Letters from Our Reader

Jahan Choudhry BAR Comments Editor

26 Dec 2018

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Letters from Our Readers

We have another round of strong feedback engaging with and challenging our pieces this week.

Readers wanted to talk about pieces on white supremacy in the media and among the black political elite. Provocative responses came for “Bigoted Paternalism Behind “Russians Targeted African-Americans” NY Times Article” and “Michelle Obama Slanders Black Men In Her Book, Adds To The Obama Family’s Long Anti-Black Tradition”.

In “Bigoted Paternalism Behind “Russians Targeted African-Americans” NY Times Article” Teodrose Fikre examines the ideology behind the recent New York Timesarticle on black voters and the alleged Russiagate scandal.

Noah Walkerwrites:

“CNN also unsurprisingly propped this insidious narrative up. There’s also NAFTA, TANF (temporary assistance for needy families), the drug war, police killing black people deliberately in broad daylight that did not get highlighted until BLM began, school to prison pipeline, the significant cuts to HUD funding, the elimination of Dodd-Frank, and the rise of racist austerity before 2016. But expectedly, corporate media is never going to pay close attention to this information. I also found it oddly gratifying that both black people that voted for either Stein or Sanders and those who voted for Trump at least agreed on calling this propaganda for what it really is: propaganda.”

In “Michelle Obama Slanders Black Men In Her Book, Adds To The Obama Family’s Long Anti-Black Tradition” Danny Haiphong places Michelle Obama’s recent comments comparing Barack to other black men in context of the family’s politics.

Jonathan Atingduiwrites:

"The article repeatedly makes claims that are based on the most ludicrous of premises and hyperbole. For example, using the statement that she had never met a man like Barack as an insult to all Black men. How on earth is that an insult to me and all Black men?
Moreover, I'm tired of the segment of Black America who placed their current and future conditions of their lives in the hands of a Black President who at best would only have 8 years to govern. Why would anyone with a critical thinking brain think that what took centuries to create could be undone in 8 years? The Obama's are the ones who are actually shining a positive light on Black people and giving America and the world an alternative narrative of Black people. I think too many Blacks in America associate being black with poverty, misery and struggle so whenever a Barack shows up they are attacked basically for not being ‘street enough.’"

Danny Haiphongresponds:

“Michelle Obama’s comments uphold a politics of respectability that do not represent the material reality of most Black Americans, especially Black men. This is why Obama-mania emerged in the first place. The ruling class gave the Obamas the most powerful position in the imperial order not to “undo” centuries of Black oppression but rather to intensify it. Black wealth is nearly zero, and much of this has to do with the policies of the Obama Administration. We need to place Michelle Obama’s comment and Barack Obama’s long history of speaking down to Black people within this context.

“The Obamas didn’t make the system, the system made them. Michelle Obama can ‘code switch’ and appear relatable because her status has been profitably branded to left-leaning constituents. Black Americans have historically been the most left leaning constituency and thus the most important to neutralize. The Obamas expanded war, austerity, and the militarized police state without protest. Their record doesn’t shine a light on Black people, it does the opposite. It associates Black people with the worst excesses of this vile and decrepit imperialist system. The fact that there are many who see this as a progressive development is outright frightening and an indication of the work we have to do to struggle against the psychosis produced by living within this American nightmare.”

Engaging with your views is an important part of building a clear analysis of the black mis-leadership class and the corporate media. We will be on the lookout for your feedback on this and other issues for the struggle next week.

Jahan Choudhry can be reached at comments@blackagendareport.com.

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