Stories by Rich Benjamin

Rich Benjamin is the author of Searching for Whitopia: An Improbable Journey to the Heart of White America. He is senior fellow at the nonpartisan think tank Demos and sits on the board of the Roosevelt Institution. His commentary is featured on NPR and Fox Radio, and in newspapers nationwide. subscribe to Rich Benjamin's feed

Obama’s Safe, Overrated and Airy Comments on the Trayvon Martin Affair

Posted on: Jul 19, 2013, Source: Salon

The president's remarks gave us context to the episode, but not a single opinion on the issues that brought us here.

So Much for “Post-Racial” America: Just This Week, We've Had the Zimmerman Trial, Paula Deen's Outrages, and Supreme Court's Voting Rights Assault

Posted on: Jun 25, 2013, Source: Salon

The same divisions are getting stoked.

A Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man

Posted on: Jul 9, 2010, Source: AlterNet

Confessions of a white crackhead and literary wunderkind: Bill Clegg discusses drugs, booze, literature and interracial sex.

There Are Zero Black Republicans in Congress, Yet 32 Are Running for Office in 2010?

Posted on: Apr 23, 2010, Source: AlterNet

Michael Steele's admission that the Republicans have explicitly pursued a race-based 'southern strategy' runs counter to the strikingly high number of black GOP candidates.

Yes, I Love Paying Taxes

Posted on: Apr 15, 2010, Source: USA Today

The bare minimum that our common good requires is a civilian's matching commitment to pay his fair share of taxes.

Racial Questions Rock the Census

Posted on: Apr 4, 2010, Source: AlterNet

Should the US stop tracking its inhabitants' race, as the colorblind movement would have? Or should we endeavor to track race more comprehensively and nimbly?

Texas Suicide Flyer Had Real Populist Grievances

Posted on: Feb 19, 2010, Source: AlterNet

Joseph Stack's suicide screed chafes and exposes a raw wound this country does not know what to do with.

White Racial Resentment Bubbles Under the Surface of the Tea Party Movement

Posted on: Feb 5, 2010, Source: AlterNet

The simmering movement is the whitest phenomenon on the national scene, evident not just in its Caucasian numbers but in the bedrock beliefs stirring its anti-government contempt.

If MLK Were Around, He Wouldn't Care About Racial Brushfires in the Media -- He'd Be Talking About Poverty

Posted on: Jan 15, 2010, Source: AlterNet

It’s the personal and dramatic aspects of race that obsess us, not the deeply rooted and currently active, political inequalities.

Pockets of White America Are in the Throes of an Existential Crisis

Posted on: Dec 18, 2009, Source: AlterNet

As the Census "time bomb" ticks, fear mounts over a perceived loss of whites' raw power - demographic, social, economic, and political.

"Clean, Safe and High-Value" Neighborhoods Are Nice Ways of Saying "White" Without Bringing Race into It

Posted on: Oct 16, 2009, Source: Hyperion Books

The law does not forbid segregated or discriminating neighborhoods. It simply forbids intentional discrimination.