The conservative media has turned denying racism into a cottage industry. They say things like:
- "[T]he only people perpetuating racism are people like this gentleman from NAACP...."
The report regarding the systemic racism in Ferguson as well as a litany of other incidents over the past few years suggest that racism is far from over in the U.S. With that in mind, white America should consider the following statement from Thomas Sowell: "When you want to help people, you tell them the truth. When you want to help yourself, you tell them what they want to hear." Well, the truth is that data show that if you are white, you are probably racist. You may not be overtly racist, but you are racist nonetheless.
Luckily, conservative whites have spent an awful lot of time recently telling other races and cultures how they can go about fixing their issues, so there is already a guide for white people to follow to help with their racist tendencies.
For example, many conservative pundits obsessed over the idea that black leaders were ignoring problems in their communities to focus on systemic inequality in the justice system, leading to the deaths of a disproportionately high number of African Americans at the hands of law enforcement.
Bill O'Reilly even went so far as to offer up a couple of "solutions" to fix what ails the African-American community. The first gem was to suggest that "you've got to stop young black women from having babies out of wedlock."
Forgetting for a second that socioeconomic status, not skin color, is the greatest predictor of how likely a woman is to have children out of wedlock, it seems that if we were to apply O'Reilly's principles equally to both whites and blacks, then to end racism, we need to stop single whites from having children. After all, if being unattached and black means your children are destined to be criminals, then children of unwed white mothers will similarly have no choice but to be racist. It's just common sense.
The second completely not-racist solution from O'Reilly was that "you've got to demand discipline in your public schools," because everyone knows that black students are inherently more disruptive than white students. If that weren't the case, then it would mean that the reason that black students are three times as likely as white students to be suspended and expelled is racism.
Again, following the O'Reilly logic, we also need to demand discipline for whites in public schools, since the education system has clearly failed these students. Some whites will claim that students are already being racially indoctrinated in Comrade Obama's public school system, but if the conservative media has taught us anything, it's that reality doesn't matter when it comes to discussions about race. If it did, then the fact that scores of black leaders were discussing the high rates of crimes in their communities long before it became a conservative racist denial tactic would have killed a key media talking point before it started.
Of course, African Americans aren't the only group that conservative whites have advice for. Following any violence by individuals or groups who are associated with Islam, the conservative media outrage machine goes into overdrive. Muslims who interpret their holy book completely differently than the violent extremists do are told that they must denounce the actions of these people simply because the name of their faith is the same. It is also suggested that these people learn how to assimilate into a society that may be different from the way of life they are used to.
Obviously if these recommendations are good for Muslims, then they should also be good for whites. Instead of making excuses for racists and their ignorant actions and statements, all whites should denounce them. After all, if you are white, then you have something in common with racist whites. Essentially you are racist by proxy unless you excoriate white racists.
The same is true for assimilation. Clearly these racists are having trouble assimilating into a world where non-white people are afforded all the same freedoms and rights as their Caucasian countrymen. If whites followed Sean Hannity's rules for Muslims and eliminated all "no-go zones" that deter or prevent non-whites from entering certain places and engaging in certain activities, removed all religious paraphernalia from hotels, and prevented the government from privileging any one religion, then these racists would assimilate into the American melting pot, and racism would completely disappear.
The good news is that conservative pundits have no shortage of spurious solutions that they could support to fix white America's racism problem. The bad news is that the arrogance that allows these people to pontificate on topics on which they are ill-informed is the same arrogance that lets them dismiss even the most scientific data as invalid. If only these conservatives were as enthusiastic about addressing their own faults as they are about pointing out the defect of others.