Republicans have been playing defense on the race card for far too long. Their instinctive need to make nice with the trigger-happy race-baiting media has forced so many conservatives into a corner, preventing many of them from engaging in serious discussions about race–how it should matter less, but still matters only because of Democrats who exploit color differences to push their extreme, socialist policy goals.
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The last controversy to blow open this genuflective self-loathing among conservatives has emerged around Congressman Steve King and remarks that he made to the New York Times a few days ago.
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Here's what Congressman King said:
— how did that language become offensive?” Mr. King said. “Why did I sit in
classes teaching me about the merits of our history and our civilization?”
public statement calling himself a “nationalist” and defending his support of
“western civilization’s values,” and said he was not an advocate for “white
nationalism and white supremacy.” “I want to make one thing abundantly clear: I
reject those labels and the evil ideology they define,” he wrote.
Before Trump, Steve King Set the Agenda for the Wall and Anti-Immigrant Politics
Congressman King has never opposed immigration per se. He has been a vocal, consistent critics of illegal immigration, and he has demanded the removal of illegal aliens from the United States. Here's some more context: Mexico enforces some of the most draconian immigration laws in the world. Along the Mexico–Guatemala border, Mexican national guardsmen are instructed to "shoot to kill" illegal alien invaders attempt to break into Mexico. Colombia has a wall with Venezuela, and Israel has two walls. Compared to these countries, the United States is extensively compassionate when it comes to illegal aliens.
As for the New York Times article, their bias toward call King, to call him "anti-immigrant" in the title, is unmistakable. It's worse to lump law-abiding men and women who came into the United States legally with those who break into the United States illegally. Besides that, within the article one finds the following passage:
the country legally and fully assimilate because what matters more than race is
“the culture of America” based on values brought to the United States by whites
from Europe.
Did King talk about "whites from Europe"? He talked about culture, not skin color. The same Western Culture which taught mankind to value every person as equally precious in the eyes of God, that same Western Tradition animated Dr. Martin Luther King Jr's expectation for that promise to hold true for all Americans, especially black Americans who had endured 100 plus years of segregationist misery following the American Civil War.
The biggest problem time and again that emerges is this dangerous linking of skin color and culture. This discussion must focus on culture, not color. I am a nationalist, but I would not call myself a white nationalist, even if I am white, and even though I am an American nationalist.
Here's why:
First reason: I do not see skin color as immediately or essentially relevant. There was a time when Europeans were called "black" because they had dark hair and a dark beard. I learned this from an Armenian born in Soviet Russia who had heard that term used during her upbringing. She would later study to be a teacher in Long Beach, by the way.
Second reason: the term "white nationalist" has too often become synonymous with those who want a country filled with white people only. The term reflects on nationalism rather than the skin color of that specific nationalist every time. There are terms whose usage becomes so shaped and charged over time, that to use the term invites too much confusion. With all of this declared, let's recall that there is nothing to suggest that Representative King is a racist of any kind.
Then another problem presents itself: this burden for individuals to prove that they are "not racist". This challenge is necessarily frustrating and seemingly without end. How does one prove a negative? People on the Left will still play the race card against any opponent, even if that person had a black wife, Hispanic kids, Asian parents, a long pedigree of non-white, non-European ancesters, etc.
And this was the larger point that Congressman King was trying to make. The "Race Card" has turned into a perennial distraction from the more substantive concerns of our nation. Calling one's opponent racist has remained the number one tactic of the left to delegitimize and silence opponents as well as stifle meaning debate. Case in point? The Southern Poverty Law Center once labeled a Muslim as "anti-Muslim extremist" because of his political views. It did not matter what he thought of Islam or Muslims. His views did not suit the SPLC narrative on Sharia Law, so they smeared him. Thankfully, that individual, Maajid Nawaz, sued the SPLC for defamation, and he collected a $4 million settlement and a formal apologize from that corporate-financed online hate machine.
Today, Congressman King is being pilloried by a political establishment tso desperate to prove that they is "not racist". Worse yet, the GOP-Democratic Establishment is seeking to silence one of its most vocal opponents, an effective champion of border security and national sovereignty of amnesty and open border policies. Congressman King did indeed demand repeatedly for the securing of our borders. He modeled different types of border barriers a decade before Donald Trump even appeared on the horizon.
If these remarks are not persuasive, consider this logical defense of Representative Steve King from Keith Hardine, a black American, self-defense trainer and teacher of constitutionalism based in South Los Angeles:
the U.S. House of Representatives, an explanation of the comments he made
during an interview with the New York Times that was published a day earlier.
the Times story that he asked:
that language become offensive? Why did I sit in classes teaching me about the
merits of our history and our civilization?”
context. ” he said. “One phrase in that
long article has created an unnecessary controversy.”
was not complaining that those terms were no longer admissible in polite
society; instead, he was asking how “that offensive language got injected into
our political dialogue?”
nationalism and white supremacy,” King went on. “I want to make one thing
abundantly clear: I reject those labels and the evil ideology that they define.
Further, I condemn anyone who supports this evil and bigoted ideology which saw
in its ultimate expression the systematic murder of 6 million innocent Jewish
lives.”
white supremacy
Western Civilization's values, and that I profoundly believe that America is
the greatest tangible expression of these ideals the World has ever seen. Under
any fair political definition, I am simply a Nationalist."
as “racist,” “fascist,” “Nazi,” and “white supremacist” have been “used almost
always unjustly labeling otherwise innocent people.”
of what he said—that Republican Congressman Steve King is a racist?
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