Racism in America: Obama and his Grandmother

I can no more disown [Rev. Wright] than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother – a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.

--Barack Obama, March 18, 2008

So Barack Obama compares his loving grandmother, a woman who helped raise him, to his hate-spewing pastor.

Beyond the obvious "you can't choose your relatives but your can choose your pastor" stuff and the disrespect he showed for her, what bothered me about Obama bringing up his grandma was the larger point he was making.

To me, Obama was saying that even people who love you, your own flesh and blood, will be racist and hurt you. He's saying that racism is so deeply embedded in the American soul that a grandmother will make offensive racial comments that degrade her own grandson.

It's weird. By using her, he seems to be trying to excuse racist remarks, as if they're beyond our control. He's saying that good people are racist. In other words, don't condemn Wright. He's a good, loving person, too, just like grandma.

I think Obama was trying to make the point that everybody is racist in American, absolutely every single person.

That's false. It's unfair. All Americans are not racist.

Contrary to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Editorial Board's perspective in "Yes, race still matters," I don't believe that Obama's speech "pointed a hopeful way forward."

I think he described a quagmire and offered no exit strategy whatsoever.

Bottom line: Obama's view of the American people reflects Wright's view, not reality.

That shows just how dramatically Wright and his teachings have influenced Obama.