Tuesday, January 17, 2017

Explaining Toni Morrison as she explains Donald trump.

TWEET ME
The Field Negro education series continues.

The following article was written by Brianna Cox for Atlanta Black Star :

"Pulitzer prize-winning and prolific author Toni Morrison has penned an important essay in response to Donald Trump being elected president — as well as to the vile beliefs and violent actions of his supporters — in an effort to explain exactly why he won in the first place.

In her essay, “Mourning for Whiteness,” which was published in The New YorkerMorrison’s central thesis is simple: Trump won because privileged white people, white men especially, feel threatened by a “rapidly” diversifying United States of America.

“Unlike any nation in Europe, the United States holds whiteness as the unifying force. Here, for many people, the definition of “Americanness” is color,” she begins.

She continues: “Under slave laws, the necessity for color rankings was obvious, but in America today, post-civil rights legislation, white people’s conviction of their natural superiority is being lost. Rapidly lost. There are ‘people of color’ everywhere, threatening to erase this long-understood definition of America. And what then? Another black President? A predominantly black Senate? Three black Supreme Court Justices? The threat is frightening.”

Morrison goes on to explain that white people, whether consciously or subconsciously, fear Black people and otherwise non-white people fighting for and obtaining equality, as this ultimately means losing their superiority. Equality for all is a loss for white people.

Because of this fear, white Americans, “[i]n order to limit the possibility of this untenable change and restore whiteness to its former status as a marker of national identity, a number of white Americans are sacrificing themselves. They have begun to do things they clearly don’t really want to be doing,” Morrison writes. “[T]hey are (1) abandoning their sense of human dignity and (2) risking the appearance of cowardice.”

The cowardice that Morrison writes of is specifically the racism that white Americans allow — and commit — every day: “Much as they may hate their behavior, and know full well how craven it is, they are willing to kill small children attending Sunday school and slaughter churchgoers who invite a white boy to pray. Embarrassing as the obvious display of cowardice must be, they are willing to set fire to churches and to start firing in them while the members are at prayer. And, shameful as such demonstrations of weakness are, they are willing to shoot black children in the street.”

In this particular paragraph Toni Morrison alternates between racially motivated happenings both old and new, from the church bombing in 1963 that killed four young Black girls to Dylann Roof‘s slaughter of nine Black church goers in 2015. Morrison articulates easily just how eerie it is that things have not changed in that time frame.

Morrison continues, saying, “These sacrifices, made by supposedly tough white men who are prepared to abandon their humanity out of fear of black men and women, suggest the true horror of lost status.”

And it is for these reasons — the imminent “collapse of white privilege,” as Morrison calls it — “that many Americans have flocked to a political platform that supports and translates violence against the defenseless as strength. These people are not so much angry as terrified, with the kind of terror that makes knees tremble.”

Morrison skillfully illustrates that all white Americans did this, not just rich, not just poor, not just men and not just women — ALL of them:

“On Election Day, how eagerly so many white voters, both the poorly educated and the well educated, embraced the shame and fear sowed by Donald Trump. The candidate whose company has been sued by the Justice Department for not renting apartments to black people. The candidate who questioned whether Barack Obama was born in the United States, and who seemed to condone the beating of a Black Lives Matter protester at a campaign rally. The candidate who kept black workers off the floors of his casinos. The candidate who is beloved by David Duke and endorsed by the Ku Klux Klan.”

She concludes her essay by recalling an old novel by William Faulkner titled “Absalom, Absalom!” and how even in 1936, there were people who understood how serious whiteness was to white Americans: “William Faulkner understood this better than almost any other American writer. In “Absalom, Absalom,” incest is less of a taboo for an upper-class Southern family than acknowledging the one drop of black blood that would clearly soil the family line. Rather than lose its “whiteness” [once again], the family chooses murder.”' [Source]

As of this post, there are over 50 lawmakers (mostly people of color) who have decided to boycott the trump inauguration.  

40 comments:

Yisheng = nigger said...

Hate crimes have risen since Trump was elected. They will become even more frequent and become even more brutal once he takes office.

dinthebeast said...

I've never understood what the poltroons are so terrified of, but I have a hunch that neither do they.
And about the fuss over the Democrats not attending the inauguration:

http://www.capitolhillblue.com/node/46068

-Doug in Oakland

Anonymous said...

Ms. Morrison and Field Negro are oppressed?

B.T. said...

The Color Purple is a lot better than Beloved.

Josh's ex boyfriend said...

Countdown to Josh appearing and telling us Toni doesn't know of what she writes and her whitesplaining to us dumb negroes. In 5 4 3.....

Yīshēng said...

Toni Morrison is a literary genius!!

Lance Cockstrong said...

Why would Toni Morrison reference little dicked white boy William Faulkner?

Josh said...

"Essay" lol

Read: Another privileged American racist* chalking everything up to racism because virtue signaling hides the fact that they're not actually presenting any evidence, and thus nobody cares about the fact that they're just blatantly racist against white people and are assuming racism, racism, racism, without anything whatever to back it up. Without ANY evidence! None.

Understandably, a white person writing such drivel wouldn't be called an "essay," and Pete forbid they tried to pass it off as literature. They would be lambasted in the mainstream for having written a hate manifesto.

*What an incredibly odd form of oppression we have in America. ALL white people, not just some of them, not just the privileged and poor, did this, because they're racists. And as such privileged racist oppressors, we allow nonwhites in America--this oppressive land--to reach any heights imaginable -- and fucking beyond. Millionaires and billionaires; presidents and politicians; Supreme Court Justices and heads of law reviews; doctors and scientists; pop culture icons and entertainment insiders; blatant racist essayists whom we give awards for displaying disdain for the oppressors.

(Of course, those who have reached those heights typically worked for them rather than sitting around calling whites racists. Though we reward that too! We're SO RACIST that we will allow you to have a fucking successful career whereby you call us all racists! THAT'S HOW RACIST WE ARE! That's how oppressed you nigs are.)

What a weird fucking sort of oppression this racist nation is practicing.

"from the church bombing in 1963 that killed four young Black girls to Dylann Roof‘s slaughter of nine Black church goers in 2015. Morrison articulates easily just how eerie it is that things have not changed in that time frame."

Well, except you're all being dishonest crybaby racist twats, though, in'it? You see, she covers "from" X to Z, but that's because there's nothing in between! LOL Where's the white essayist illustrating on how black-on-white crime happens 40:1 over white-on-black crime? Where's anyone honest to point out that Dylan Roof-type shit hasn't happened in America in nearly three generations?

"and how even in 1936, there were people who understood how serious whiteness was to white Americans:"

Fuck. Nearly a century ago -- notice how far back you victim cultists have to go to make a point... that doesn't even end up being a point. She's simply smearing white people as sick Lannisters who'd rather cousin-fuck than mix with blacks. This is out-and-out hate speech.

This whole myth of "whiteness" is something blacks project onto white people because they refuse to see anything but their "blackness." Like I said, what an incredibly strange brand of oppression we have in America.

Puerto Rican food looks, smells, and tastes like shit said...

Josh is losing it. He has been for awhile now.

The Real Lance Cockstrong said...

Butt Trumpet will attack Toni Morrison in a stupid tweet, and his micro-dicked supporters will lap it up.

The Purple Cow said...

In America, do you guys have to pay for psychiatric healthcare?

Josh is a teenaged girl said...

Wow, and Josh didn't disappoint. As usual she wrote a fucking essay no one will ever take the time to read but she still think she knows all about the negro experience. Where would we be without the all knowing Josh to whitesplain things to us.

Josh said...

Yep. Ad hominent-fest 3000. What else is new? I'm such a blatant racist and an ignorant moron in need of a shrink and nothing I say is correct and yaddah yaddah yaddah. But which points do any of you disagree with?

Zero. Never any criticisms of what I write; only that I dare write it. SJWs personified.

With which points do any of you disagree?

- Do you disagree that America--whose populations of whites is, according to Morrison here, all racist and to blame--actually allows black people to climb to the highest heights imaginable and even rewards, as a lucrative industry, those who call white people racist?

- Do you disagree that Morrison is simply saying that American whites are racist and fearful of allowing nonwhites in power? It's precisely what she's saying, and she provided precisely zero pieces of evidence for that conclusion.

- Do you disagree that Dylan Roof (a horrible faggot who shoulda been shot on sight) is the overwhelming exception in the past three generations?

- Do you disagree that whites are 40x more likely to be victims of black violence than the other way around?

- Do you disagree that modern times are not 1963, the KKK is no longer relevant, and you have to go back nearly a hundred years to make this whites-are-cousin-fucking-racists argument?

- Do you disagree that the idea of "whiteness" is something that blacks invented, not whites? White people are from a multitude of cultures: German, Nordic, British, Irish, Italian, Greek, Slovakian, and on and on. It's not "white" people who decided to join some fucking sort of club and say, "Hey, we're all white. Let's be friends!" It's black people who, because they want to be a segregated monolith, started grouping together every independent cultural identity based on nothing but skin tone to create this monolithic--and even mythical--beast that is "white people."

These are the points of my post. You can (a) decide to prove James is wrong about your inability to think rationally and logically and refute actual points. Or (b) continue insulting me with some nonsense that makes James look like he knows more about you than you know about yourselves.

The choice is yours.

The Ministry of Truth said...

"I've never understood what the poltroons are so terrified of, but I have a hunch that neither do they.
And about the fuss over the Democrats not attending the inauguration:"


I can understand what they're afraid of. I think it's reasonably clear from listening to enough right-wing rants.

You hear often enough the complaints that "white people are the real victims of racism." These are absurd on their face, but make sense IF you start by accepting their wrongful premises, which are that actual racism ended 50+ years ago, and that this has been enough time for black people to have gotten out from under the effects of it (they discount any lingering economic impacts); and therefore, that high rates of poverty and crime in the black community are entirely the result of the bad collective character of black people.

So they interpret black complaints about racism as illegitimate, as milking an old historical complaint that is no longer valid. They see black people as using "imaginary" racism to extort money and other economic support from white people, because black people simply don't want to work. And that BLM are now marching against "imaginary" police racism in order to demand black people should be exempt from perfectly sensible law enforcement practices, because black people mostly just like committing violence.

Again, all of this is ignorant crap. But if one begins by believing these premises, then black people are manipulating false claims of injustice to justify leeching off of and assaulting white people without consequence -- which logically would make black people parasites and white people "the real victims of racism" in the 21st century.

The Ministry of Truth said...

... (cont)

In addition, if you view the world in the way I've already mentioned, then things only stand to get worse in the future. If things are bad now, while some "naive" (i.e., liberal) white people are manipulated into supporting these "unjustified" black demands, imagine what will happen when white people are no longer the numerical majority? At that point, they predict some sort of people-of-color alliance between "parasitic" black people and more recently arrived non-white citizens (also often viewed as "parastic") against hard-working, decent white folk.

They foresee future white people being abused and persecuted non-stop for slavery and lynching and God knows what other bad acts of previous generations of white people, which they, personally, had nothing to do with.

Now, back in reality, the best way to head off this dystopian future of revenge on white people would be to reform our country now, to make sure people of all ethnicities have real opportunity and have a stake in our nation; that our economic system is fair, that our justice system isn't excessively punitive, that the racism that still goes on is discouraged.

But they don't actually acknowledge any of those issues exist -- they think critics of the present-day social order are just whiny "snowflakes" and the only thing that needs fixing is the bad attitudes of other ethnic groups -- so none of those options for reform sound reasonable to them, and they're left doom-mongering about an apocalyptic white-minority future.

field negro said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
field negro said...

Josh@1:22AM, what do u mean "we allow non-whites in America"? That is an incredibly revealing statement.

You don't own America, and some of these "non-whites" u talk about have just as much right (if not more) to it as u do.

Yīshēng said...

PC, if you waste your life reading posts by Field's hourly troll clown, then it should be obvious that the US doesn't pay for psychiatric healthcare.

Josh said...

Field, I knew you were a partisan hack, but I never thought of you as a pure cunt. Until now, that is.

You're going to act righteously indignant off of something you obviously quote-mined, and blatantly so, just to virtue signal here to an audience that already laps up the ball sweat of every cut-paste job you put here on the daily.

You didn't even quote the whole fucking sentence! You took only half the sentence to make your point. Not only did you quote-mine out of context, but you only quoted a sentence fragment. That's cunt-level dishonesty that TPC would cringe to sink to. How the fuck can you race-baiting victim cultists even sleep at night? You have no conscience whatsoever.

"What an incredibly odd form of oppression we have in America. ALL white people, not just some of them, not just the privileged and poor, did this, because they're racists. And as such privileged racist oppressors, we allow nonwhites in America--this oppressive land--to reach any heights imaginable -- and fucking beyond. Millionaires and billionaires; presidents and politicians; Supreme Court Justices and heads of law reviews; doctors and scientists; pop culture icons and entertainment insiders; blatant racist essayists whom we give awards for displaying disdain for the oppressors."

The point, which your intellectually dishonest ass knows I was making: IF white people are supposedly these horrifically evil oppressors that only want to hold whitey down and, as Morrison puts it, chose MURDERING MINORITIES by voting Trump, then we would not see anything but black failure en masse because it wouldn't be a system wherein blacks could climb.

Anonymous said...

White's demise in America and the world. A recent report aired on CBS Evening News stating that Whites in America are killing themselves in historic numbers never seen in this nation before. Their standard of living has fallen and stress has run amuck especially in rural America and life expectancy has fallen in line with minorities. I believe suicide was the highest between ages of 30-45.

The electing of the megalomaniac Donald Trump as their new white 'Savior in Chief' I believe will prove to only hasten their demise once reality sets in and like Ronald Reagan times the only citizens who will benefit from a Trump presidency will be millionaires.The planet has seen tribes disappear before and whites will be just one more tribe, at this point whites in America will do almost anything to continue with their political dominance of our political system even try to destroy Democracy itself, thus Comrade Trump. But in the end due to their selfishness, greed and inability to adapt to a new America the white male will cease to exist and believe it or not the world will be a better place without their ungodly rachetness.

mike from iowa said...

Josh said- I'm such a blatant racist and an ignorant moron in need of a shrink and nothing I say is correct and yaddah yaddah yaddah.

Truth shall set you free, Josh. Now get that help.

Anonymous said...

Damn, Josh and James are so much more intelligent and insightful than dumbass darkies like Yisheng, lilac, and Lance "Muh dik" Cockstrong.

RaiYah Bat Yisrael said...

I zeroed in on that same sentence..."we allow non-whites in America"...that sentence shows the depth of "white privilege" that is here in Amerikkka... The whites feel they "allow" some people of color to prosper and succeed...lol...though they will turn on those same pic they have "allowed" to succeed in a heart beat...if they open their mouth to speak about social ills...shut up and take the money we "allow" you to make...you people should be grateful we "allow" you to make...smh...I rarely comment on your page because of the mindset of some of these comments... Who get off on commenting from the safety of their keyboards...

RaiYah Bat Yisrael said...

I zeroed in on that same sentence..."we allow non-whites in America"...that sentence shows the depth of "white privilege" that is here in Amerikkka... The whites feel they "allow" some people of color to prosper and succeed...lol...though they will turn on those same poc they have "allowed" to succeed in a heart beat...if they open their mouth to speak about social ills...shut up and take the money we "allow" you to make...you people should be grateful we "allow" you to make any money...smh...I rarely comment on your page because of the mindset of some of these comments... Who get off on commenting from the safety of their keyboards...

Anonymous said...

White boys have tiny brains and tiny dicks! Lol!

Steve Harvey said...

Uh... I don't know nothing about any racism or White supremacy in America, and I have never heard of this Tony Morrison cat.

But I'd sure appreciate it if somebody here could give me directions to Donald and Melania's next "Golden Shower" party in Moscow, Russia.

Lacey said...

Black and White America will survive Trump's America. Calm down, motherfuckers.

Josh said...

"I zeroed in on that same sentence..."we allow non-whites in America"...that sentence shows the depth of "white privilege" that is here in Amerikkka.."

Then you're objectively a stupid person, as THAT IS NOT A SENTENCE! You both are quoting a few words of an entire sentence in order to act butthurt. I understand people wanting to get mad at something, but it's NOT a sentence. It's a fragment of a sentence.

The sentence is: "And as such privileged racist oppressors, we allow nonwhites in America--this oppressive land--to reach any heights imaginable -- and fucking beyond."

It is saying, in perfectly understandable context, that America, which is supposedly SO RACIST, allows black people to do extremely well. If America were as racist as Toni Morrison is claiming, the white racists, the MAJORITY in America, would not allow black achievement. What sort of system of institutional, systemic oppression allows for blacks to rise to such incredible heights?

What a comfortable type of oppression that must be.

It's like I'm speaking to little kids. Do I have to break out the alphabet blocks?

You people don't even know how to read. If America is going to ever boot anyone, you and Field should be atop the list. Not because you're black; because you're adults who apparently cannot read as well as grade-school children. (But, on the upside, you could always become a school-board president in Detroit.)

Who is honestly unable to discern a complete sentence from a fragment while still having the cocksuredness to flesh out an entire diatribe refuting the fragment?

I am embarrassed to be here.

mike from iowa said...

I am embarrassed to be here

Don't let the door hitya where the good lord splitya. Easier to swallow than the load of bs you lay on this blog with your frightfully HiQ.

Maybe we are a burden you must bear for being a little prick growing up.

Anonymous said...

https://fee.org/articles/my-lyft-ride-with-a-black-trump-supporter-on-mlk-day/

Anonymous said...

You can be sure that if 50 Republicans refused to attend President Obama's inauguration they would have been called racist,xenophobic,whatever-phobic. The Democrats are THE party of hypocrisy and lawlessness. Talk about having no respect for the people.

dinthebeast said...

Anon@2:29: I posted this link near the top of this thread. There were more than 50.

http://www.capitolhillblue.com/node/46068


-Doug in Oakland

dinthebeast said...

TMoT: Yes, I am aware of the bullshit, lies, and insanity with which they try to rationalize their poltroonery, but it has just never made sense to me. Why degrade the actual standard of living you have achieved with made-up oppression? How does that help them?
Perhaps having lived through some genuinely scary things, I no longer have the mental circuit for fake-ass pants pissing over things not actually likely to leave puncture wounds. And maybe the taste for being frightened at all. In other words, perhaps I lack the ability to understand why they think this is a good way to live. So, to each their own, but can we please forego the lies? Reality doesn't care about the fragility of your worldview, and in the wild, the price for any creature that writes mistakes into its description of the world is always the same: it becomes dinner for one that didn't. Now I know that doesn't work with Republicans, as no matter how much butter and garlic you put on them, they still taste terrible, but the underlying trend in nature still holds.
So to use the vernacular, what's up with that?

Then there's this from Andy Borowitz:

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/bush-counting-down-days-until-he-is-no-longer-worst-president-in-history

-Doug in Oakland

dinthebeast said...

http://www.perrspectives.com/blog/archives/003407.htm

-Doug in Oakland

Oh geez, it's Josh's time of the month said...

As we are embarrassed that you have to show your tits here everyday to get attention. Sorry to embarrass you in front of the football captain sweety. Now go change your tampon.

Facts of Life said...

Progressives are pussies.

The Ministry of Truth said...

"TMoT: Yes, I am aware of the bullshit, lies, and insanity with which they try to rationalize their poltroonery, but it has just never made sense to me. Why degrade the actual standard of living you have achieved with made-up oppression? How does that help them?"

See, that's where I don't exactly agree. I don't think these beliefs are an attempt to rationalize fear. They are the cause of the fear.

People hold racist beliefs for a variety of reasons:

*They are too intellectually lazy to try and understand people and things outside their immediate experience.

*They badly want to believe in a simple world, and so they decide that the world IS simple and filter out any evidence of complexity (this is true for a myriad of right-wing views).

*They are fundamentally selfish and don't like having to care about other people, so they seek out excuses for dismissing various social injustices as not real.

*They like feeling superior to some other group. It gives them a warm fuzzy to have someone else to scapegoat for problems.

*They are in some major way benefiting from racist rhetoric or policy (I'm thinking of a politician who uses racism to scare up votes, or a private prisons exec who would profit personally from deportations if more people hate Mexicans).

Those are just a few explanations for why these lies are appealing. But believing in these lies comes at a cost. If you have decided to carve the country simplistically into good guys and bad guys, based on false criteria (see: Donald J Trump), then you get to be afraid of the bad guys.

This, in a nutshell, is the difference between left-wing and right-wing world views.

Left-wing: The rules of society are unfair. A better organized society would lead to greater happiness for more people.

Right-wing: Society's rules are fine. It's just that part of the citizenry are scum, so if we, the Real Americans, could just make the scum go away ...

Life of facts said...

Conservatives are idiots.

Josh said...

Could also be:

*They realize how 3% of the population is responsible for more than 50% of its violent crimes like assault, rape and murder.

*They see the state of all-black communities and inner cities and legitimately fear what "diversity" will do for their communities and schools.

*They see that, if given control, Africans create Haiti, not Hawaii, and it's a shame for them that they need to risk their lives just living in a nation alongside such barbarity.

*They see a flood hit a place like New Orleans, where people are either (a) completely helpless and reliant on government to save them, or (b) criminal looters who are stealing from others within their community, juxtaposed against a valley in West VA that experienced more flooding and damage yet the community itself pulled together and didn't stand on a bridge and moan "dey don care abow us!"

Devil's advocate, of course; though white people who believe stereotypes about blacks, or insist they're true, don't just make them up as fiction. You folks whine and moan about dis waycis and dat's waycis and everyting's waycis, yet do absolutely nothing to stop those who put blacks in a negative light while instead attacking those who view blacks in a negative light. I mean, if black girls in weave would stop fighting in McDonald's, that would stop being a stereotype. This shit is pretty simple. Humans are pretty simple creatures. If the 3% of Americans responsible for over 50% of violent crimes stop being responsible for violent crimes, all these horrible white "racists" wouldn't stereotype blacks as violent criminals.

To be ignorant would be to stereotype blacks as loving, peaceful, intelligent people. From dropout rates to murder rates, believing that would be ignorant. Believing that all blacks are responsible for it is certainly overstating things, but we don't hear stereotypes that the Irish can't hold their drink or the Italians can't drive.

Instead of fighting the stereotype, people go out of their way to BE the stereotype, and then blame white people for holding the stereotype.

Maybe it's time, for the first time in world history, to own your shit rather than blaming whitey.

Anonymous said...

Field…as usual you "hit it out of the park" with this blog. Keep up the great work!
You continue to keep it real. Thanks.