# Has the Obama presidency made racism acceptable? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 11, 2010, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404 "2010-09-11T14:30:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![sleestak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/919ad9/32.png) [@sleestak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sleestak)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2010, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/41 "2010-09-11T20:52:24Z")
> [@CannyDan](#): > > > [@Knorf](#): > > > > I am convinced that the main reason so many Obama-haters cling irrationally to blatant lies – e.g. “Obama is secret Muslim,” “Obama is a socialist,” “Obama was born in Kenya,” etc. – is because those lies are convenient masks for their racism. > > > > For them, a black man in power is the most frightening thing there is, because to them Obama as president represents the dwindling of white male hegemony. > > This. > > I’m sure many of them are not consciously racist. That’s why they will deny it so vigorously and sincerely. The racism is subconscious, but all the more powerful to them because it comes from inside and is not based upon rational reasons or verifiable actions. > > It’s xenophobia, and these folks are probably also creeped out by all of the different “others” around them, but only Obama is in such a high profile seat of authority. This raises their discomfort up to outright fear. And since they can’t rationalize an irrational fear they have to find something concrete upon which to ground that fear. As \*\*Knorf \*\*says, these are convenient masks, hiding their racism even from themselves. This is absolutely brilliant. Using this line of thinking is just another form of racism. You’ve just assigned motives to people based on the color of their skin without knowing what they truly think. And you’ve done it in such a way that whatever the person really believes, it gets disregarded as subconscious racism. Bravo. Slee Note, there are racists out there, sadly. However I think it is hard to figure out the true number. My guess is that the number of racists is higher than I think and it is an lower than you think it is. I think it is pretty low. However, I could be wrong. ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2010, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/42 "2010-09-11T21:02:51Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > Did black Democrats dislike Bush because he was white? No, we hated him because he turned what was a surplus into a deficit, started one war on a false premise and under-manned the war against the country that sheltered the attackers, and created a new extra-legal system for trying and imprisoning suspected terrorists. Obama has done virtually nothing that was outside the mainstream of a couple of years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Knorf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/58956e/32.png) [@Knorf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knorf)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2010, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/43 "2010-09-11T21:02:56Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > I’m still looking for the missing step, though. It’s not that his poll numbers _ **are** _ low; it’s that people who didn’t have a problem with him back then have a problem with him now. I wouldn’t be surprised if, upon teasing out the numbers, we need to explain a solid number of white males who even voted for the guy – and then proceeded to give Obama-as-President solid approval ratings for a while – before changing their minds about him _ **after** _ a solid number of months had gone by. To be quite clear, I’m not talking about people (such as some conservatives on this board), who have a principled opposition to Obama’s policies. Without a doubt, some whites who voted for him now disapprove of the job he’s doing, and aren’t racist. I’m speculating rather on those who cling to idiotic, blatant lies, as stated above: Obama’s not an American citizen, Obama’s a socialist, Obama’s a Muslim. These people’s eager willingness to cling to such lies is very suspicious, in my view. The most likely explanation is as a mask for racism, at least for some. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2010, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/44 "2010-09-11T21:05:26Z")
I think conservatives are sorer losers than liberals or moderates. Conservatives feel entitled to power and when they lose an election they feel it’s a mistake that needs to be corrected. Sure Bush was scorned by moderates and liberals. But he earned that scorn. Clinton and Obama were attacked from their first day in office. Rush Limbaugh was calling for Clinton’s impeachment the first week of his administration. Tea Partiers were marching within days of Obama’s administration. These were not reactions, they were pre-emptive attacks. And I feel they were orchestrated. The conservative leadership didn’t really give a damn if Clinton was committing adultery or if Obama is black. These would be non-issues if Clinton and Obama had been conservatives. The conservative leadership is just using these issues to promote opposition among the rank and file to Presidents they didn’t choose. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2010, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/45 "2010-09-11T21:11:14Z")
To start with black people overwhelmingly supported him at the ballot box. Race was the deciding factor with this vote and not politics. No other President in my lifetime had as little experience as Obama and would not have survived the Primaries. It was a mathematical skewing of the vote due to the percentage of black Democrats that put him on the national ballot. If he was white he would not have won the Primary. From there it was a function of riding Bush’s unpopularity. McCain wasn’t seen as a strong candidate within his own party. President Obama stepped into office with an agenda instead of addressing a serious economic crisis. he supported a pork bill intended to reduce unemployment and all it did was raise the level of debt. From there he supported a health care bill that affected businesses. His next project is to push increases in cap and trade taxes which will harm business. Obama may be the face of it but it’s the Democratic Party that screwed the pooch on the economy. ---
**Author:** ![Empire\_State](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Empire\_State](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Empire_State)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2010, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/46 "2010-09-11T21:17:26Z")
> [@sleestak](#): > > This is absolutely brilliant. Using this line of thinking is just another form of racism. You’ve just assigned motives to people based on the color of their skin without knowing what they truly think. And you’ve done it in such a way that whatever the person really believes, it gets disregarded as subconscious racism. How is calling out someone else’s racism an inherently racist thing to do? If a person really believes all Muslims are terrorists, they are racist. If they dislike Obama, not because of his politics, but because he’s a Muslim (despite evidence to the contrary), or because he’s not even a real American (a blatant lie), or because Obamacare is only going to benefit welfare moms and their baby daddies (really?), then they are racist. Obscuring racism behind witty sayings like “Not all Muslims are terrorists, but all terrorists are Muslim,” is not fooling anyone, and no one is prejudiced if they call someone out on this unacceptable behavior. There are some legitimate arguments the conservative fringe could be making without resorting to untrue and ad hominem attacks, but they don’t care about those legitimate reasons. ---
**Author:** ![CannyDan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cannydan/32/548_2.png) [@CannyDan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CannyDan)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2010, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/47 "2010-09-11T21:47:42Z")
> [@sleestak](#): > > This is absolutely brilliant. Using this line of thinking is just another form of racism. You’ve just assigned motives to people based on the color of their skin without knowing what they truly think. And you’ve done it in such a way that whatever the person really believes, it gets disregarded as subconscious racism. > > Bravo. > > Slee Please. Not the old “all opinions must be equal because they’re all opinions” crap. We were talking about the folks who believe all those totally untrue things about Obama. Their beliefs have absolutely no basis in fact and are impossible to support by any realistic metric. They arose and were given voice _before_ Obama took any actual policy actions. They continue, full throat and with flecks of spittle visible, in complete contradiction to fact (e.g., Obama raised everybody’s taxes, he nationalized car manufacturers, etc.). “Whatever the person really believes” is demonstrably total bullshit. These “beliefs” about Obama are pure and utter nonsense, yet these people continue to believe in them anyway. I’m not disregarding it by calling it subconscious racism. I’m pointing it out, waving flags, setting up searchlights, and issuing press releases about it. I’m offering an explanation for such behavior. Your hand waving is not convincing. > [@sleestak](#): > > Note, there are racists out there, sadly. However I think it is hard to figure out the true number. My guess is that the number of racists is higher than I think and it is an lower than you think it is. > > I think it is pretty low. However, I could be wrong. Indeed. _(checks forum)_ Watch any Tea rally, read their signs, observe the demographic represented, listen to the rhetoric, and you will see just how amazingly, overwhelmingly, incontrovertibly wrong you are. ---
**Author:** ![Lakai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de0a6/32.png) [@Lakai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lakai)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2010, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/48 "2010-09-11T22:23:12Z")
It’s not racism anymore, it’s xenophobia. Regan used to scare white people by associating democrats with black criminals, welfare queens, and affirmative action. You can’t do that to Obama because he clearly doesn’t fit that stereotype. What his opponents have done is claim he’s un-American, a foreigner who doesn’t share America’s values. McCain’s “Country First” slogan was a pretty blatant example of that. The country is now more afraid of foreigners than black people. If that’s not racial progress then I don’t know what is. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2010, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/49 "2010-09-11T22:40:34Z")
> [@DanBlather](#): > > > [@Quartz](#): > > > > Did black Democrats dislike Bush because he was white? > > No, we hated him because he turned what was a surplus into a deficit, started one war on a false premise and under-manned the war against the country that sheltered the attackers, and created a new extra-legal system for trying and imprisoning suspected terrorists. > > Obama has done virtually nothing that was outside the mainstream of a couple of years ago. But can you comprehend that some people think he has, or is in danger of doing? And I agree that some things like UHC are very much to America’s benefit, even if some people don’t think they are. I’ve learned a lot about the sad history of racism in America from the SDMB, but in this case, I just don’t see racism as even a significant cause of dislike of Obama. To me, it seems to be pretty much standard political partisanship. To take another example, the comments about Obama aren’t even near the level of slime that was launched at Palin. Nor, to take an example from side of the Atlantic, are they anywhere near the level of hatred inflicted upon Mrs Thatcher. Obama’s a Democrat and that for many is enough. ---
**Author:** ![Mozart1220](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@Mozart1220](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mozart1220)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2010, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/50 "2010-09-11T23:21:48Z")
> [@CannyDan](#): > > > [@Mozart1220](#): > > > > If the Republicans have one great strength, it’s the realization that nothing gathers supporters like a common enemy, real or otherwise. > > > > Japs, Huns, Commies, Terrorists, Gays, Liberals, Muslims…whatever the flavor of the month is. > > No, I think this is because they actually HAVE so many common enemies. They have retreated so far into their little tent of elite white guys that now pretty much _everybody_ else is an outsider. They’re neither making it up nor playing it up. Theirs is truly a siege mentality. The fact that it is they who have made everyone else the enemy doesn’t change the reality of it. That’s true isn’t it? Though Reagan actually once said that if we want to see the entire world get together, wait until we are attacked by space aliens. ---
**Author:** ![Mozart1220](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@Mozart1220](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mozart1220)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2010, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/51 "2010-09-11T23:24:05Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > > [@DanBlather](#): > > > > No, we hated him because he turned what was a surplus into a deficit, started one war on a false premise and under-manned the war against the country that sheltered the attackers, and created a new extra-legal system for trying and imprisoning suspected terrorists. > > > > Obama has done virtually nothing that was outside the mainstream of a couple of years ago. > > But can you comprehend that some people think he has, or is in danger of doing? And I agree that some things like UHC are very much to America’s benefit, even if some people don’t think they are. > > I’ve learned a lot about the sad history of racism in America from the SDMB, but in this case, I just don’t see racism as even a significant cause of dislike of Obama. To me, it seems to be pretty much standard political partisanship. To take another example, the comments about Obama aren’t even near the level of slime that was launched at Palin. Nor, to take an example from side of the Atlantic, are they anywhere near the level of hatred inflicted upon Mrs Thatcher. Obama’s a Democrat and that for many is enough. I’m wondering if any White President would have been heckled by a congressman while giving the State of the Union, or if people would have been allowed to bring assault weapons to a rally by a White candidate. Maybe it’s just the state of the Republican party these days, I don’t know. ---
**Author:** ![joew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/34f0e0/32.png) [@joew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/joew)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2010, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/52 "2010-09-12T17:07:25Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > > [@joew](#): > > > > So this got me thinking…I see blatant hatred of Obama everywhere I go and everywhere I look. And I wonder how much of it is because of race? > > Where were you when the ‘Bush = stupid’ meme was running? Have you and your black colleagues actually considered that most of those who profess dislike of Obama for his policies simply dislike him for his policies and no more? Did black Democrats dislike Bush because he was white? > > Of course, I speak through the filter of 3000 miles of Atlantic ocean. I was here and I took part. But I disagree that it was hatred behind it. To me it was “making fun of..” and using that as a pretense to cover the moves I thought were not in America’s best interest. As a nation we are not at war with 2 countries that are largely stupid, we are at war with two countries that are largely muslim. And A LOT of people in America hate/fear Muslims for whatever reason (principally terrorism). So to equate Obama with being Muslim transcends saying Bush is not really all that bright. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2010, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/53 "2010-09-12T19:31:51Z")
> [@](#): > > Has the black community taken ownership of Obama to the point that any attack on him is seen as personal? No more so than with any other politician. Obama was too new to have any track record, therefore he was a good Rorschach blot for people to project their fantasies onto. > [@](#): > > Do democrats not back him because of his policies or because of his race? To the extent that Democrats don’t back him, it is because they did what he wanted - doubled the deficit, passed a gigantically expensive stimulus package, passed his Obamacare health insurance reforms - and the economy is still in the shitter and health care costs have continued to rise. Obama has added more to the national debt held by the public than every President from Washington to Reagan, combined. And, although not in recession, we are limping along with unemployment at nearly ten percent, and BHO has nothing more to suggest besides “more of the same”. > [@](#): > > Has the media fed this by constantly being anti-Obama? Or are they simply reflecting the public’s taste? The American mainstream media is about as far from “constantly anti-Obama” as can be imagined. Unless by “the media” you mean FoxNews. Obama came into power with approval ratings based on what people hoped he could do. Now they have had a couple years to see what he can actually do, and his approval ratings have dropped to remarkably high to the low- to mid-forties. As the mid-terms approach, I look to most of the MSM to try and prop Obama up, or at least distance him from what they fear is the coming debacle. > [@](#): > > If Obama loses all momentum and is unable to pass any reforms, will it hamper any future black American from attaining the presidency? I don’t see why it would. Assume that he is fucking up - he isn’t fucking up because he is black, so I don’t see why someone else who lacks his flaws but shares his racial identity would be hampered by it. > [@](#): > > Is my co-worker right? Has the election of a black president made racism OK again? No. All this stuff about how people oppose Obama because of racism is just an attempt to deflect criticism. “Obama is black, racists don’t like black people, you don’t like Obama, therefore you are a racist” is too easy a dodge for Democrats to resist, but reasonable people can see thru it fairly easily. The situation is really not essentially different from what it was when Jimmy Carter’s Presidency began to resemble last month’s soufflé. It’s just now that there is the convenient excuse that the soufflé in question is not vanilla. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2010, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/54 "2010-09-12T22:26:31Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > To start with black people overwhelmingly supported him at the ballot box. Race was the deciding factor with this vote and not politics. No other President in my lifetime had as little experience as Obama and would not have survived the Primaries. It was a mathematical skewing of the vote due to the percentage of black Democrats that put him on the national ballot. If he was white he would not have won the Primary. From there it was a function of riding Bush’s unpopularity. McCain wasn’t seen as a strong candidate within his own party. > > President Obama stepped into office with an agenda instead of addressing a serious economic crisis. he supported a pork bill intended to reduce unemployment and all it did was raise the level of debt. From there he supported a health care bill that affected businesses. His next project is to push increases in cap and trade taxes which will harm business. > > Obama may be the face of it but it’s the Democratic Party that screwed the pooch on the economy. Nope. Hilary won the majority of the black vote in the early primaries, and the black political establishment was against Obama. They made a variety of public statements against him. Hilary won not just the New York State primary, but also the majority of the black vote in that primary. It was only when Obama proved that he could could get majorities of white support in states with few black people that the black primary voters got behind him. Now in the general election, black voters consistently support Democratic candidates at levels of 90 per cent or higher. This election was no different. Obama got overwhelming black support, just like Clinton, just like Carter. It’s absurd to claim that Obama didn’t make addressing the economic crisis a major part of his agenda when he took office. The only way you could have missed this is if you were in a coma. Your entire post was bunk. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/55 "2010-09-13T13:56:23Z")
> [@Mozart1220](#): > > I’m wondering if any White President would have been heckled by a congressman while giving the State of the Union… Yup. [Cite.](http://www.slate.com/id/2227966/) Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![CannyDan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cannydan/32/548_2.png) [@CannyDan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CannyDan)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/56 "2010-09-13T15:02:53Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > > [@Mozart1220](#): > > > > I’m wondering if any White President would have been heckled by a congressman while giving the State of the Union… > > Yup. [Cite.](http://www.slate.com/id/2227966/) > > Regards, > Shodan Methinks your cite does not support your thesis. From your cite: > [@](#): > > It depends on what you mean by heckle… …last night may be the first time a congressman went beyond communal muttering—and interrupted the president with a loud and denigrating retort. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/57 "2010-09-13T17:33:05Z")
> [@CannyDan](#): > > [Methinks your cite does not support your thesis. From your cite: > > > [@](#): > > > > It depends on what you mean by heckle… …last night may be the first time a congressman went beyond communal muttering—and interrupted the president with a loud and denigrating retort. It does - > [@](#): > > And when George W. Bush claimed in his 2005 State of the Union that Social Security will be “exhausted and bankrupt by 2042,” Democrats responded with boos. (At the time, several political talk-show hosts, including Ted Koppel of ABC, claimed such booing was unprecedented.) Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![CannyDan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cannydan/32/548_2.png) [@CannyDan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CannyDan)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/58 "2010-09-13T17:56:01Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > > [@CannyDan](#): > > > > [Methinks your cite does not support your thesis. From your cite: > > It does - > > > [@](#): > > > > And when George W. Bush claimed in his 2005 State of the Union that Social Security will be “exhausted and bankrupt by 2042,” Democrats responded with boos. (At the time, several political talk-show hosts, including Ted Koppel of ABC, claimed such booing was unprecedented.) > > Regards, > Shodan False equivalence. We’ve been down this same road repeatedly, I am sure you recall. But you still continue to trot out your tired argument anyway. I don’t understand why you revel so in ‘fail’. ---
**Author:** ![Knorf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/58956e/32.png) [@Knorf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knorf)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/59 "2010-09-13T18:19:23Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > > [@Mozart1220](#): > > > > I’m wondering if any White President would have been heckled by a congressman while giving the State of the Union… > > Yup. [Cite.](http://www.slate.com/id/2227966/) > > Regards, > Shodan The citation does not support the thesis. Why am I not surprised? ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404/60 "2010-09-13T18:59:38Z")
I’m not sure what you are claiming - that Bush was never President, that it didn’t happen during the State of the Union speech, that it didn’t come from Congress, or that Bush isn’t white. Actually I know that you aren’t claiming anything - merely waving away evidence that you can’t refute. Regards, Shodan [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-obama-presidency-made-racism-acceptable/553404.md?page=4)