segregated that some schools are 90% white and Asian while others are 90% black
and Hispanic. Mr. Wise says, "The
question is whether the insularity that comes with living in small, culturally
homogenous communities is correlated with religious or racial prejudice, or
with political conservatism." What I'm
saying is that such small communities constantly occur within large cities and
often host affluent and well educated people who are fascists. In fact, it is often the high levels of
education and affluence of middle class and urban white people that allows them
to live in segregated insularity. I
don't take offense to Mr. Wise critiquing insularity - just his making his
critique class and geography based.
Mr. Wise notes that in Louisiana poorer rural whites voted
for Neo-Nazi David Duke far more than their urban more educated and affluent
counterparts - apparently extrapolating these results to white people
everywhere. However, as Third Way, an organization that describes
itself as progressive, noted in their paper "Unrequited Love: Middle
Class Voters Reject Democrats at the Ballot Box," the white, educated, middle
and upper class voted heavily for Bush in 2004, whom I am sure Mr. Wise would
label the fascistic candidate in relation to Kerry, while whites who earned
less than $15,000 a year, who we can presume were less educated, supported
Kerry. In other words, it remains
inappropriate to correlate income with progressivism or conservatism, or to
assume, as Mr. Wise does, that small town poor less educated folks are the
"shock troops" of fascism. My point in
stating that almost all the bigots I knew were well read, well traveled, and well
off was simply to show that being well educated or urbane doesn't prevent huge
masses of people from being fascistic - that there are eager fascistic shock
troops in board rooms, resorts, and opera houses all over America. My point is that if there are fascists in
Volkswagons and fascists in Mercedes, it's classist to pick on people who drive
Volkswagons (ignoring the non-fascists who drive Volkswagons and the
non-fascists who drive Mercedes) instead of picking on people who are
fascist. It's as though Volkswagons,
not fascism, is the problem.
"There are eager fascistic shock troops in board rooms,
resorts, and opera houses all over America."
As far as religion, if Mr. Wise doesn't distinguish between
opposition to homosexuality and what he calls "heterosexism" I agree to
disagree with him. Mr. Wise then
suggests, as many people do, that because one sees one dictum from the Bible as
literal and applicable to today's society he or she should also take whatever
exotic and decontextualized verse the person picks, in this case killing
children who talk back, as applicable to today's society without concern for
whether or not one verse was meant to be adhered to for all time and another
verse only in a particular situation during a particular era by a particular
people. Mr. Wise says that the people
"I seek to defend" are not "devout students of the Bible" when I made it quite
clear in my essay that I was not seeking to defend those who use the Bible to
attempt to defend bigotry, but rather taking issue with Mr. Wise failing to
distinguish between studying the Bible responsibly and using the Bible
pseudo-religiously, since every time the Bible appeared in Mr. Wise's original
piece it was as an ominous object. Mr.
Wise claims he condemns people who take the Bible to a literal extreme but what
he means is he condemns those who misinterpret the Bible, as he doesn't seem to
know what the Bible says. People who
imagine God "is white" and condemns "all those who don't think like they do" to
Hell don't do so because they take the Bible literally as these ideas aren't in
the Bible in the first place.
Therefore, literal creationism and the kind of bigotry Mr. Wise opposes
come from two different sources.
Secondly, by combining praying at meals with praying to a white God or
believing the world was made 6,000 years ago in six days with considering
Muslims and Jews to be spiritual inferiors, Mr. Wise is doing exactly what I
scold him for in my essay: conflating aesthetics with morality, mixing the
stuff that's actually unethical with the stuff he just doesn't like.
Mr. Wise says that "for Ms. Prince to suggest that rural
white folks are highly nuanced in their recognition of white privilege and the
oppression of people of color is so silly that I hardly know how to
respond." Mr. Wise misses my
point. I didn't positively or
negatively generalize about "rural white folks." I spoke about rural white individuals
- the kind of individuals who constantly get rendered invisible, and Mr. Wise's
quick caveat that sometimes rural communities have good people, doesn't give
such individuals meaningful visibility.
Furthermore, I didn't say that my friendships with radical rural whites
obviated the presence of fearful rural whites - I argued that fascism, not
being rural and white, was the problem.
I recognize the humanity of people non-white and white, rural and urban,
and I insist that they be treated as individuals, not as stereotyped
demographics. Mr. Wise claims that I
ignore that he also castigates liberals "like him" who don't challenge Joe
Sixpacks for their fascism. My point
was that he fails to recognize the Joe Sixpacks who are "liberals like him" and
the fascists who have the same degrees, bank statements, and zip codes he does.
Ms. Prince can be contacted
at [email protected].This e-mail address
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