We’re Watching White Anxiety Turn Into Violent Rage
During Barack Obama’s first presidential campaign I can remember very clearly an extended family member saying, “There is no way America elects a Black man to that office, but I’m proud he’s trying.”
Then, once Obama won, the sentiments of “never” from one family member grew to a chorus of Black people holding their breath that he wouldn’t be assassinated and/or harmed following his history-making election.
While many during those first few years wanted to tout America’s new status as “post-racial,” Black and brown America knew the truth. While his election wins in both 2008 and 2012 were indeed historic, the whitelash that had been brewing since the advent of birtherism and the Tea Party would soon manifest itself in an upending of all that “post-racial” hope. That’s when Republicans nominated the anti-Obama—a man who ramped up racial anxieties rather than speaking to them with compassion and nuance—Donald J. Trump.