Identity Politics and Race
Identity Politics and Race
Why Honesty Matters in Regards to Race in America
*For $35 per year you get real, honest, unadulterated non-tribal writing. Think about how rare that is in 2023. Consider it; that’s all I’m saying. Or don’t. Your call. I’ll keep writing either way.
A Substack writer and I clashed on notions of race and police brutality and other issues connected with identity politics. Said writer’s name will remain mute. But I wanted to respond. The writer’s critique was simply that Black unarmed men are disproportionately killed by racist cops and that my data didn’t add up and that Hate Crimes towards Black Americans from white Americans are up and that things are generally very bad for Black Americans. Etc. (I’m being vague.) The “you” being used in the article is directed towards said writer.
The argument you mentioned a la unarmed Black men being killed by the cops more is a commonly used trope at this point. Black Americans make up about 13.6% of the population (47.2 million as of 2021) and are killed at a higher rate…yes. But as a group Black Americans (and we know it’s a tiny fraction of Black Americans in low-income urban areas; it’s young Black men) commit significantly higher rates of crime, ergo they’re interacting much more often with police. This increases the likelihood of something going wrong.
Further, the WaPo (Washington Post) database does in fact show roughly 15-20 unarmed Black Americans killed by police each year. You literally have a higher chance of being struck by lightening. The perception is that it’s happening every five seconds but that’s because the media plays and replays these incidents incessantly. BLM’s whole claim is founded on this falsity.
I added some photos of the Washington Post Police Shooting Database, which has been running since 2015. You can’t link with the details for some reason. I encourage anyone to look the numbers up themselves. Keep in mind the numbers are tiny. Between 7-37 (usually between 10-20) unarmed Black men have been killed each year since 2015. Some people say it’s actually more people because fill-in-the-blank, inaccurate counting, etc. Ok. Add 10, 15, 20 to it. Fifty if you want. Hell: 100. Still. *(Obviously the ideal for every race is ZERO. But we live in reality.) These are tiny numbers out of 47.2 million people in a nation as ripe with guns and violence as ours is. And the reality remains that among a sliver of the Black population more crime is committed each year ergo more police incidents will and do occur. Lastly, as I mentioned, keep in mind that a large proportion of the time the media claims A but when you watch the video of the police shooting on YouTube it turns out to be much more complex than we’ve been told. Often there is a gun, a knife, resisting, violence, etc. It’s almost never as simple as MSNBC or CNN etc claim. I’m all for body cameras and police accountability when appropriate and discussing the fairness or lack thereof of qualified immunity.
Number of unarmed Black men killed by police by year:
2015: 37
2016: 20
2017: 21
2018: 22
2019: 12
2020: 18
2021: 11
2022: 12
2023: 7 (so far)
Washington Post Police Shooting Database: Police shootings database 2015-2023: Search by race, age, department - Washington Post
From the Department of Justice:
“Race and Ethnicity of Violent Crime Ofenders and Arrestees, 2018
Allen J. Beck, Ph.D., BJS Statistician
2018, based on data from the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program, Black people were overrepresented among persons arrested for
nonfatal violent crimes (33%) and for serious nonfatal violent crimes (36%) relative to their representation
in the U.S. population (13%) (table 1).1 White people were underrepresented. White people accounted for 60% of U.S. residents but 46% of all persons arrested for rape, robbery, aggravated assault, and other assault, and 39% of all arrestees for nonfatal violent crimes excluding other assault.”
Department of Justice stats: https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/revcoa18.pdf
Obviously, what happened to George Floyd was reprehensible and I’m glad Chauvin got nailed.
Then there’s the fact that white people are being killed by cops all the time, and yet this is completely ignored. Have you heard of Tony Timpa? Google him. It’s on video: White guy in 2016 who died exactly like George Floyd, knee on the neck (for 13 minutes), no repercussions. And this is not rare or unusual. We know the data. We have the YouTube videos of white people being gunned down by police. Yet the media does not care. Then of course you’ve got record numbers of cops retiring the past few years and record crime, mostly in Black neighborhoods in Chicago, New York City, etc. White people on the left get to sit there and act self-righteous while Black urban poor areas get ruined. It’s gross. And it’s actually racist.
From 2019-2021 I lived in NYC. I watched as the media claimed Asian hate was happening because of ‘white supremacy.’ But I saw what happened literally with my own two eyes. Watch the videos. It’s always a Black man beating the shit out of an innocent Asian person. Disgusting. One Black man in April, 2020 I watched walk up to a tiny Asian woman walking her baby in a carriage when I lived in East Harlem and yell, “Go back to China, bitch.” He was muscular and probably 6’1. She was maybe 4’10.
There’s so much myth to unpack. For example, did you know the 1994 Clinton crime bill was pushed by the Black political and voting block. From ABC:
“Curiously, Rangel was among the 11 Congressional Black Caucus members who voted against Clinton's Crime Bill, which did not lack of Black support. In addition to the dozens of pastors who signed a letter in support of the bill, it also had the support of Black mayors. Kurt Schmoke, the first elected Black mayor of Baltimore, was a vigorous supporter.”
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna552961
I’d also point you to Roland Fryer’s Harvard Study (he happens to also be Black). Here’s the link and abstract:
https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/fryer/files/empirical_analysis_tables_figures.pdf
“An Empirical Analysis of Racial Differences in Police Use of Force”
Roland G. Fryer, Jr.
July 2017
Abstract
“This paper explores racial differences in police use of force. On non-lethal uses of force, Blacks and Hispanics are more than fifty percent more likely to experience some form of force in interactions with police. Adding controls that account for important context and civilian behavior reduces, but cannot fully explain, these disparities. On the most extreme use of force – officer-involved shootings – we find no racial differences in either the raw data or when contextual factors are taken into account. We argue that the patterns in the data are consistent with a model in which police officers are utility maximizers, a fraction of which have a preference for discrimination, who incur relatively high expected costs of officer-involved shootings.”
*There is of course plenty more evidence. There are Pew, Politico and Gallup polls as well. (See my linked piece on Black American views via Pew.) But I’ve already written on much of this in previous posts. I want to make one thing absolutely crystal clear: I am in no way, shape or form “anti-Black.” Actually, I am anti-White Denialism, if anything, or perhaps Anti-Denialism in general. Another way of putting it is that I am a free-thinking Democrat (centrist) who loathes the new fringe-left identity obsession and thinks this cultural phenomenon is tearing the party and the country apart.
Republicans and the far-right are just as nasty and disgusting. I do not defend them, either, and never have. (Never will, either.) It always saddens me and makes me shake my head to see that people on the left cannot take responsibility for their side and that, furthermore, they cannot see one obvious axiomatic reality: The two sides propel each other. It takes two to tango, kid. The far-Right is reacting to something; they have been since 2016. The left should spend less time in ad hominem attacks against anyone who disagrees with them, and more time examining themselves. Look in the mirror, people!
The answer to far-right extremism and the nutjobs who were involved in and supported January 6 is NOT Woke identity politics. Two wrongs do not make a right. Do not pass Go, do not collect $200. Until the left (yes, my “side”) owns their own insanity, we can never get anywhere. Why the left and not the right? Because I have zero faith that the Right can or will change. But the left generally has a long track record of being more or less on the “right side of history.”
I do not give a shit WHAT race anyone is. I’m not claiming to be color-blind. NO one is. What I’m saying is that I genuinely do not judge people based off their skin pigmentation. If anything I might be a bit of a classist. I will relate much more to a middle or upper-middleclass Black dude then a poor or working-class white guy. Just not what I know. Why, you might ask, am I so “obsessed” with Black Americans and what they do or do not do, etc.
My answer is that I’m *NOT* obsessed with them. The liberal media is obsessed with them, and I am obsessed with breaking down dumb myths that not only aren’t based in reality, but are actually harming the very people the media claims to be helping. Chicago, NYC, San Francisco, and many other (liberally-led) cities have, since 2020, been experiencing record levels of crime. The vast majority of that crime is being perpetrated in Black communities, against Black victims. Record numbers of police have retired and quit. This has a direct connection, of course with the BLM/anti-police sentiment. Who is to blame here? White racists? NO!!! White woke culture which has amazingly somehow infected the country as a result of the mad narcissism of one Donald J. Trump. Only an extreme idiot such as Trump could have created an equally idiotic movement of identity politics. Pendulum swinging, people.
I know there is a hardened portion of leftist people who are boiling right now, who are just livid, who are writing their ad hominum attacks right this second, who can’t wait to use pre-packaged phrases (Orwell wrote brilliantly about Socialists who did this) such as “Republican talking points” and “victim shaming” and “coming from a white man…” Etc, etc etc. On and on they go. I just don’t take these people seriously. How can you? They aren’t interested in data, polls, debate, discussion. They’re right (in their eyes); they’re angry; and they just know the truth, damn it!
I am not anti-Black. I am anti-Stupidity. I am even anti-Racist in the truest meaning of the phrase. Anti-racist like Mark Twain was. Like any intelligent, thinking, honest, compassionate, loving human being is. I reject all excuses for crime. I don’t care what the race of the perpetrator is. Poor white people commit crimes all the time. And they get shot by cops all the time. Roland Fryer’s data shows clearly that Black Americans DO get arrested more often, roughed up more often, abused and treated badly by cops more often (cops of all races, by the way, not just white), but do NOT get killed at higher levels for racist reasons.
If anyone wants to discuss these things with anyone anytime: Awesome. But let’s deal with Truth, with reality. Wokeism is not popular anymore outside of the mainstream media bubble. For example: A solid majority of Black Americans, Pew found (66%), believe that biological sex is permanent and is not fluid. There are many data points here. Here’s my old post on this.
Remember: Black Americans overwhelmingly chose Biden, *not* Bernie Sanders, the leftist Socialist. Most Black Americans are Democrat-voting…but centrist, and many are center-right when it comes to many social issues. There is no one “Black” experience. Nor is there one “white experience.”
In a nation of 331 million-plus people, one of the most dangerous, violent, gun-toting nations on Earth, it’s a simple miracle that a mere 1,000-plus human beings are killed by police each year (again check the Washington Post database; it’s right on the front page, you literally cannot miss it). One thousand! Out of 331 million. That is a tiny, tiny fraction. Are their bad, racist cops? Of course there are! There are bad, racist people in nearly every corner of society. Is there a grotesque history of racism and slavery in America? Yes there is! Is racism worse now, in 2023, than say in 1995 or 1975 or 1955 or 1900 or 1850 or before? C’mon. That doesn’t even warrant a serious response.
Of course things are much, much, much less racist in 2023 than ever before. Are things perfect? Have we arrived at a race-blind utopia? Obviously not. There is more work to do. Racism is a real phenomenon, clearly, and must still be tackled and pushed back against. The history of slavery is a blight and a travesty.
Neither, however, is slavery unique. Slavery originated in Africa itself and was encouraged by Africans selling other Africans. It’s been done world wide since time immemorial and before, during and after the West began doing it and ultimately ended it. There’s a fantastic book debunking the 1619 Project and the case for American Self-Hatred by prize-winning author Gordon Wood called Power and Liberty: Constitutionalism in the American Revolution. It’s a powerful read.
Nothing can ever get fixed in society unless we agree on first principles and unless we are honest about what the actual problems are and how bad said problems genuinely have become. As all the data clearly shows: The racial problems in America, particularly when it comes to police shootings of unarmed Black people, are not even close to as bad as the progressive culture and media want you to believe. It’s almost as if fringe-left identity-obsessed white people WANT things to be worse than they are so they can fight a crusade that isn’t actually happening. Perhaps this is because they’ve run out of serious identity crusades to fight. Or as if the media WANTS there to be a war they can fight so they can pad their bottom lines. Because as we all know tribalism and outrage SELL.
**Final Note: Some of you will no doubt be annoyed by this choice. Some will call me a coward. But: I am turning comments here OFF. Why? Because in this very touchy issue I just don’t want to play the game where it starts feeling like an online Cormac McCarthy novel. Some of you will agree with me. Some will vehemently disagree. Some will feel neutral or have mixed, nuanced feelings. All of that is perfectly fine and good. That’s what Democrazy is all about, right? Thinking, debating, disagreeing? I know my turning comments “off” seems to contradict that. Perhaps it does. But I just don’t want a nasty, negative Twitter experience. I had my say. You are all perfectly free to create your own posts in response, rebuttal or agreement etc.
Anyway. Long live ALL human beings of ALL races. I truly await a day when skin pigmentation does not automatically (in some people’s minds) force you into some arbitrary sociological cage and turn you into a tribe member who must digitally UFC fight with other tribes. Until we learn to change and grow—because identity politics is SO obviously not working—we will most certainly continue to endlessly spin our wheels in the muddy ditch.
There are also Black thinkers, writers, political theorists, etc who tackle these issues wonderfully from a similar angle as myself. (Or who disagree with me on some things and agree on others but either way present nuanced thoughts on important ideas.) I encourage everybody to check these people out:
1. Zadie Smith
2. John McWhorter
3. Thomas Sowell
4. Glen Loury
5. Thomas Chatterton Williams
6. Kmele Foster (and his 3-person podcast The 5th Column)
7. Wilfred Reilly
8. Coleman Hughes
9. Basically anyone at Quillette, Free Think, City Journal, etc
10. And plenty more, both Black and other races
**Final final comment: Like Sam Harris (who has a massive following and I do not), I do not want to become known as “the identity politics guy.” There is so much more to write and think about. I also write fiction, memoir, personal and non-personal essays, book reviews, etc. I plan to move back over mostly to that. This is my last piece on this topic probably for a while.
Over and out. For now.
Michael Mohr