Move Over, Harry Reid–There’s a New Racist in Town

posted at 2:23 pm on January 29, 2010 by Howard Portnoy
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When Harry Reid “praised” Barack Obama earlier this month by calling him “light-skinned” and acknowledging that he spoke without a “Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one,” he took a seat in the doghouse still warm from the back end of Joe Biden. Biden, you will recall, himself raised an eyebrow or two during the 2008 campaign by observing “I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy.” Biden went on to punctuate his carefully considered remarks by adding “I mean, that’s a storybook, man” (and in so doing reminding us that despite his pathetic hair plugs he is one cool hombre who uses the colloquial man a lot).

Now along comes an offhand comment that may turn out to be the most blatant act of verbal racism yet. The perpetrator is a man, no less, down whose leg Barack Obama sends shivers. I am referring of course to MSNBC host of Hard Cheese Chris Matthews.

According to an AP dispatch, Matthews declared on the air following Obama’s State of the Union address:

I forgot he was black tonight for an hour. You know, he’s gone a long way to become a leader of this country, and past so much history, in just a year or two. I mean, it’s something we don’t even think about.

Forgot he was black! In all fairness to Matthews, apart from Obama’s having light skin, not using a Negro dialect (unless he wants to have one, which during the SOTU he obviously didn’t), and being articulate and bright and clean, the president was also not eating watermelon or collard greens at the time, so I suppose it’s easy to see where Matthews is to be forgiven.

Maybe. Then again, I’m not so sure. The AP article had another quote, this one by Dr. Imani Perry, a professor at Princeton’s Center for African American Studies. Quoth Dr. Perry, “As a black American I want people to remember who I am and where I come from without attaching assumptions about deficiency to it.”

Say what? You want people to notice your race? I believe the good professor has a touch of racism, too. I can appreciate that Perry wants to be respected, and with that I have no problem. But if being judged by the content of one’s character is insufficient — if in order for her to consider herself a hail fellow well met, I have to openly acknowledge that she is black — then, Houston, we have a problem.

Racial justice has a short menu. Either you’re seen as different or you’re seen as equal. No ethnicity, regardless of its history, gets a special dispensation in this regard.

What’s more, this type of demand breeds hard feelings, thereby leading to a lose-lose situation, too. The minute members of any ethnic group start setting rules of conduct for all other people, then the chances of remarks like Chris Matthews’ increases. Think about it: Matthews thought he was doing good. In point of fact, he was doing precisely what Imani Perry is advocating. He was going out of his way to acknowledge the specialness of Obama by virtue of his being black. Is this really something any reasonable, thinking person wants?

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