4: The Policy of Race

How do policies that systematically discriminate against BIPOC folks come to exist? More specifically, the thinking that people and politicians latch onto that inspires discrimination. Ta-Nehisi Coates suggests that racist policies are the means by which white people cling to power in an increasingly diverse country. One way to gain and maintain power is to silence those with different values, beliefs, and priorities.

In A Promised Land, President Barack Obama recounts an exchange had on the campaign trail during his run for President in 2008. An attendee at a high-dollar fundraiser asked why he thought so many working-class Americans voted against their interest in electing Republican leadership. His response began:

“You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for twenty-five years and nothing’s replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are going to regenerate and they have not.”

So, economic anxiety and, perhaps, resentment, for previous failed leadership, regardless of the leader’s political orientation.

President Obama continues:

“So it’s not surprising then that they get frustrated and they look to the traditions and way of life that have been constants in their lives, whether it’s their faith, or hunting, or blue-collar work, or more traditional notions of family and community. And when Republicans tell them we Democrats despite these things — or when we give these folks reason to believe that we do — then the best policies in the world don’t matter to them.”

Or this is what he would have said. Instead, in what he chalks up to fatigue or impatience, what came out was:

“So it’s not surprising then that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like them, or anti-immigrant sentiment, or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”

Of course, the political backlash threatened to derail his campaign, but this incident and its consequences may provide insight into the source of racist policy and, perhaps, racism — fear. More specifically, white people’s fear that the mere existence of BIPOC folks threatens their “way of life.” And so white people favor policies, and politicians, that transfer fear onto those who they perceive to be a threat — Black and brown people, non-Christians, immigrants, etc.

That said, racist policy wouldn’t exist without policymakers to exploit white people’s fear and resentment. It seems no coincidence that the vast majority of these politicians wear white skin, thus reinforcing the prejudice that leads to the subjugation of large swaths of Americans.