White Oppression, 21st Century Style

Well, it's official. It's okay to impute white men for any malady that befalls us. Feel free to openly state, "what goes around comes around". Fear not as you affirm that selecting a white man in lieu of anyone else is "disgraceful". Say these things and more, and do so without fear of reproach.

As we get our daily updates on the Sonia Sotomayor confirmation hearings, newspaper op-eds and blog posts abound with this new-found freedom of expression. It's not that white men are for the first time "evil". The difference is now, it's mainstream.

Consider the following:

In Whose Identity Politics?, Washington Post Op-Ed columnist Eugene Robinson wrote,

"Yes, justice is supposed to be blind. But for most of our nation's history, it hasn't been -- and women and minorities are acutely aware of how our view of justice has evolved, or been forced to evolve."

More overtly, The New York Times' Maureen Dowd stated in White Man's Last Stand,

"It was a disgrace that W. appointed two white men to a court stocked with white men."

Why is this kind of rhetoric acceptable? What happened to Dr. King's dream? Does it not include white men?

I'll start by dissecting Mr. Robinson's excerpt. He starts by stating that justice has not been blind for women and minorities (true). I'll assume he's inferring that most of the injustice has been adjudicated by white men (also true). Mr. Robinson is trying to excuse Judge Sotomayor's empathetic approach to Law (my opinion). If I can paraphrase, "Since white men did it to us, we can/should now do it to them, or at least be excused for doing so. What goes around comes around!"

Before I get to my point, let's turn for a moment to Ms. Dowd's comment. So selecting two white men from a pool of mostly white men is a disgrace, huh? Then where on the "disgrace meter" does Bill Clinton fall for appointing Stephen Breyer to the highest court in the land? The last time I checked, justice Beyer is white. And What about Bush 41? He appointed two conservative men - ouch! But Justice Thomas is black, so does he get any points for that? Am I to assume that you agree with Sotomayor, and feel that qualified white men must be overlooked?

All of this is troubling to me. In America, it's racism and sexism. In my native Kenya, it's tribalism. On either continent, the oppressed feel justified in retribution through an "it's our turn to eat" mentality. It's unfair and unwise. It's taking the low road, and it inflicts a condition of inequality across more levels than it heals. If this kind of rhetoric is not challenged at its core, we can never get to an "all are equal" society. I sometimes get the feeling that there are those that benefit from inequality, and they are willing to do anything to maintain it - and they ain't white men (at least not exclusively).

I'm not suggesting we feel sorry for white men. Nor am I about to propose a government program to help oppressed white men all over this land. After all, being white and male are still great commodities. it's just simply not fair to treat anyone like this because of the past (or the present). And this, from people who claim that their political party has moral authority on fairness. Wow.