Black Racism

Black author and columnist Larry Elder calls attention to a problem that would be amusing were it not so serious. It's the claim by many on the left that blacks can't be racist. Of course, much depends upon how one defines the word "racist," but if we adopt the common-sense definition that racism is discrimination against, or contempt for, someone solely based on their race then racism against whites is rampant among blacks.

Unfortunately, however, the word is often defined in ways that make it a characteristic of which only the majority race can be guilty. This is absurdly tendentious, and Elder cites an example from a recent Piers Morgan podcast:

Piers Morgan, in a February podcast, accused his guest, "trans activist" Blossom Brown, of "race-baiting." Brown replied, "Black women cannot be racist to white women." Brown then added this inability to be racist to white women extended to Morgan: "How am I racist to you? I'm Black. I can't be racist to you." Brown also accused Morgan of lacking "the intellectual capacity to understand" this position.

Ms Brown accuses Morgan of lacking the capacity to understand that there's a racial double standard held by people like Ms Brown. The double standard goes like this: When whites say X about blacks, it's racist and thus morally evil, but when blacks say X about whites, it's perfectly acceptable. If a white does Y to a black, it's racist, but if a black does Y to a white, it's not.

How convenient.

Elder writes:

Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) made a similar slur against (black) Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.). In a discussion about the breakdown of the nuclear family, Donalds factually noted that during Jim Crow, a black child was more likely than today to be raised by a married mother and father.

Crockett said: "The fact that you're sitting around talking about 'life was better under Jim Crow,' like, is this because you don't understand history? Or literally it's because you married a white woman and so you think that whitewashed you?"

"Whitewashed"?

Does this apply to Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, former Vice President Kamala Harris, ex CNN host Don Lemon, to name a few, who married "outside their race"?

Or Barack Obama's mother and father?

Elder cites a 2020 Rasmussen poll that found that,

"75% of American Adults think the term 'racism' refers to any discrimination by people of one race against another." It found adults more likely to assert "most" blacks are racist than to make that claim about whites, Hispanics or Asians: "Eighteen percent (18%) say most white Americans are racist.

But 25% believe most black Americans are racist. Fifteen percent (15%) think most Hispanic-Americans are racist, while nearly as many (13%) say the same of most Asian-Americans. ... These findings parallel surveying done in 2013, although Americans were even more likely at that time to identify blacks as the most racist group."

The reason so many Americans think racism is common among blacks is because there are so many cases of it. For just a few examples of the dozens like it that could be cited go here, here, here, here, and here. If the races were reversed in any of these examples, we would've had a national meltdown over the insidious prevalence of white racism permeating the nation.

Elder closes his column with these words from black economist Thomas Sowell:

Anti-black racism, as an obstacle to success, has never been more insignificant. Thomas Sowell has said, "Racism is not dead, but it is on life support -- kept alive by politicians, race hustlers and people who get a sense of superiority by denouncing others as 'racists.'"

Sowell is speaking of the white community, but racism is still alive, well, and tolerated in the black community.