The Trouble With Spikol: Print Edition
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Wright or Wrong?
Is Barack Obama’s pastor really that controversial?
Obama’s speech at the Constitution Center last week was the first time in my life I heard a major political figure speak in depth about race. The speech was roughly 5,000 words—almost the length of a State of the Union address.
To deflect the controversy over Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Obama didn’t need to deliver a 5,000-word speech on a subject that isn’t high on voters’ lists of concerns. The economy, war, healthcare—these are issues people vote on. But Obama didn’t want to waste the opportunity for discourse. And I’m glad he didn’t.
Of course, within those 5,000 words, he had to thoroughly chastise Wright. Among other things, he said, “[Wright’s] remarks … expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country—a view that sees white racism as endemic.” He called Rev. Wright’s comments “wrong.”
I understand why Obama said that, and I’m guessing Rev. Wright—who’s being called a hatemonger—gets it too. But I don’t see the need to condemn everything the reverend has said.
Other than saying black people have gotten AIDS from the government (read The New York Times’ Nicholas Kristof for an interesting commentary on that), Wright’s excerpted remarks suggest a man whose primary belief is that racism has caused grievous harm to African-Americans and to American society in general.
As Rice University religion and philosophy professor Anthony Pinn said on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered, “Folks including myself may be taken aback by the inflammatory nature of the rhetoric, but I don’t think very many of us would deny that there is a fundamental truth: Racism is a problem in the United States.”
Some of Wright’s other remarks struck me as unspectacular for the same reason. They’re either true, or they’ve been said many times before.
Let’s break down one of them, just for fun, from 2001:
“We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and the black South Africans, and now we are indignant. Because the stuff we have done overseas has now been brought back into our own front yard. America’s chickens are coming home to roost.”
Saying the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, were a result of failed American foreign policy isn’t new now and it wasn’t groundbreaking then. One of the first calls I got after the attacks was from a college friend who said exactly the same thing, and I think he might’ve used the chickens line.
From Michael Moore to Ann Coulter, people from every side of the political spectrum have long suggested we made our own bed.
In June 2002 Market & Opinion Research International and Harris Interactive did a poll of Europeans regarding the reason for the 9/11 attacks. A majority of the people asked believed that U.S. foreign policy was partly to blame.
Around the same time Rev. Wright gave the sermon from which these remarks were taken, the Christian Science Monitor reported: “But from Jakarta to Cairo, Muslims and Arabs say … a mood of resentment toward America and its behavior around the world has become so commonplace in their countries that it was bound to breed hostility, and even hatred.
“And the buttons that Mr. bin Laden pushes in his statements and interviews—the injustice done to the Palestinians … —win a good deal of popular sympathy.”
Emphasis mine. And Pastor Wright’s.
The 9/11 Commission Report references the same problem—that of “millions of Arabs and Muslims angry at the United States because of issues ranging from Iraq to Palestine to America’s support for their countries’ repressive rulers.”
Having said what he did about foreign policy, in fact, makes Rev. Wright guilty of one thing he hasn’t been accused of: banality.
The phrase “state terrorism” in reference to Israel—whether you agree with it or not—is also banal. In 2004 the prime minister of Turkey—an ally of Israel—accused Israel of “state terrorism” after roughly 60 Palestinians, including children and innocents, were killed, and thousands were left homeless after their houses were destroyed.
It was the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz, in fact, that posed the question: Was Israel practicing “state terrorism”? The prime minister answered, “When you look at the structure of what has happened, how else can you interpret it?”
In July 2006 The Nation published an article headlined “Israel’s State-Sponsored Terrorism.”
Even Tikkun—a magazine of Jewish thought—has characterized Israel’s policies toward Palestinians as “state terrorism.” Is it really so incredible that Pastor Wright might say the same thing?
As for U.S. complicity regarding Israel and South Africa, that too is pretty uninventive. More U.S. aid goes to Israel than to any other country. And the U.S. spent two decades opposing U.N. sanctions against apartheid.
When the Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act was presented to Ronald Reagan in 1986, he vetoed it. From personal experience, I can tell you I muddied many pairs of jeans during sit-ins to get my complicit college to divest from South Africa, and I’m not sure it would’ve happened at all if the bad publicity didn’t embarrass them.
To sum up, I guess Noam Chomsky would be a lot scarier if he were black. He’d get a lot more press too.
Church of Chomsky, anyone?
liz | 1:20 PM | Uncategorized
I would like to comment on Liz Spikol’s article about Mr Wright. I don’t choose to call him a reverend as what he preaches is Not God’s work. He is a hate monger and I think he does a terrible disservice to the black communities and every other community too. This man has had so many opportunities to do good work for the country he chooses to live in, but instead he calls it a place where black people don’t have the opportunity to prosper. Well, I would like to know how many Africans would like to have what he has and trade places with him and eveyone like him. I wish our fore fathers didn’t bring Africans over here and maybe today we would have a different society.
Thank you.
Dearest Liz:
Let’s just agree to disagree on this issue. Because I am going to definitely write an opposing view point to your article. Politics, race, and character during a presidential election year! What a novel concept! Now I hate to be a cynic here: but if I went to a racist church whose pastor regurgitated racist ideology and untruth to pander to his partisan parishioners for some twenty years; then I as a candidate for president of the United States of America openly articulated that this pastor was a kin to being as an uncle and mentor to me throughout my intellectual formative years. I would think that might become a worthy issue in an election. Hold on here! Reality check! (If I happened be Caucasian it would not only be an issue, it would be a no brainer. I would be trashed by the media and pretty much be completely ostracized by my constituency). But then again we live in a double standard society where it’s ok, or at the very least much more acceptable to be racist if your part of a minority; because history has shown there was some form or another of oppression and certified wrong doing done is the past to certain segments of our population. There seems or has the appearance of this under riding tide of entitlement (some might call that retribution theology or pay back thinking) among some in the minority community. I honestly don’t buy into or understand the rational in this line of thinking. But it is a very real and disturbing trend in a country of stated equality for all. Even as the other Democratic candidate Hillary stated clearly: “I would not have attended a church like that”. Maybe because these powerful influences that help shape us a person can be a determiner and factor of our very core values and character development. I don’t want a racist leaning or tainted decision making president no matter what issues I agree or disagree with that person on! I wouldn’t care if that person was black, white, female, bipolar, purple, and stunning alien green. Just sometimes faith, principles, and character do matter. Of course way back when, I actually voted for Jimmy Carter on principles and character! Too bad he turned out to be such a lousy and ineffective president. So we can all make mistakes and misjudgments even in election years. That’s why they call it politics; it’s a dirty game some wealthy, powerful, and endeared few get to play. I say let’s get those magnifying glasses out, and dawn those boxing gloves; because the dirt has only started to fly.
Now as for aid financially and militarily going to Israel, the only true democracy in the Middle East ( here are a few reasons for an imbalanced aid policy: They are America’s greatest ally in the region, Israel is surrounded by sworn enemies on all sides, there is a wide spread theocracy bend throughout the region on Israel’s eventual complete annihilation and destruction, they have been the victim of unprovoked attacks in the past by neighboring countries, and have a population that is subject to terrorist acts of horrific nature on a frequent and ongoing basis). Palestine has still not yet formed a reliable government that can control it own in fighting, hate mongering, terrorist elements, or is unified in recognizing Israel’s right to exist as a sovereign nation. Is war a horrific event where women, children, and innocent people die? Unfortunately it is! That is the absolute and terrifying reality of all wars. Don’t you believe America and Israel have not only a right as nations; but a solemn duty to their citizens to protect themselves against imminent threats and sworn enemies bent on their destruction! I would hope we all could agree on at least that point! I’m not going to sit here and write war is a good or noble act in its very nature ( I don’t happen to believe that pugilist philosophy), but I do believe sometimes it’s a necessary evil we have to embrace or relish ourselves to perishing off the face of this earth. I personally happen to believe that Israel has been more than tolerant in its response policy to rogue nations and terrorist actions taken against them. If that were America being attacked in that kind regular fashion; Palestine and a few neighboring countries that finance and train terrorist would be nothing more than barren dust bowls of ash and bone at this point. It’s a little ironic that we still haven’t opened our eyes yet and seen the bigger picture here! Our enemy is fighting a Holy Theological War; as we sit at home in relative comfort fighting a policy war! I can’t help but wonder what our nation’s forefathers would think of us now.
Yours truly
Stan
I agree with you Liz. The
‘chickens coming home to roost’ comment has been said by many, is not controversial, and I believe that Rev. Wright was actually quoting someone else when he gave that sermon (check out the complete sermon on YouTube). And we can pretend that racism magically disappeared with the passage of the Civil Rights Act, but it did not. There is a substantial portion of the black community that believes AIDS is a government plot, that drugs were introduced to subjugate the black man (someone please explain to me the powder v crack cocaine penalties). Rev Wright is expressing what many believe. And state terrorism? We are the biggest perpetrators of it. As you said, read a little history, read a little Chomsky
i certainly agree with your summary statement in reference to chomsky.
i also find it ironic that once again religion has poisoned our politics, and vice versa. how sage some of the founders were to try to separate church and state, and how foolish we are to meld them.
in taking up the christian banner, however sincerely, obama’s chickens have also come home to roost. that being said, his address on race here in philadelphia won my vote back.
Good for you, Liz. I, too, haven’t heard much in Rev. Wright’s comments that I either can’t agree with or respect his right to his own experience. People really don’t like to hear the truth of the experience of others if it will cause them to actually have to DO something. And if we allow ourselves to hear what this gentleman is saying, we’ll have to change in order to start living up to what we claim to be our national ideals. I wish I could believe this is going to happen…but I’m not optimistic about this country’s willingness to really become the land of the free and equal.
If someone took a random recording of only my most impassioned remarks throughout the years I might sound as harmful as Wright. Held in context his remarks almost always reflect the truth we as a whole refuse to admit. Having multiple friends who actually attend the church, I know they can attest to his social ethic and dedication to world issues. His sermons speak the gospel more than racial rhetoric, and when he speaks of race, he’s almost always uncomfortably correct. Caucasians have become politically correct, we know what not to say about race. But White power differentials and passive racism remain strong entities in our culture. We’ve become comfortable with this and don’t like the challenge people like Wright puts forth. In my opinion Obama’s speech is historical.
I echo what Stan said, all of it! I am a new visitor to your blog Liz, just as you are contemplating and going through changes. Cute Hamster! Watching your video made me think I should have a tiny furry companion too, lol. I prefer rats though. They’re uglier, but they are calmer and smarter and they live longer. RIP to your two previous hamsters.
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