Black-White Paradigm: Source of Social Upheaval in America

Published in The Sun
(China) on 22 June 2015
by Liu Da Ke (link to originallink to original)
Translated from by Chase Coulson. Edited by Eva Langman.
A few days ago, a white supremacist entered an African-American church in Charleston, South Carolina, and left a bloody massacre in his wake. Nine African-American victims were murdered that day. It’s been reported that the fiendish suspect’s senseless slaughter of innocents was simply “because they were black.” This issue only serves to intensify contradictions already extant in the clash between blacks and whites in America.

Racial conflicts in the country are growing ever sharper and more acute, especially when the killings of black men by white police officers are increasingly commonplace, causing demonstrations and riots to spread rapidly. Seething beneath the surface of these events are issues of racial discrimination that have never been rooted out. In America, de facto segregation is a dirty secret that everyone knows exists but never talks about openly. Just because the law and public opinion keep it out of the limelight doesn’t mean its existence can be erased.

Racial Conflicts Growing Increasingly Intense

The year Obama was elected, it was deemed that black people had turned the tide and become masters of their own domain. In both elections, Obama won the great majority of the black vote and African-Americans were exuberant and beaming with “amour-propre” [a French word meaning self-esteem]. African-Americans held high hopes in the belief that his election would change the plight of those of African bloodlines that kept them trapped in the lower echelon of the social hierarchy. However, this turn of events deeply provoked many whites, causing them to feel that black people were now riding on top of the backs of white people. The perpetrator of the heinous crime in Charleston felt that after Obama took office, blacks were coming to steal white people’s jobs, houses and their entire world. One could say that when Obama was elected, not only did it not bridge the black-white paradigm, it has actually only served to intensify conflicts and the divide between blacks and whites in the country.

Statistics show that black people’s wealth is the lowest among any race in America, while the amount of blacks eating bread and water in a jail cell far and away surpasses that of any other race. The number of adult black males that have been arrested is 2 1/2 times greater than the number of Latinos who come from equally poor conditions. Although a black man now sits in the Oval Office, many people, especially police, still feel that there is a greater propensity for black people to commit crimes. Even if to a certain extent African-Americans now expect to enjoy a greater amount of recognition in the society in which they live due to the election of a black president, they are still growing increasingly intolerant toward the indiscriminate arrests, detainment and even shooting of their people. Because of changes in the psychology of race relations between blacks and whites, conflicts between the two groups are becoming ever more common, and the scale of the incidents ever more vast.

In reality, America’s future decline may stem specifically from black-white race relations. Deeply rooted contradictions are not something that can be solved during the terms of one or two leaders. Regardless of the Emancipation Proclamation having been added to the Constitution and regardless of last century’s sweeping Civil Rights Movement or the post-Cold War democratic “Springs,” nothing can solve the racial antagonism inherent between blacks and whites in America. Once conditions are right, the clashes will erupt again.

Due to America’s powerful economic might and lofty international status, U.S. leaders have worked through domestic and foreign policy measures to conceal and suppress racial contradictions in order to maintain lasting stability. But the color revolutions that have broken out all over the country have caused much social unrest and put the nation in a perilous position. The malignant tumor that is black-white conflict will also become the fundamental reason for black revolutions to explode across the country. Once blacks are fed up with repeatedly calling for equality and never getting it, a group of savvy and farsighted black elites just may propose the foundation of an all-black nation, while white supremacists may call for the foundation of an all-white republic. In that case, America will find itself once again fighting a civil war.


虎視寰球:黑白衝突是美國動盪之源

2015年6月22日 (一)

一名白人極端種族主義者日前在美國南卡羅萊納州城鎮查爾斯頓非裔教堂製造血腥槍擊案,九名黑人遇害。據悉,兇嫌濫殺無辜「只因他們是黑人」。事件再次將美國黑白衝突的矛盾激化。

近年美國黑白衝突愈來愈激烈,尤其白人警察致死黑人案頻發,不斷引發示威和騷亂,並迅速擴散。事件背後是美國從未根除的種族歧視問題。在美國,黑白分離是眾人皆知的秘密,只因法律和輿論約束,國民公開不講,但不能抹殺其存在。

矛盾衝突日益尖銳

奧巴馬當年入主白宮,被視為黑人翻身作主人,在兩次總統選舉中,奧巴馬都贏得絕大部分的黑人選票,黑人揚眉吐氣,寄望他能改變非裔「低人一等」的處境,卻讓很多白人深受刺激,認為黑人騎在自己的頭上。今次行兇者就認為,奧巴馬上台後,黑人搶走了白人的工作、房子及一切。可以說,奧巴馬當選總統,不僅沒有彌合黑白矛盾,反而加深美國黑白衝突。

有統計顯示,黑人擁有的財富在美國各個種族中最少,但吃牢飯的黑人卻遠遠超過其他主要族裔,黑人成年男子被拘禁比例甚至是跟他們差不多窮的拉丁裔的二點五倍。雖然可以選黑人當總統,但很多人特別是警察還是認為,黑人有比其他族裔更強的犯罪傾向。甚至在一定程度上,由於有了黑人總統,黑人對獲得社會承認的心理預期也比以前強了,他們愈發不能容忍警察再像以前那樣隨便拘禁甚至射殺黑人。正因黑白種族心理狀態的變化,黑白衝突更頻繁,規模也更大。

事實上,未來美國的衰敗可能就出在黑白關係上。根深柢固的種族矛盾,決非一兩個領導人能解決。無論美國憲法還是《解放奴隸宣言》,無論上世紀狂飆的民權運動還是冷戰後的民主衝擊,都未解決美國的黑白對立問題。一旦條件具備,這種矛盾就會爆發。

由於強大經濟實力及強勢國際地位,美國執政者通過內外政策掩蓋或壓制了種族矛盾,使國家保持了長期穩定。美國在各地發動的顏色革命,導致社會動盪,國將不國。但黑白衝突這個毒瘤,也將變成美國爆發黑色革命的動因。一旦黑人屢屢要求平等而得不到,一些有見識的黑人精英,就很可能提出建立純種黑人之國,或者白人至上者要求建立白人共和國,如此一來,美國很可能再度陷入內戰。

劉大可

This post appeared on the front page as a direct link to the original article with the above link .

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