Whiny Conservatives: How Dare Rich White Guys Cry About Oppression?

By Christopher Deis, AlterNet. Posted June 22, 2009.

The assertion that white men are an oppressed class in America is a given and working assumption for Buchanan -- an assumption and premise that goes largely unchallenged by the mainstream media.

Limbaugh also works diligently and steadily to advance the narrative of Jim Crow 2.0. On an almost-daily basis he conflates political partisanship with the systematic racism historically experienced by black Americans. For him, Obama is a reverse racist, who like "the other minorities" has learned "how to use anger" against white people as a weapon to advance his political career.

In opposition to the Democratic Party, Limbaugh refuses "to sit in the back of the bus" like the other Republicans. Limbaugh is not "oppressed" because he continues to resist, while the other Republicans are afraid of "fire hoses" and "police dogs."

Limbaugh refuses to drink from the "colored" water fountain. Undeterred, he references the political thuggery of such racial terrorists as Bull Connor and asserts that the Democrats are "standing in the schoolhouse door." As one of the prime architects of Jim Crow 2.0, Limbaugh depicts himself as a freedom fighter who against all odds will push these bullies aside as he works to advance the conservative agenda. In effect, Limbaugh reduces the black freedom struggle to a petty politics of partisan maneuvering within a narrative of white male grievance and victimhood.

As they work to legitimate a narrative in which white men are victims of oppression and racism, the architects of Jim Crow 2.0 have revealed a deep understanding of the symbolic power afforded to "heroic" figures. To that end, the right needs its freedom riders, Rosa Parks and Martin Luther Kings in order to communicate the righteousness of their cause.

In keeping with this strategy, Sean Hannity has rechristened the firefighters in New Haven, Conn., who were denied promotions because of a questionable exam as "the New Haven 20." It is a clear allusion to the Little Rock Nine, a group of schoolchildren who in 1957, under protection of the United States military, braved threats of violence and death in order to integrate their local school in Little Rock, Ark.

Frank Ricci, the "leader" of the New Haven 20 has been valorized. In the version of events offered by Hannity, Ricci, a dyslexic, studied day and night with the assistance of tutors in order to pass the exam for promotion only to see his hard-earned opportunity denied him by a lawsuit filed by the city of New Haven on behalf of a group of "unqualified" African American firefighters. For Jim Crow 2.0, Ricci is Rosa Parks, and the upcoming Supreme Court hearing of his case will be the equivalent of Brown v. Board of Education.

Who Bears Responsibility?

The ability of the right to mine white racial resentment as the fuel for Jim Crow 2.0 is not surprising given the long relationship between white racial resentment and identity politics in American society. In keeping with this precedent, the ability and willingness of the right to quite literally play with history as it rewrites the civil rights movement, an event of radical energy and liberal aspirations, for the purposes of racially conservative and reactionary politics is also to be expected.

However, what is surprising is the preponderance of silence by African American pundits, critics and public intellectuals in combating Jim Crow 2.0. While it embodies a set of political values that are seen as increasingly marginal in American politics, the ability of Jim Crow 2.0 to gain traction, and to persist for as long as it has, signals a divide of experience, memory and values that may be deeper than previously imagined.

Could a failure to critically engage Jim Crow 2.0 be a result of an inability and unwillingness on the part of Americans to think critically about the relationship between racism, history and inequality? Likewise, does Jim Crow 2.0 resonate with its audience because Americans (white, black and brown alike) are afraid to ask if white privilege is in any way unsettled or challenged by the election of Barack Obama as president of the United States? Most importantly, how does this narrative of white male oppression and victimhood complicate the continued struggle for full racial equality and justice in the Age of Obama?

Ultimately, Jim Crow 2.0 will continue to have life to the degree that these questions remain unasked and unanswered.

See more stories tagged with: race, obama, buchanan, conervatives

Christopher Deis is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Political Science at the University of Chicago. His work has appeared in the Chicago Defender, the Washington Post's Web site the Root, Culture Kitchen and Popmatters. He is a 2009-2010 visiting faculty member in the Department of Political Science at DePaul University.

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