Why are so many republicans are racist?

Catherine - posted on 01/25/2012

Wow - that is a stunning assumption! Even a bit offensive... But before I judge too harshly, define "Racist"? Explain how & why you have come to that conclusion, so I can decide if I should even attempt to approach this. Honestly, most people I find crying "racist" are the worst offenders... with their "good intentions". I have a bigger problem with the well-meaning, "positive" racists than the ones who just "judge on skin color". The second type know what they are doing, and for whatever reason hold to a certain set of beliefs or standards, correct or not. The others have no idea that they are racist - in that they expect preferential treatment (coddling) because of some inherent right for "different" people to have advantages & opportunities that are not available to everyone equally.

A person should have no more rights, freedoms, opportunities, advantages than anyone else based solely upon color of skin or origin of ancestry. Does it make me racist to believe if a society allows "perks" for being black they should also allow for every other nationality & color - INCLUDING white?? If you are going to exclude people, don't cry foul when you are not included in something else!

Karla - posted on 08/31/2011

There is a political spectrum that is multi-dimensional; it has the Economic Left and Right, the Social Left and Right, and the Authoritarian Left and Right. Racism is in the Social Right section of that spectrum, and Republicans are in the Social Right.

It’s kind of like a Venn diagram of sorts, Racists are socially on the Right, as are Republicans, but Republicans are not all racists. Are some Democrats racist? Most likely.

Also, in our Capitalist Economy, making money for the corporations is of utmost importance. This Economic Conservatism is hurting us because our government has given so much power to Corporations through allowing lobbying, corporate donations, corporate subsidies, and even consulting corporations when designing laws.

I mention the Economy because that trend hurts all poor people. The USA favoritism toward corporate America means it is not supporting, helping, or making life better for individuals. That trend may feel like discrimination towards certain groups because a large percentage of that group are lower income earners, but actually all lower income earners are being hurt.

Mind you that our Media is part of Corporate America, and that affects the News Corporations and what they will broadcast, support and report.

In other words I don’t think the Republicans of today are necessarily racist, I do think racist goals fit better in the right wing ideology, and I think Corporate America is extra strong, favored by the Right wing, and harmful to all individuals. All of this makes it appear that Republicans are racist.

Kelsey - posted on 08/30/2011

I believe they are racists because of their "views". They are all white supremacist and uneducated. They dont want their "white suppority" to ever fade. (as in running Corporate America! and demanding that they should not pay high taxes!)

I just believe by speaking to other republicans, that is it just the "old" fashioned values that they were taught growing up. Which back in the day, old fashioned values also meant, supporting the KKK, hate crimes, believing they are superior from most all races. The list goes on and on....These same families still live with those values today and are being taught to their children and grand-children. They sit around the picnic table telling racist jokes and slurs. That is why they have a problem with Obama as president and any African-American person that supported his vote. How often do Democrats sit around their picnic having nothing better to talk about then, telling racist jokes? Not very often. Because we've got class!

Demetria - posted on 03/28/2010

About the richest politicians being Democrats. The Republicans fight in the backroom. While they may/may not be the wealthiest politicians, they do have the wealthiest backers. The Republicans often have a very different face than the one they show to the public. They are backed by very wealthy big business members yet, to gain votes and support, they project the image of the "average joe". Same reason I believe they have been putting Palin and Michael Steele in the forefront. To show "Hey! We aren't racist! Look we got a black guy! And look, we are for women's rights! We got a soccer mom!" That's why you won't see a KKK member elected to high office in the Republican party. But you could probably find one working in a powerful position behind the scenes. I don't believe they are all racist, I agree with Jennifer.

As for Hoover wire-tapping MLK. It was allowed begrudgingly. Hoover blackmailed the Kennedy's that if he was not allowed to tap MLK he would expose JFK's affair with a Soviet hooker/spy and that would spell the end of the Kennedy presidency. Unfortunately shortly thereafter JFK was assasinated. And lets not ignore all that the Kennedy's have done for Civil Rights

Kate - posted on 03/26/2010

Thank you, Joy. I was just about to give Diane a history lesson, especially about the Republican Party of the 1800s (being a History teacher myself). Well said.

Isobel - posted on 03/25/2010

I don't think that most republicans are racist...not even close. I DO, however, believe that most racists are republican. And I also believe that today's republican party has NOTHING to do with the republican party of 25 years ago...let alone 150 years ago.

Vicki - posted on 03/25/2010

I would like to know why the republican party is racist as well. I have yet to see one republican law-makers denounce some of the things that had gone on during the primaries, the election process and the healthcare debate and vote. John McCain had to painfully and publicly set the record straight about Barack Obama to one of his audience members (not being a real american, being a muslim bent on destroying america atc) - so he gets small props for that. The rest of them... very suspect. Not one came forward and said that spitting on a congressional member was wrong. Not one of them came forward and said that calling a congressional member a nigger was wrong. Not one of them came forward and said that throwing bricks through office windows, threatening to kill family members and sending nooses was wrong? Folks who have lived through the Jim Crow era are still ALIVE and REMEMBER this - namely my family members - are saying this was just as bad, if not worse than those times, I believe them. I cannot shake the feeling that until someone is killed (meaning a member of congress or God forbid the President), will there be a backlash against the hypocracy.

JL - posted on 03/22/2010

You know if you are going to quote historical facts Diane please at least be clear and provide an adequate factual historical representation.........the Republican party of the 1800s no longer exists the issues and ideals once held by the Republican party flip flopped during the progressive era and slowly overtime the Republican party ideology became adherent and associated with the Democrat party. It was Roosevelt who brought African Americans and supporters of equality into the Democratic party. His presidency marked a great change in the party stances flip flopping the Republican social ideology toward the Democratic party.



During the Civil Rights Era Southern Democrats broke rank with the Democratic party because they disagreed with the fervent push for civil rights legislation those Democrats turned to the Republican party and thus after the 1950s the Parties we recognize today and the ideologies associated with them became engrained and no longer did the party of Lincoln exist. Overtime another flip flop may occurr and 50 years from now what we once considered in this period to be clearly identified as Democratic maybe viewed as some other political party affiliation.



It would be one thing to claim historical facts makes the RepublicanParty that exits to the champion of equality and inclusion if the Republican party still adhered to the same ideological standards the party did during the Reconstructionist period but it does not. Prior to the 1960s the Republican party historically advocated liberalism and progressivism but after the 1960s the party adopted a conservative platform that still stands today and the turn toward conservativism in the party was a result of Southern Democrats joining Republicans because of their stance against civil rights legislation. In fact the ideals the party once upheld are the same ideals that they now attack and accuse of being..socialistic......hmmmm...the irony.



Let's remember it was a Democratic president who upheld and supported the push for the Civil Rights Act 1964 and that it was the Southern bloc of Demcrats who stood against it and was those same Southern Democrats who then turned away from the party to join the Republican party. They became the dominating Republican leaders who turned the party toward extreme conservative ties.



Please don't try to manipulate historical facts to make some assumption that does not hold historical weight.



While I do not think the Republican Party is the party of racism I do think the extreme right wingers of the party make the party look so with their racist hateful diatribes and verbage. I mean it was Republicans at Palin rallys holding stuffed monkeys with Obama face plastered on them. It was Republicans at Palin rallys yelling racial slurs. It is Republicans where I live in SOuthern Georgia who make statements publicly about how that nigger needs to be taken out. SO it is kind of hard to disregard the racial slurs when they are prevelant. If you guys don't want to look like the party of racial bigotry they speak out against those idiots, because...IT is the silence...that stands out.

Janessa - posted on 03/22/2010

Thank you for putting your views on this. Diane S why are you even on the obama page you are clearly a republican and i never said all republicans are racist i said most are big differences. Also the Republican party used to be Democrat and the Democrat used to be Republican their switched there parties. So that means you have no truth at all the republicans today always say their were for freedom for blacks during slavery very untrue.

"When President Johnson helped pass Civil Rights legislation in the 1960s he commented that: "Well, there goes the South." He meant, of course, that now the South would become Republican as they now saw the Democrats as the party standing up for the blacks."

http://www.vernonjohns.org/rosemary1246/...



Regean in the 1960s he was against the civil act right bill he said it was humiliating for the south.He would not back sanctions against south africa during aparthied.



Do you not remember during the election of obama the word NIGGER being used saying that their did not want a NIGGER in the white house? A nuce around obamas neck and pictures of monkeys that look like obama. I have no idea where you were but it was all over the news and no republicans came forward and go against those racist people but their were laughing on the side like it was a big joke. Remember the world is watching america and the republicans are not doing a good job if their do not want to be called a racist party.

Diane - posted on 03/20/2010

How many of the top ten richest politicians are Democrats? Top fifty?

http://www.uni-muenster.de/PeaCon/global...

If democrats are for the little guy.......then why so many rich ones in the top ten? They are for the little guy until they get power themselves and that happens with all politicians................... Dianne Feinstein, Sen. Frank Lautenberg, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, Rep. Jane Harman, Sen. John Kerry, Sen. Edward Kennedy, Sen. Claire McCaskill, Rep. Carolyn Maloney, Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and the list goes on and on.
Most of Hollywood are liberal Democrats.........are they rich? Are they for the little guy?

To insinuate that Republicans are the rich party is ridiculous.
About racism...look at the facts.

It’s not the Republican party that has always taken Blacks for granted. All one needs to do is to look at the civil rights record of both parties. I did some digging.

In 1865, Congressional Republicans unanimously backed the 13th Amendment, which made slavery unconstitutional. Among Democrats, 63 percent of senators and 78 percent of House members voted: "No."

In 1866, 94 percent of GOP senators and 96 percent of GOP House members approved the 14th Amendment, guaranteeing all Americans equal protection of the law. Every congressional Democrat voted: "No."

February 8, 1894: Democratic President Grover Cleveland and a Democratic Congress repealed the GOP's Enforcement Act, denying black voters federal protection.

January 26, 1922: The U.S. House adopted Rep. Leonidas Dyer's (R., Mo.) bill making lynching a federal crime. Filibustering Senate Democrats killed the measure.

May 17, 1954: As chief justice, former three-term governor Earl Warren (R., Calif.) led the U.S. Supreme Court's desegregation of government schools via the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision. GOP President Dwight Eisenhower's Justice Department argued for Topeka, Kansas's black school children. Democrat John W. Davis, who lost a presidential bid to incumbent Republican Calvin Coolidge in 1924, defended "separate but equal" classrooms.

May 6, 1960: Eisenhower signs the GOP's 1960 Civil Rights Act after it survived a five-day, five-hour filibuster by 18 Senate Democrats.

And the list goes on......

The Republican party also is the home of numerous "firsts." Among them GOP presidents Gerald Ford in 1975 and Ronald Reagan in 1982 promoted Daniel James and Roscoe Robinson to become, respectively, the Air Force's and Army's first black four-star generals. November 2, 1983: President Reagan established Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday as a national holiday, the first such honor for a black American. President Reagan named Colin Powell America's first black national-security adviser while GOP President George W. Bush appointed him our first black secretary of state. President Bush named Condoleezza Rice America's first black female NSC chief, then our second (consecutive) black secretary of State. Democratic ex Klansman Robert Byrd and other Senate Democrats stalled Rice's confirmation for a week. Amid unanimous GOP support, 12 Democrats and Vermont Independent James Jeffords opposed Rice — the most "No" votes for a State designee since 14 senators frowned on Henry Clay in 1825.

I think it was Wallace a Democratic leader in the 60’s who was credited with saying, “Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.”

It was J. Edgar Hoover head of the FBI who wiretapped MLKing. Who gave him permission? Robert Kennedy, a Democrat.

Now I am sure there are racist politicians on both sides, but to say Republicans are all racist and that the party is racist simply is a lie. IMO bases on all the information I have ever read about this issue it’s the Republicans who care least about color of skin.

I can say this……I don’t think a former KKK member has ever been elected to a high office in the Republican party.

Whitney - posted on 03/10/2010

To understand racism, it's also important to understand class-ism and how many things that at first appear to be strictly and blatantly racist are actually classist at the root of it. When you hear the term "welfare mom", what color skin does the person usually be assumed to have?

Keisha - posted on 03/03/2010

Very well said Jennifer! She nailed it! With that said I dont think the majority of Republicans are racist. Many religious groups will claim Republican merely for the consensus with the Republican views on social and family value issues. However, they will forever have that stigma attached because of what Jennifer just mentioned and the fact that they will always be the majority in the southern states of the US.

Jennifer - posted on 03/01/2010

Liberals tend to be inclusive, and conservatives tend to be exclusive. Racists are by definition exclusive. For that reason, they are more likely to agree with the Republican / conservative agenda. If 15% of the US was racist, and it was evenly split between Republican & Democrat, you'd have 30% of Republicans being racist. Racists are not accepted by the Democrats in the way that they are accepted by Republicans. They cannot influence the Democratic agenda, but they can influence the Republican agenda, media machine, etc.

Katie - posted on 03/01/2010

I agree with Yolanda, most republicans are rich white men, close minded and are racist against anything not white and not rich.

Yolanda - posted on 02/24/2010

IMO i thought it was a regional thing like red states and blue states....most of the republicans that ive dealt with have been very wealthy and therefore mostly motivated by money not by race. theones i have interracted with say at glenn Beck rally's are definately more motivated by the race factor...which is why i don't understand the "black republican" its confusing to me. if you really listen to a republican law maker u can hear a lot of racial undertones not just against blacks but latinos also. I don't want to say all republicans are racist because i don't think that is a fair statement but then again they don't really play fair!