Neo-Racism and Its Language Must Be Rejected
Today we are faced with the new mask of an old foe: racism. This current form of racism, which I refer to as neo-racism, includes some elements of traditional anti-black racism, such as prejudice, discrimination, and segregation, which have continued, though in altered and diminished form, since the ending of Jim Crow segregation, but it masquerades under the guise of antiracism. This new ideology of racism includes the belief that (1) racism in the United States preceded the development of the slave labor system rather than the other way around and (2) the formation of caucuses based on racial identity is a vital part of multiculturalism and the wave of the future. Further, it is undergirded with an anti-white component, as evidenced by the rapid spread of anti-white language and doctrine.
Indeed, the ideological abuse of language is a key aspect of neo-racism, which includes not only overt anti-white doctrines and tactics but also more subtle anti-black attitudes and practices. Originally the anti-white blame-and-shame language of this neo-racism centered around phrases like “white privilege” and “white fragility,” but it has now intensified into an Orwellian weaponization of the phrase “white supremacy culture” to intimidate activists for multiracial unity. Often these doctrines have been disguised under the innocent-sounding rubric of “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI), but let’s be clear: we must rebut this new ideology of racism, noting that it is not grounded in ethical scholarship or validated social science. Rather, it has been created without guardrails—more in the manner of a dogmatic religion or authoritarian political regime—and it is undoing the multiracial victories of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Criticism and dialogue have been silenced by ad hominem attacks, including slander and character assassination, while the authoritarian attitudes and undemocratic doctrines associated with this ideology have justified censorship.
The beliefs and language of neo-racism have predictably led to a “white backlash”: the rise of white nationalists who argue that since whites are now the despised and defective racial group, they themselves need to be defended, both intellectually and in action. These white nationalists implicitly and explicitly call for a neoliberal form of white supremacy (white populism) to defend “whites” and their allies from a totalitarian form of social democracy. And these beliefs have also led to breakdown of solidarity among progressives of all racial backgrounds, who traditionally supported universal—not tribal—values.
These two related developments are perhaps the greatest danger facing us today, and their fruits are entirely predictable: an increase in racist violence and the continued oppression of the working class.
The purpose of the neo-racist propaganda, unleashed by the power elite, including a black elite recruited into the ruling class, is to hide the class nature of governance in the United States today. Sometimes the white supremacist element is deliberately exaggerated, as in the constant stories about white police officers killing black lower-class brothers. The much larger number of poor white brothers and sisters also killed by the police often goes unreported. The point of such propaganda is to magnify white guilt, creating a fallacious view of modern racism.
Not surprisingly, many well-meaning progressives, who want to appear virtuous on issues of race, have fallen for this clever trap. Conflict arose when the concept of “whiteness” was promoted to spur white guilt. This promotion began in the 1990s with the dogma that “all whites are racist” but really took off two decades later, rephrased as “white identity is inherently racist” by Robin DiAngelo and popularized in her book White Fragility. This concept featured the Kafkaesque/Orwellian ploy that denying racism is proof of racism.
But it is actually class, not race, that determines an individual’s fate under global capitalism.
Capitalism these days is so focused on new ways to make a profit that it draws few distinctions based on race. It depends far more on manipulating vulnerabilities related to class, or to financial, job, or family stresses, using clever advertising and deceptive terms to confuse people, black or white, about where their true class interests lie. In such a world, the very term “white supremacy culture” is little more than a Machiavellian anachronism. The “everything-included” Critical Race Theory notion of “white supremacy culture” serves as a divide-and-conquer ploy by the ruling class to inflame racial tensions by magnifying and exploiting white guilt. The overall strategy is to mask the damaging political, economic, social, and ecological effects of neoliberal globalization while capturing much of its unprecedented wealth for elite interests and consumption.
Those lower on the class ladder, of whatever racial group, are more likely to be imprisoned, to be laid off or fired, or to lose pensions or health care. In fact, old fashioned anti-black racial prejudice is fading away in our globalized world. While at the higher echelons of society, there may still be some racial tensions, there is also shared wealth, power, and luxury. But why any remaining racial tensions at all? Continued separatism, which is promoted by some, both black and white, is clearly one factor. And why are well-known methods of conflict resolution not more widely applied? Instead of seeking to work out differences between racial groups, “whiteness” is the new original sin, making a mockery of progressive aspirations. But the new anti-white racism promoted by Robin DiAngelo, Tim Wise, and others won’t cancel the old anti-black racism in U.S. society as a whole. In fact, it will only continue to re-racialize U.S. society, reinvigorate the cultural wars, and magnify the social breakdown we are experiencing.
In the neo-racist concept of separatism, even online networking must be determined by color rather than by skill, interest, or careers. Some people claim that potential friendships can be based only on racial identity because people of color cannot feel safe unless they are with one another. For instance, segregated institutions such as the historically black colleges and universities were designed for the Jim Crow era, not for the collaboration required in the integrated institutions of higher education that are now the norm.
The weaponization of language (“racism” as in “all whites are racist” and “white supremacy culture” as in “centering whiteness”) has been successful in producing many DEI jobs in many parts of academia, non-profits, corporations, and government. Note that as one purported “redefinition” wears thin, another is quickly found to keep the grift going. Sadly, the actual effect is to hobble those white brothers and sisters who are seeking to create a post-racial society.
The answer is multiracial unity, not a new racial segregation or disengagement. What is needed is “ethnic pragmatism”—looking at the actual circumstances in one’s community, then building relationships and trying to figure out practical ways forward.
On the national level, those of us who propose a true multiculturalism have little power to directly oppose the global political-economic system. However, we can oppose its socio-psychic and socio-cultural aspects by building organizations based on multiracial unity. Building that multiracial unity lies in our hands, but only through the slow process of making clear the class nature of neo-racism.
We must recognize, of course, that many from all backgrounds will not on their own move in the direction of multiracial unity. Instead, many will opt instead for black unity, white unity, Latino unity, or other ethnic unity. This inclination to identify with one’s racial group explains why, for the ruling class, the promotion of racial identity became a key strategy of division.
Only an active multiracial struggle against specific forms of racism, both in society at large and within organizations, can clarify what neo-racism looks like. We’d like the masses of black folks here in the United States to learn to see what Zimbabweans experience every day: that the oppressor in a black skin is as much an enemy as the oppressor in a white skin. An oppressor is an oppressor is an oppressor, though the color of the oppressor can confuse the unwary - for a while.
The ironic consequence of the neo-racist movement, when seen through the lens of multiracial analysis of class, has been to make white members of the world’s rank and file victims of this neo-racism. Given the escalating inequality produced by neoliberal globalization, many rank-and-file whites, especially those in the “middle class,” have been pushed into the discovery that they have become members of an oppressed working class. If they had bought into the notion of white privilege, they came to realize it as a form of false consciousness, or even a poisoned carrot.
Despite the claims of white privilege or supremacy, millions of white workers have been victims of the class oppression that from its beginning lay behind the mask of racism. This was especially true for those who died in factories and mining accidents, or in imperialist wars, or from nutritional deficiency or diseases. Their suffering was connected to the exploitation and oppression of their black working-class brothers and sisters.
In the neo-racist theory of white supremacy, whites as a whole, rather than the capitalist/imperialist institutions of racism, are the cause of this oppression. White folks are depicted as having a variety of racially determined defects: white prejudice, power or privilege, rage or fragility, with even kindness negatively labeled as paternalism. The targeted result is white guilt. Those so propagandized are expected to become subservient allies.
However, such “white allies” may not be dependable, given the long history of confessions and apologies that crumble before the complexities of life. In addition, these “allies” may alienate their more level-headed, multiracial brothers and sisters, who resent the bigotry of the true believers in “whiteness” as the pre-eminent source of evil that must be exposed and denounced, whether real or imagined.
In sociological terms, neo-racism posits that whites can be in gesellschaft (formal community) with people of color and with blacks in particular, but never in gemeinschaft (personal community). Translated by Malcolm X into plain English: they can work with us, but they cannot join us. But even Malcolm believed that this separation was a transitional reality until blacks worked out their black inferiority and whites rid themselves of their white superiority. He gave the process ten years of functional separatism in preparation for eventual unity (1965 – 1975). In the context of today’s antiracist practitioners, that made him a full-blown optimist.
In the midst of this complex racial situation, one essential truth breaks forth for us like a fiery torch, and that is the class nature of racism as well as the often-racist nature of class oppression. We must be prepared to struggle even with our friends and acquaintances to overcome this blindness. We must take direct aim at the economic and political inequality that breeds racism in order to create a truly multiracial, international, universalist community.
Within our organizations and churches, we must reject race-based identity groups and “diversity” training that promotes racialized practices. Instead of ideologies of victimhood, such as white guilt-tripping and black paranoia, we must practice post-racial endeavors. These might include projects for the common good where each contributes his or her personal or cultural assets to coordinate and boost activities toward successful outcomes.
The redefinition of “white supremacy culture” on the pseudo left and its attendant revival among the far right must be repudiated. To restore a balanced society and eventually achieve a fully post-racial society, multiracial unity will first be required. This means we must reject neo-racism and all the language that comes with it.
This essay comes from a manuscript the author was working on at the time of his death in 2023.
Rev. Dr. Finley Campbell spent decades working for multiracial unity and racial harmony. He founded and led for many years the Unitarian Universalist Multi-Racial Unity Action Council (www.uumuac.org), a dissenting group of Unitarian Universalists formed, as the name suggests, to promote the unity of dark and light skinned people throughout the world.