By The Realist • 11/1/07
The last column on IW delivered some bad news to race realists: we are a small minority of the white population, and our numbers are concentrated among the poor and poorly educated.
Further examination of data from the General Social Survey (GSS), supplemented by the results of Gallup polls, brings more bad news, but also some hope. First the bad news: not only is realism rare among whites, but it is becoming more so. Even worse, realism is virtually non-existent among young whites; almost all realists are middle-aged or elderly. While racial right organizations, such as the New Century Foundation (publisher of American Renaissance), the Council of Conservative Citizens, and Stormfront, tell followers that their ideas are gaining traction, all the hard evidence indicates the contrary. Absent a radical change in strategy that rehabilitates their political outlook, realists can only expect their ranks to grow smaller and smaller, and older and older, as the years go by.
Now the good news: racial liberalism, whose core propositions are that whites are a cancer and diversity is a strength, is also declining. The white majority appears to reject the “whites as cancer” myth, or the belief that whites are responsible for the failings of non-whites. Only a small and decreasing minority of whites think that black socioeconomic underperformance is due to white racial discrimination. Whites are also increasingly unfavorable to government aid for blacks.
Whites’ attitude towards the proposition that diversity is a strength is more complex. Their view of immigration, a good indicator of their feelings about diversity, is highly contradictory. When asked whether immigration in the abstract is good or bad for the country, the majority of whites answer the former. However, when asked about immigration’s impact on specific aspects of American society, such as the economy, taxes, and moral values, whites are much more likely view immigration as harmful than beneficial.
In short, we are witnessing the growth of a racial conservatism that whole-heartedly rejects race realism and other racialist beliefs, but is also skeptical towards racial liberalism. Unlike realism, racial conservatism appeals to young and old alike: on all the measures I looked at, young whites were at least as conservative as their elders.
As I mentioned in the last column, race realism is currently a position held only by a small minority of whites. Furthermore, race realism has been declining ever since the GSS started measuring it in 1977. As the chart below shows, in 1977, twenty-six percent of whites believed socioeconomic differences between whites and blacks had an innate basis; in 2004, only seven percent did.1
Even worse, virtually none of the young espouse realism. Thirty-six percent of 81 to 89 year olds are realists, and a flat zero percent of 18 to 20 year olds. Age is, in fact, an even better predictor of realist beliefs than education and income. The correlation between age and adherence to realist beliefs is an almost perfect 0.92.
The decline of race realism has gone hand in hand with the decline of other racialist beliefs. Racialists believe not only that the races are biologically different, but in segregation and loyalty to one’s own race above others. The following graphs on white support for a law against interracial marriage show exactly the same trends by year and age as the graphs on race realism.
The same pattern of steadily declining support, especially among the young, also characterizes responses to other GSS questions that measured racialism, such as whether respondents would vote for a black president, support racially segregated neighborhoods, and mind sending their children to a school that was attended by black children. While race realism does not necessarily entail other forms of racialism, it is plain that whites associate the two and have rejected them in tandem.
While the statistics on race realism are quite grim, realists can take heart in the decline of “whites as cancer” myth. Believers in this myth reflexively blame whites for the evils of the world; one manifestation of the myth is the unlikely theory that white racial discrimination is responsible for minority underperformance in America.
Whites are less and less likely to believe the discrimination theory as the years pass, suggesting that the “whites as cancer” myth is losing its hold on their minds. In 1977, 41 percent of whites saw discrimination as the reason for black underperformance, but only 27 percent do today.
Furthermore, younger whites are less likely to espouse the discrimination theory than older ones. Only 24 percent of whites in the 18-30 year old age group believe in this explanation against 40 percent of whites in their 70s and 80s.
A corollary of the discrimination hypothesis is that the legacy of white racism obligates us to help blacks through government aid and racial preferences. These beliefs are declining as well. In 1975, 20 percent of whites thought the government should help blacks. Today, only a surprisingly small minority of 10 percent do. Whites in the 18-30 year old age group are no more likely than the general white population to support government aid to blacks.
Opposition to affirmative action has been massive and consistent ever since the GSS started tracking it in 1994, with only about 10 percent of whites supporting it. Once again, young whites are no more likely to support affirmative action than older ones.
There is no direct measure available of the extent to which whites believe diversity is a strength. However, their views of immigration, the source of diversity, is a good measure of this belief.
The evidence indicates that liberals have been considerably more effective in convincing whites that diversity is a strength than that whites are a cancer. However, a more careful look suggests that whites’ faith in diversity is fragile. Even though most whites believe immigration in the abstract is beneficial, whites are also inclined to say that immigration is harmful when asked about its impact on specific aspects of American society. It seems as though the fear of being labeled xenophobic and racist is strong enough to convince whites to parrot the official mantra; however, faith in diversity is being corroded by doubt, and it may well collapse like a hollow log.
A Gallup poll of 2006 found that 68 percent of whites think that immigration is “a good thing for this country,” versus 27 percent who think it is a “bad thing.” White sentiment about immigration turned more negative after 9/11, but quickly rebounded.
Also, immigration restrictionism has declined among whites since the 1990s. In 1994, 57 percent of whites believed immigration should be decreased against 41 percent in 2006.2 Nevertheless, whites were still three times more likely to think immigration should be decreased than that it should be increased.
Despite their favorability to immigration in the abstract, whites generally view its impact on specific aspects of America as harmful. A Gallup poll of 2007 found, for example, that 49 percent of whites think immigration makes the economy worse, versus 24 percent who think it makes the economy better. Perceptions of immigrants’ impact on crime, taxes, job opportunities, and moral and values were also lopsidedly negative. The only aspect of society that whites thought immigrants improved was food, music, and the arts.
Since 2001, whites have been becoming more negative about the impact of immigration. Their views of immigration’s impact on the economy and social and moral values illustrate the general pattern.
Even the percentage of whites who think immigration has a positive effect on food, music, and the arts has been declining.
On the issue of illegal aliens, whites take an enforcement first attitude. Seventy-three percent of whites believe border enforcement and immigration reduction are very important, but only 27 percent think legalizing illegals is very important.
Finally, the young are less likely to believe that immigration is beneficial than their elders. Just over half of 18-20 year olds think that immigrants improve American society, against 79 percent of 81-89 year olds.
This review of white attitudes towards race paints a mixed picture for realists. On the one hand, we are clearly failing in our current efforts, especially among the young. On the other hand, the liberals are also losing. Today’s white majority today rejects liberal anti-white beliefs and is ambivalent towards diversity.
One way of interpreting this state of affairs is that the racial dynamics of the civil rights era, when racialism and liberalism were the dominant positions, are fading. Most whites turned away from the racialist vision of George Wallace long ago, but today they are turning from the liberalism of Lyndon Johnson as well.
Those of us who wish to rehabilitate race realism and white racial consciousness would do well to target the racial conservatives. To this end, we should learn as much as possible about them. Are they more inclined to be pro-war or anti-war, fundamentalists or religious moderates, free traders or protectionists? Such scrutiny may yield the reason why our views are so unpopular.
We realists need to listen to the white majority before whites listen to us. This may be a humbling experience, but it is a necessary one if we are to reverse our legacy of failure.