By Ian Jobling • 6/25/08
In the past couple of weeks, I’ve started writing about negative stereotypes of whites, which are a major component of the leukophobia, or hostility to whites, that dominates our culture. In posts on the Matrix movies and an alternative rock song called “Don’t Call Me White,” I’ve shown that one stereotype about whites is that we are natural fascists, repressive, violent, secretive, and conspiratorial. Especially revealing of stereotypes about whites are racial hate hoaxes, such as the Duke rape and Jena 6 cases, in which false accusations about whites committing acts of racial hatred gain widespread credence. The hoaxes are believed because people leap to conclusions, and it is stereotypes that cause them to do so. The Duke rape case reveals two stereotypes about whites that are particularly entrenched in the mind of our journalistic and academic elites: that whites harbor violent hatred of minorities in their hearts and that whites are privileged. In case any of you don’t remember, the Duke lacrosse players were pilloried in the press and by Duke professors before there was any indictment in the case or any reason to take seriously black stripper and prostitute Crystal Mangum’s accusations that the players had raped her. In Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Case, Stuart Taylor, Jr. and K. C. Johnson give many examples of this rush to judgment. Nancy Grace, host of her own CNN show, for example, “took special joy in excoriating the lacrosse players, cheering on guests who did the same, and hectoring those who dared to suggest the possibility of innocence.”1
In fact, many journalists admitted that stereotypes had caused them to leap to conclusions. Sharon Swanson of the Raleigh, NC based News & Observer said:
When this case first made national news, I was viewing the scenario through the prism of white liberal guilt. I felt somehow responsible that young black women were still being exploited by affluent young men in the South. I stereotyped the entire Duke lacrosse team.2
What then are the stereotypes about whites that caused the rush to judgment? The first is that white people cherish a violent hatred for minorities in their hearts. Indeed, William Chafe, former dean of the Duke faculty, compared the case to the Emmett Till murder, a real hate crime against a black man that took place more than fifty years earlier.3 If you believe the emotions that motivated the murderers of Emmett Till are still common among whites, then it is natural that you would believe Mangum’s claims.
The case appealed to another stereotype about whites as well: that we are privileged. In fact, Duke faculty and news commentary on the case implied, completely without evidence, that whites secretly commit a rash of crimes against non-whites that is covered up by the fascist, pro-white establishment. Thus, Prof. Houston A. Baker said in a public letter to Duke administrators that the lacrosse players were the beneficiaries of a “culture of silence that seeks to protect white, male athletic violence.” The players were “white, violent, drunken men… veritably given license to rape, maraud, deploy hate speech.” Their crimes were “safe under the cover of silent whiteness.”4
Although they were was more subtle, the newspapers picked up on this theme. The players’ privileged status was a constant theme of newspaper commentary, and they peppered their articles with sentiments like the one conveyed by this quotation from a Duke student: “Is this going to be a team of rich white men who get away with assaulting a black woman?”5
Of course, neither of these stereotypes is true. According to a Pew Research Center poll, only eight percent of whites have unfavorable view of blacks. Blacks are more likely to be unfavorable to whites than the other way around. Moreover, whites can scarcely be called privileged when people are so eager to believe evil of us. Affirmative action has made blacks and other minorities the real privileged class in America.
So some of the most common stereotypes about whites are that we are fascists, that we hate non-whites, and that we are privileged. Discrediting these stereotypes is a key component of pro-white activism.