White Racialism

 

On August 31, 2023, I received an update column from Christopher R. Rufo (I am a subscribed follower.), entitled No to the politics of whiteness, The case against right-wing racialism. Now, I think I can imply that Rufo is against racialism of any form wielded by any race or ethnic group. Racialism is regarding one’s own race as superior or special, and whether the members of the race currently are oppressor or oppressed, the interests and needs of one’s own group are paramount to prioritize.

 

 Racialism for me is not only racist behavior and thought, but it is a system program of promoting the primacy of one’s own race at the expense of other races. Rufo is below arguing against the politics of whiteness, the case against right-wing racialism.

 

Rufo would also be against racialist ideology if expressed as left-wing racialism, promoted by blacks or people of any other color or race. Rufo is against the politics of blackness too, and that seems reasonable.

 

Here is Rufo’s first paragraph in full, which I will then comment on: “In recent years, I have devoted considerable time to exposing the radical Left’s politics of ‘whiteness’ which posits that white identity, culture and power are irredeemably oppressive and must be ‘abolished’ in favor of alternative modes of being. ‘Whiteness’ represents the metaphysical essence of left-wing race politics: an irreducible force of evil, a master synonym for racism, oppression, inequality and suffocating bourgeois norms; anything saturated with its properties can be automatically categorized and condemned. In practice, the politics of whiteness has been translated into the demonization of European-Americans in primary school curricula, the performance of elaborate ‘white privilege’ rituals in the workplace, and outright segregation in many public institutions. All of it is done to solve ‘the problem of whiteness.’”

 

My response: whites are demonized like the Nazis demonized the Jews, a vicious campaign of lies and race attack that ultimately culminates in Final Solutions. The reverse-racism of Leftists against whites and Europeans is pure evil, and we must fight back and hard. I do not want or advocate racial war or civil war, but the Progressive race-baiters want revolution here by any means possible, and if they can precipitate a civil war, then they can declare emergency powers to ‘stabilize the country.” Once the crisis is resolved they will never relinquish their police state, socialist regime, the installation of which was their sole aim all along, and racialism was the strategy for bring it about.

 

Rufo: “Some pushback has resulted. In the years following the 2020 Black Lives Matter riots, conservatives have exposed the poisonous politics of left-wing racialism, shutting down some of the bureaucracies that push it and proposing a reaffirmation of the ideal of colorblind equality. Unfortunately, some of the right would snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, preferring instead to adopt the basic framework of identity politics and simply reverse its polarity. Dismayingly, a sentiment is rising in some corners of conservative politics that the answer to left-wing identity politics is right-wing identity politics; or, put another way, that the answer to the demonization of whiteness is the celebration of whiteness as such—a new racial politics in the interest of ‘white identity.’”

 

My response: Jordan Peterson warned against Leftist identity politics warmongers operating back then, but noting that whites and play that game to, and that was a result that the Left should not strive to bring about. Identity politics promotes collectivism, groupist-tribalist categories with groups divided into oppressor/oppressed status, victimizer/victim assignation and tyrant/ slave owner groups subjugating slaves in other groups.

 

This Marxist subordinating the individual always to the collective pits master groups against slave groups, and the war is incessant, so the have-nots must war and revolt to overthrow the oppressors and then to be the new oppressors. Conflict and raw power are the essential human condition.

 

The American natural rights tradition is pro-individual, pro-constitution, pro-liberty, for free markets and limited government. It supports for a color-blind society of free individuals is to move away from identity politics and winners and losers duking it out for primacy. And privilege. We want to move away from socialism and its immoral system of altruism pushing group against group as the human norm, and then move towards capitalism, rationalism, individualism and egoism, and these are moral, political, economic and cultural systems aligned with American tradition.

 

Rufo: “The main argument for this position is that colorblind equality is unattainable. Left-wing racialism has been embedded in our institutions, laws, and policies to such an extent that it cannot be rolled back using conventional means. All politics is friend-enemy politics, this faction argues, and given the demographic decline of European Americans, whites will eventually need to activate ‘white racial consciousness’ to secure their basic interests. European Americans once had robust ethnic identities, but after generations of assimilation and intermarriage, these distinctions have lost their salience and consolidated into a homogeneous, generalized ‘white identity.’ If there is to be a racial spoils system, then each group must get its share—including whites.

 

How should we evaluate this argument? First, as an empirical matter, some basic facts should be acknowledged. Yes, left-wing racialism is indeed now deeply embedded in America’s institutions, and the demographic balance of the country has shifted in recent decades. And yes, the basic racial classifications system in the United States broadly delineates the continental origin—Europe, Africa, Latin America, Asia—in a way that is not arbitrary or meaningless. Terms such as ‘white,’ ‘black,’ ‘Latino,’ and ‘Asian,’ while often obscuring the important variations within such groupings, have become the lingua franca and are useful shorthand descriptors for many purposes. And different groups have different characteristics, attitudes, and beliefs, at both the racial and ethnic level, and between and within those broad demographic categories.”

 

My response: I disagree. We just achieved a colorblind equality by 1980, and that ideal is one we must return to. The cure for anti-white, left-wing racialism is not for whites to counter with pro-white, right-wing racialism. That is playing into the hands of the Progressives, Marxist haters favoring favored groups over disfavored groups, and collectivism and altruism and revolution all increase human suffering and misery. It is to be refuted by all, permanently.

 

For America to survive, we must return to our cultural tradition of the paramount emphasis on the rights of the individual citizen as sovereign. We must eschew racial politics, and condemn any racial spoils system.

 

Rufo: “None of this, however, justifies the racialist argument, which is wrong on moral, political and practical grounds. First, right-wing racialists employ the same reductive demographic arguments as their left-wing counterparts, presenting American life as a zero-sum conflict between ethnic and racial groups, while ignoring the two other essential units of categorization: the individual and the universal. A more fruitful analysis would begin with a full accounting of these categories: individual, ethnicity, race, and humanity—and build a political theory capable of organizing them in the interest of human flourishing. Fortunately, such a political theory already exists: the natural rights theory of the American Founders, who argued that each human being was endowed with ‘certain inalienable rights’ that applied to all as a universal principle; at the same time, they accepted that, because human cultures are contingent, not all groups will have identical capacities, expressions and outcomes.”

 

My response: Racialism must be cast aside in favor of our natural rights theory, saying that all enjoy such rights as individuals, and that this is universal to all Americans, no matter their ma=racial makeup.

 

Rufo: “This approach remains the best available. The essential political question for both supporters and opponents of the racialist worldview are these: What is the proper locus of rights? How should people be judged as a matter of government policy? And what approach is consistent with American principles and most likely to ensure our success as a nation?  The honest racialist would respond: the proper locus of rights is the group; people should be judged in a race-conscious manner; and the best approach is one that rewards friends and punishes enemies. My answer, by contrast is: the proper locus of rights is the individual; people should be judged in a color-blind manner; and the best approach honors particularity while discouraging the formation of group factions, foregrounds equality of rights while accepting inequality of outcomes, and acknowledge group differences while appealing to our equal dignity as human beings and as citizens of a common polity. This approach is, in my view, consistent with the method (natural rights) and the ultimate telos (human happiness) that the Founders envisioned and that the Constitution and American law have gradually secured. The ultimate criterion of public judgment can either be race, leading toward a ‘prison yard society,’ or leading toward an ‘aristocracy of virtue and talents.’ Choose one.”

 

My response: we must follow our tradition of individualism as the proper locus of rights, not accepting the woke option of group as the locus of rights. We do not want to reward friends in our group and punish enemies for being outside of our group. Each person must be treated as a particularity, in a color-blind fashion, with equality of rights, but not guaranteed equality of outcomes. Our happiness as a people will grow out of an aristocracy of virtue and talents. Rufo is quite articulate here.

 

Rufo: “As a practical matter, too, the politics of colorblind equality is vastly superior to the politics of ‘white identity.’ Whatever one’s judgment on mass immigration, America is now a mixed multiracial republic, and any successful political movement will need to build a coalition beyond any single racial group. The good news for conservatives—and a point against arguments for demographic determination—is that many racial minorities, most notably Latinos and Asians, oppose critical race theory-style discrimination, support the principle of colorblind equality, and have begun to shift politically to the right. By contrast, the advocates of ‘white racial consciousness’ have a track record with the opposite results: from the late author Sam Francis to the racialist website VDare, such efforts have failed to garner an audience, much less a political coalition., beyond the fringes. Such a politics, is perceived, rightly, as victim-oriented and antithetical to deeply held American principles.

 

The vision of racialists, whether on the right or on the left, is pessimistic: the first is driven by a spirit of vengeance, the second by a sense of inferiority. They are two sides of the same coin. Despite real tensions and disparities, Americans, on the whole, are a tolerant, cooperative people who aspire to a colorblind standard, derived from the natural rights tradition, that remains the best guidepost for the country’s future. The temptation of racialist politics must be resisted. The solution is not to mirror the frame of left-wing racialists, but to persuade strong majorities to abolish racialism from public life and entrench the higher principle of colorblind equality. This is our fight. Slowly but steadily, we can win it.”

 

My response: I like his ideas in these last two paragraphs, Since America is now a huge multiracial society, we must appeal to the sovereignty of the individual and colorblind equality to save us from racialist attacks from either fringe. Racialism to the left or to the right only emphasizes group rights, collectivism and altruism over individual rights, individualism and egoism in America, and that choice grows evil in the land, not love, peace, harmony, and happiness. Rufo called this right. This genius is so eloquent, but also seems to be wise. May the future be bright.