There were two periods in the 20th century that had America convincing the world that it had conquered white supremacy and systemic racism. By the end of the Civil Rights Movement with the double murders of key figures like Malcolm X in February 21st 1965 and Martin Luther King Jnr on April 4th 1968, and the reluctant passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. These events turned the United States into a nominal democracy for the very first time. The pathology was that white supremacy and systemic racism, had finally been defeated, so “let’s just get along with our lives, and stop looking for monsters under the bed that had finally been put to bed” excuse the pun.
It was evident before, during and after the Civil Rights Movement that America was still far from being a free country, at least for people of colour and to a lesser degree for white women. We had been acculturated that if laws were passed in our favour, (as if it is a favour and therefore we should be grateful), then all other matters of racism existed in one’s head and thus was “our” problem. It wasn’t the problem of the racists or beneficiaries of white privilege!
The repatriation of land and financial restitution for 100’s of years of institutionalised slavery had never been meaningfully considered by the establishment because “you can vote.” This was seen as being given “equal opportunities,” which was akin to saying, “now that the anti-rape law has been passed, let’s forget the rape of the past.” An utterly ludicrous and insane way of dealing with people’s generational abuse, torture and trauma.
The only instance in modern history of a people given paid compensation for the trauma caused by genocide, are the survivors of the Holocaust, in fact so thorough was the German financial restitution, it included medical-aid and lifelong psychiatric help and assistance. But along comes Donald J. Trump, a low-level crook, conman and huckster who just so happens to have inherited a half-a-billion dollars from his father and he gets elected to office. For four long years, Trump openly demonstrated his naked racism, misogyny and bigotry in a way so at odds with how white Presidents of America spoke and behaved.
It emboldened the conservatives, ignited the Nazis, who for too long, were wallowing in the shadows with their message. their gospel of white supremacy and virtually reinvents racism for the 21st century, undoing any imaginary gains of the Civil Rights Movement and spectacularly proves the primary axiom of CRT, Critical race Theory correct, “Racism is Normal.”
Racism is Normal because it is experienced by millions of black and brown people the world over, with the wealthiest continent in the world, Africa as proof of that concept. Trump demonstrated in more than 25 000 recorded lies and half-truths that racism is alive and well to the consternation of 1000’s of liberals and posts racial intellectuals.
For four years, Donald J. Trump has proven black people’s truths, their constant admonishing of white society and the white establishment right. Trump has perhaps achieved what no other American President has achieved since the birth of the nation in the seventeen hundreds; he has conclusively demonstrated that America and racism are the same things. That America, the “land of the free and the home of the brave” is neither free nor brave because it still warehouses one-third of its population in the world’s largest open-air prison and has the largest prison population in the world with mostly black and brown inmates.
As I write this article, the Americans are busy counting the votes in their latest Presidential race for the White House. The presidential race is between Joe Biden, the ex-Vice President under Obama, and the incumbent Donald J. Trump! This, speaks to how black and brown people will live over the next generation, and whether America will survive as the “greatest country” on earth. It’s “too close to call,” and that ladies and gentlemen, is the reason why Professor Derrick Bell, the founder of CRT was right, “Racism is Normal” still…
