A little over a year ago Charles Blow wrote an opinion piece for the NY Times entitled White Extinction Anxiety, the thrust of which has to do with one cultural segment’s loss of dominion at the end time of what was assumed to be a dominion that would be endless (or secured through to the “End Times” when a white Jesus would return, kick butt and take names.)
It’s not unlike having one nation that is labeled a “most favored nation” of other nations in international economics in which that nation enjoys special treatment, privileges and opportunities at the expense of all other countries.
White Extinction Anxiety then perhaps seems to be the suffering of loss of status and privilege that was taken for granted as an inherent right – a natural consequence of being born white as opposed to other random acts of God.
Or, as Peggy McIntosh put it,
“Whites in Western societies enjoy advantages that non-whites do not experience, as “an invisible package of unearned assets”. White privilege denotes both obvious and less obvious passive advantages that white people may not recognize they have, which distinguishes it from overt bias or prejudice.
These include cultural affirmations of one’s own worth; presumed greater social status; and freedom to move, buy, work, play, and speak freely. The effects can be seen in professional, educational, and personal contexts.
The concept of white privilege also implies the right to assume the universality of one’s own experiences, marking others as different or exceptional while perceiving oneself as normal.” – Wikipedia
Ultimately, it seems that perhaps the only strategic way to avoid being the hapless losers of white privilege is through belligerence and violence defined by racial stereotypes. These are mostly stereotypes common to the white privileged society itself but are considered patently aberrant and abnormal by every other race and society including whites not of the “nationalist” ilk.
We are seeing the desperate sub culture of white nationalists now beginning to have to subsist on reduced respect and regard that were formerly – if at all – maintained through some sort of economic superiority if not downright intimidation and condescension. It’s not unlike the scene in Dr. Zhivago where the good doctor comes home one evening shortly after the revolution to find that his mansion has been invaded by peasants and he can do nothing about it but accommodate – which he does with as much graciousness as he can personally muster.
Graciousness is what is lacking in the white nationalism crowd; the thinking as suggested by words and deed that intimidation, violence and downright bluff will carry the day – when in truth the situation can only be ultimately hopeless.
White nationalism already finds itself on the same kind of “slippery slope” that has trapped sexual predators. Such are mucking along under an increasing social awareness and rejection that will only build as such chauvinistic sexual attitudes toward other human beings becomes more and more a behavior that is condemned.
White nationalists are headed for rejection.
Verbal and physical violence will no longer be a foundation for the maintaining of undeserved or unearned privilege.
That’s the bottom line.
Curmudgeon at Work 