Today, I continue deconstructing the Left’s phony diversity narrative. But first, two bits of astounding news about things I told you yesterday.
Democrat Nury Martinez apologized for racist remarks and resigned her post as president of the Los Angeles City Council, but retained her council seat. Martinez, who is Hispanic, was recorded referring to a black kid as a ‘monkey’ and making other racist comments. But if, as we’re told, black and brown people can’t be racist, why did she apologize and resign? Why didn’t she defend herself and tell us she can’t be racist because she’s brown?
Because the diversity narrative is as phony as a three-dollar bill and everybody knows it, that’s why.
I also told you yesterday about Kamala Harris saying hurricane relief should be made on the basis of skin color, not need, a blatant violation of the Equal Protection Clause.
Well, it turns out, FEMA was doing exactly that after Hurricane Ian devastated parts of Florida. FEMA apportions relief money partly on the basis of “social vulnerability” on the theory that minorities suffer more from natural disasters. Including crazy rich Asians, according to FEMA. Racial discrimination is baked into FEMA policy. It’s part of the Biden administration’s requirement that every federal agency come up with a redistribution – oops, ‘equity’ – plan.
The justification? The historical denial of opportunity for minorities to participate in the economic life of the nation. Tell it to Oprah Winfrey and LeBron James, billionaires both.
The bottom line: “big chunks of federal money” are flowing out of the Treasury based on skin color.
This is not some sideshow – “At FEMA, we strive to place equity at the center of our efforts…,” a FEMA official said. A Treasury Department official said the same thing, recently – put race at the center. All of this is blatantly unconstitutional, offending as it does the Equal Protection Clause that has served our nation well. If you’re a thinking person, let me know when you think redistribution and the historical guilt trip are supposed to end.
Here are some other things that are wrong with the Left’s phony diversity narrative:
It relies on distortions of history.
The latest example is Don Lemon asking a British guest if the crown should pay reparations for colonialism and slavery. But the guest pointed out the inconvenient facts slavery existed on the African continent carried on by Africans and the British were an early force in shutting down the slave trade, being the first nation to outlaw slavery on its soil.
If reparations are to be paid, they should come from the descendants of the African slave-traders who rounded up their own people, handcuffed them in cages, and brought them to the beach to be sold and put on ships. People looking for black pride need to look elsewhere, not distorted and fictionalized accounts of history.
The diversity narrative is thinly disguised revenge and leads to race hatred.
An arts festival in Portland let blacks in for free and charged everybody else $80. The Institute putting on the event gets government grants. So I object. This is enough state action to invoke the Equal Protection Clause. As for race hatred, Democrat South Carolina State Rep. and U.S. Senate candidate Krystle Matthews, who is black, was caught on video trashing white people and saying she keeps them “under her thumb” or they “get out of control like kids.” We keep going like this and we’ll end up like South Africa where the country’s leaders sing about killing white people and black people kill white farmers to get them off the land. This way lies barbarism.
Finally, the diversity narrative is a crutch that holds people back.
First, it holds back the people who don’t get hired because of affirmative action policies. The Supreme Court is hearing a case on October 31st brought by Asians who allege Harvard’s race-based admissions policies are holding them back. Also, a class action suit has been brought against Texas A&M for reserving faculty posts based on race and giving six-figure bonuses only to minorities. Affirmative action also hurts the minorities by putting them in schools and jobs they can’t handle and inducing learned helplessness in large numbers of people. It’s racist to say minorities can’t excel and make it on their own merit. When affirmative action started in the 1970s, it was supposed to be temporary. At some point, the guilt trip and the favoritism were supposed to stop. We’re headed to India, where advantages are doled out by caste and the system is permanent. Not the best outcome for us, the country that became the best country on earth by making opportunity available to all.
The Left’s phony diversity narrative is garbage, but will remain wildly successful for a while longer.
It sucks people in. It gets them to turn off their brain and ignore all the costs the narrative imposes. Identity politics is poisonous and destroys what unified us as a country – a belief in self-rule and rights for the most important minority, the individual. But the costs become more apparent with every passing day. Eventually, clear thinking will win out and the diversity narrative will get thrown into the dustbin of history. It happened with ‘defund the police’ and it will happen with the rest of the diversity narrative, as well. We will be much better off when we return to being a nation of sovereign individuals who are captains of their own fate not looking to government for favoritism or advantages others are not allowed to enjoy.
