American Melodrama 2008

Racism in Retreat

John McWhorter, New York Sun, June 5, 2008  

A year and a half ago, often I was sweetly dismissed when I said that Barack Obama was possibly on his way to the White House and would certainly trounce Hillary Clinton for the nomination.

“You don’t know what they’ll do to him,” they’d say. As often as not, the idea was that America could not seriously support a black man for its highest office.  

I didn’t get this. The America I live in today does not seem as deeply stamped by bigotry as these people seemed to think. It seemed as if, on this topic, I was talking to people who had woken up after 25 years and didn’t know how the country had changed. Couldn’t they see that this man’s color was only going to help?  

Well, here we are. Are there some bigots? Of course. Did they, or any purported instance of “racism” during the campaign, keep Barack Obama from the nomination?  

His victory demonstrates the main platform of my race writing. The guiding question in everything I have ever written on race is: Why do so many people exaggerate about racism?... http://daily.nysun.com/Repository/ml.asp?Ref=TllTLzIwMDgvM
DYvMDUjQXIwMTAwMA==&Mode=HTML&Locale=english-skin-custom  

If you answer the multiple-choice questions below and e-mail to lessonanswers@mymontebello.com with “Lesson answers” in the subject field, you will be credited toward a “certificate of recognition in community affairs” to be awarded in 2008 by a local nonprofit organization. 

1. According to this writer, what is being exaggerated?

(a) Drug addiction in major American cities.

(b) Racism in America.  

2. If this writer were right, how would you answer his question, “Why do so many people exaggerate about racism?”

(a) They are bored.

(b) Like children, we exaggerate to get our way or to cover for our personal flaws.

July 31, 2008