[Marxism] (fwd) White supremacists target middle America

[Les Schaffer]

[ for Einde ]




Ruthless Critic of All that Exists wrote:
> On Fri, Oct 24, 2008 at 6:50 PM, Jeffrey Thomas Piercy 
> <mqduck at sonic.net> wrote:
>> Walter Lippmann wrote:
>
>> I don't know about that. In my short life, I've never seen overt racism
>> more accepted than anti-Arabism since 9/11. In fact, if anything, it's
>> only been growing more acceptable since. Back in the day, people had to
>> qualify that they weren't against "all Muslims" when badmouthing, well,
>> Muslims. Even that isn't true anymore.
>
> Muslim-bashing (despicable as it is) is not, however, "racism".
> "Muslims" are not a "race".
>
This is nit-picking. Overt racism is no longer so acceßptable as in the 
past - one of the successes of the civil rights movemnt and the other 
struggles of the 1960s. However, anti-Muslim prejudice or bigotry is 
acceptable and just by the merest coincidence the vast majority of 
Muslims happen to be non-white. Islamophobia has in reality become the 
acceptable face of modern racism - it's simply a code word.

When the racist right want to attack Obama they don't point to the 
visibly obvious fact that he's black, they emphasise the fact taht his 
second name is Hussein. It's the same old bullshit dresed up to look 
pretty.

Where I live in eastern Germany thze far right also isn't so overtly 
racist, at least it tries hard to project this image in public to avoid 
being labelled as "Nazi". But they still play with racist prejudices 
through code words like "Muslim" - they're a "foreign body" in the 
community. And incidentally certain resentments against Poles and 
Russians are also present - and despite the fact that Poles and Russians 
are white I prefer to call this what it really is - racism.

Being Irish and having lived in Britain during the Troubles, I've 
experienced anti-Irish prejudice. The ethnic mix of the indigenous 
population in Ireland isn't significantly different from that in 
Britain, nevertheless certain markers did distinguish many of us - names 
and accents - and these were picked upon to dscriminate. And as a child 
I do clearly remember on a visit to London seeing signs saying "Rooms to 
let - No dogs, No Blacks, No Irish".

In Ireland there is also widespread prejiudice against a group that used 
to be called "tinkers" when I was a child - they are now called 
"Travellers". The travellers have a lifestyle similar to gypsies but are 
ethnically indistinguishable from the rest of the population. The wy 
they are treated is indistinguishable from the racism that is faced by 
new immigrants, whether they come from Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa or 
the Middle East.

You might prefer to call it "bigotry" or "prejudice" - I prefer to call 
it by t's true name, "racism". It uses all the traditional imagery of 
racism to promote this "prejudice" and in fighting it we have to use the 
same methods used in fighting racism - from general propaganda to 
self-organisation.

I find it strange that a "Ruthless Critic" prefers to look at the 
surface phenomena instead of looking beklow the surface at the real 
forces of work. Indeed I find yet again that the "nom de plume" is a 
misnomer.

Einde O'Callaghan