Race Card Trumps Issue

By Eddie Griffin

Monday, November 27, 2006

I saw the term “race card” mentioned repeatedly some letters to the editor purportedly as a backlash to an article written by Bob Ray Sanders , entitled “Small-minded laws for a small Texas city ”. [See, “The law in Farmers Branch ”, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 11/25/2006]. This is a phrase “race card” I first heard from the lips of a North Richland Hills mayor pro tem city official, who obviously assumed I understood its nebulous meaning. Because of its current popular usage in some cultural circles, it is not so well understood in others.

The concept of race, I understand, but “race card” seems to suggest usage in the context of a game, as in the game of Spades. Trumps, I assume, is the blackest card in the deck. In seeing the phrase repeated in print, something dawned on me.

Words and phrases created by spin-doctors can change public perception of reality. The most recent example of such contrived concoction is the phrase “food insecurity”, as subversive of fact that there is hunger in America . Therefore, poor people are no longer hungry but they have little “food security”. It does not change the reality of people starving, but rather it makes reality a farce.

The concept of “Race Card” is new to our hearing in the African-American community. Obviously, it did not originate out of sky blue and hit everybody over the head at the same time. When I see it repeated in daily language like a secret code phrase, it reminds me of something in George Orwell about mass indoctrination. In this case, some people have been made to believe that allegations of racism are phony ploys used by a minority groups to get their way. The spin for the ploy is called “playing the race card” as if it were trumps___ which is one of the reasons such complaints of racism today are ignored without second thought or given serious consideration by some. Change “the thing” by changing “the word” that delineates it. There is no racism, in fact or reality, if it can be dismissed away by coining it as a “race card” ploy.

So, they accused Bob Ray Sanders of using the “race card” in his critique of Farmers Branch ’s anti-immigration ordinances. Sanders “plays the race card every time he gets a chance”, writes Dan Roe ( Fort Worth ). “He labels those who disagree with him as bigots. It makes me wonder who the bigot is”.

In another letter, Alexander Wolf ( Fort Worth ) writes: “Sanders has to be the ultimate racist. Any criticism leveled at someone with darker skin prompts him to toss out the race card.”

Note, from an African-American perspective, it looks like the letter-writers turn the table on the columnist by dismissing his legitimate criticism as a “race card” ploy. Note also, that most allegations of racism in recent times have been met with the same counter-charge: “Race Card”.

Note the writer Alexander Wolf mentions that the race card is used whenever “criticism (is) leveled at someone with darker skin”. As a thin-skinned 60 year-old black man, I am very sensitive to “criticism”, especially when I am asked to apologize for my honesty. I remember how Mike Wallace turned the tables on Malcolm X and radically changed public perception about the meaning of racism. Wallace also accused Malcolm X of being the “ultimate racist”, just as Wolf turns the tables on Bob Ray. Surely, everyone remembers this classic 60 Minute television interview showdown between the black militant revolutionary and the news media icon back during in the mid-1960s.

When Wallace accused Malcolm of being the “ultimate racist”, in the middle of the interview, Malcolm responded with this analogy:

“Calling a black man a racist would be like calling a Jew an anti-Semitic. It is a contradiction to call the victim the victimizer. No! Racism is uniquely white because it is predicated upon the ideology of white supremacy. It is the building of institutions and using legal, political, economic, and police powers to protect and perpetuate this supremacy.”

The legislation of Jim Crow ordinances was classic racism. The enforcement of Jim Crow laws was also racist, though it was the law of the land in the South, enacted by people who vehemently opposed to being characterized as prejudice. No, they were not bigots, but honest citizens creating laws to preserve the order of nature as God ordained. So also are the misguided sentiments of honest citizens in Farmers Branch with their anti-immigration sanctions. But these new ordinances do not pass the taste, feel, and touch test to be racist, according to small town standards in Texas .

But it is possible to have institutional racism without one self-proclaimed bigot. The institution, not necessarily the people, can be racist and the people immune by involuntary indoctrination (not inoculation). Laws and ordinances can be racist, as we have seen with Jim Crow laws. And, policies, procedures, customs, and practices that enforce these laws are also racist.

As for the people and the issue of bigotry___ to every man according to the purpose and intent of his own hearts, I would only add these observations, according to the words and thoughts of the letter-writers.

“And frankly, I’m sick and tired having someone like Sanders make accusations of ‘bigotry’, ‘mean-spiritedness’ or ‘racism’ every time someone suggests enforcing our nation’s immigration laws”, writes John Luckie (Weatherford).

“My proposal”, writes John Schleeter (Euless), “is to ensure that no illegal immigrants are employed anywhere…” in an all-inclusive list of industries, he suggests, “construction records of the luxury houses that many of these executives [of the listed industries] live in should be checked to ensure that no builder used illegal immigrant labor in their construction. If it was built by illegals, these structures should be torn down to prevent profiteering from illegal action.”

Tearing down the constructive labor a neighbor because of his national origin seems mean-spirited to me. We, in the African-American community, welcome immigrant guest workers as good, industrious, and productive neighbors, while recognizing they are only here by our invitation, allurements, enticements, incentives, and our support. Many in our community appreciate them for their good works and neighborly kindness, which is appears to be absent in the City of Farmers Branch .

“I suggest a 100 percent compliance audit to check for illegal immigrants at IBM, JPMorgan Chase, Dallas Semiconductor, Geico, Cingular, TD Industries and large employers that have facilities within the city limits”, suggests Schleeter, who had also suggested tearing down the mansions of these corporate executives if the hands of illegal immigrants built it. Now he would institute Gestapo-style audit checks and mass sweeps through factories of these companies.

Where are we headed? The new ordinance in Farmers Branch makes it illegal to hire undocumented workers. Now every Hispanic in the city will have to carry some form of identification, documentation, and other papers to prove citizenship. It reminds me of the fabled Tremont County , as described by my friend, The River John, where Negroes had to carry a “good nigger pass” to walk freely and conduct business in the community. Even more, some approving white person must have punched the pass; otherwise, upon request, any white had to authority to detain and lash Negroes labeled as “vagabonds”.

Farmer Branch anti-immigration laws are similar to unconstitutional vagabond laws and are subject to abuse the rights of any brown-skin Hispanic-American who is caught without ID. Whites, on the other hand, are not required to carry ID at all times as proof of citizenship. Only the select population must fear apprehension and detention, even if a legal citizen accidentally leaves his wallet at home. He is assumed “illegal” because of skin-color and absences of approved documents.

The new ordinance forbids landlords from renting to undocumented workers. This will hit the Hispanic real estate community hard. It denies an abode for migrant guest workers, meaning they cannot live within the city limits. Excluding guest residency within the city limits, because of their national origin, is discriminatory and racist also, inasmuch, as it undermines the economic base of the legal Hispanic and African-American communities.

These are our guests, here at our behest. Whites do not hold a monopoly on extending invitations to foreign friends, foreign business people, foreign dignitaries, and foreign workers. Our guest workers are a vital part of our economy. If entry into the country were as fair for those on the south of the border as those from the north or from Europe , there would be no immigration problem.

All that most undocumented workers want is to work and go home when the work season is over. Seasonal wages in America can sustain a Latin American family all winter. Those who stay in America are the ones who intend to become citizens. But the Farmers Branch ordinance provides no means for legitimate immigration, because it excludes access to application for persons of Latin American national origin. There is no access to legitimate citizenship without risk of apprehension and incarceration for Hispanics.

“ Farmers Branch residents have every right to pass these ordinances, and if Sanders doesn’t like them, who cares?” writes Della Coffman (Weatherford). “Sanders should be ashamed of what he wrote, and he owes an apology to the council”.

The bottom line attitude to racist bigotry is “who cares”. Who cares what others think in the outside world. Big City , America is not Small Town , Texas . Apologize for criticizing small town people for their lack of a more cosmopolitan and global worldview. Small town small-mindedness is not their fault, but the product of conditioning and a steady stream of ideology. As Malcolm X said, “It would be like the slave apologizing to the slave master for the sin of slavery.” But Coffman would shame the journalist Sanders to eat his words with humble pie.

“What nerve!” wrote Coffman in reaction to the journalist’s scathing criticism. The audacity to speak his mind! In the past, Negroes were repressed from speaking their peace by intimidation, which constituted suppression in Freedom of Speech. Now that we can freely express our opinion, the reaction is outrage, which is why African-Americans are still tactful when they speak. Some people cannot handle the truth.

“Bob Ray… You’re lucky that you were born in the United States ”, wrote Wolf, “and that you found a newspaper to print the rubbish you write”. As a black citizen who totally agrees with Sanders and who enjoys reading his “rubbish”, that makes me neither stupid, nor illiterate, nor “lucky” to be born in America. How presumptuous to think that I am!

I remember being told once that “if you hated Jim Crow so much, why didn’t you go to another country. Love it or leave it”, they said. Of those who did not go into political exile to Cuba or Africa, we decided to stay in the US , home of our birth, and change the system from within.

But Jill Bramblett (Grapevine) would patronize us with her assessment of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. legacy with this: “By the way, the people who King defended were citizens. Fortunately, all of his preaching paid off for our African-Americans.”

Did Bramblett say, “Our African-Americans”? How possessive! The audacity to speak for African-Americans! No, “We African-Americans” are still looking for the payoff. It may have paid off for some who use the martyrdom Martin Luther King to put the race issue behind them. But a change in attitude is a long time in coming.

It is racist to bring false allegations upon a people because of the color of their skin, or because of their national origin. Where is the true witness for this account?

The letter-writer Luckie, who professes to be sick and tired of people like Sanders, also wrote: “ Farmers Branch has done the only effective thing that can be done about this problem, given that our country’s leaders do nothing to stem the flood of illegals who sneak over and trash our southern borders.”

Trash? In the 1950s, I remember hearing the same thing about Negroes moving into all-white communities during the era of housing desegregation. Negroes would “trash” the neighborhood, they said. But the notion was based on a common belief that all poor people are trashy by nature. Personally, however, I have found most undocumented residents to be nice, clean, courteous, industrious, and not trashy. But proof is not required when the purpose of allegation is incitement.

It is racist to incite people to anger and hostilities by perpetuating rumors, myths, and lies against another people because of their skin color, culture, or national origin. The word “trash” has often been used as a racist code word to denigrate another race or their economic status. Remember “poor white trash”? False allegations that incite can lead to vigilante justice.

And lastly, there is this lordship of “worthiness” coming from the writer Olthoff: “Unless you geniuses have changed the laws overnight, you must apply for admission into the United States , prove your worthiness to obtain citizenship and do as the law says you must.”

But proving “worthiness” can be a slippery subjective slope when they keep moving the goalpost. As descendants of “second class” citizens, we could never meet the high standards of “worthiness” because of the color of our skin. The code word “Second Class Citizen” was stamped on my father’s military records. Worthiness is in the jaundice eye of the beholder, which is why it is easier to gain citizenship in the United States for white-skinned Europeans and Canadians.

It is racist to set arbitrary standards of acceptance in immigration and keep changing conditions of entrance based on skin color, national origin, and political climate. To write and re-write laws that exclude, discriminate, and criminalize by ex post facto is a racist ploy in an attempt to perpetuate white supremacy, whether by conscious intent of the citizenry or an inadvertency in law-making. The Right of Passage in America is not a bequest by white only, a presumption Farmers Branch people may have forgotten. Soon-to-be-written federal laws may be more lenient and favorable to guest workers from Third World countries.

Racism is not a contrived conjured up word like “race card”. When Mike Wallace equated race hatred and bigotry with “Racism”, he attempted to camouflage its underlying ideology of white supremacy. After the confrontation with Malcolm X, African-Americans took their case to the international body of the United Nations, the only place where issue of racism could be openly and honestly discussed at the time. The US mass media was bias, manipulated, and subverted by planted stories and propaganda designed to undermine the civil rights movement. In 1964, a formal definition of the concept of Racism was penned into historic record, in order to stand the test of time. It will forever be “a system of political, social, legal, and economic powers designed and written into laws, codes, and ordinances to support and perpetuate the ideology of white supremacy.

Turning the table against the truth seer, most people are hoodwinked into thinking racism and bigotry as synonymous in meaning.

The Farmers Branch ordinance, denying housing and employment to undocumented workers, is not racist, in and of itself. After all, the rich discriminates against the poor by denying access to privileges that only wealth can afford. But the ordinances above also provide for police training to round up illegal immigrants. This sets the stage for dragnets and massive sweeps at job sites, breaking down doors and dragging illegals from their homes, humiliating them before the public, disgracing their children in school, blocking the doors to hospital emergency rooms, keeping them living on the edge of fear, detaining them at will, and deporting them back into abject poverty. This is already happening in the Arab communities, where olive-skin is reasonable cause for detention and incarceration, with governmental impunity and without any legal recourse or judicial safeguards and review___ all in the name of “terrorism”.

It frightens me to think about the words of Bramblett who wrote: “I hope that many other cities follow suit in tending to this massive problem”.

Massive, indeed, when I try to imagine what do they plan to do with 12 million illegals? The ultimate race card is genocide.