PRAISE FOR TIM WISE
“Tim Wise is one of the most brilliant, articulate and courageous critics of white privilege in the nation. His considerable rhetorical skills, his fluid literary gifts and his relentless search for the truth make him a critical ally in the fight against racism and a true soldier in the war for social justice. His writing and thinking constitute a bulwark of common sense, and uncommon wisdom, on the subject of race, politics and culture. He is a national treasure.”
—Michael Eric Dyson, author of Race Rules, Holler if You Hear Me, and Between God and Gangsta Rap
“Tim Wise is a vanilla brother in the tradition of John Brown.”
—Cornel West
“[Wise’s] work is revolutionary, and those who react negatively are simply afraid of hearing the truth.”
—Robin D.G. Kelley, author of Race Rebels and Yo’ Mama’s Disfunktional!
“Tim Wise is one of the few people, along with perhaps Frederick Douglass, who has ever really spoken honestly and forcefully to white people about themselves.”
—Charles Ogletree, Professor of Law, Harvard Law School; Director, Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice
“The fate of this country depends on whites like yourself speaking the truth to those who don’t want to hear it. In this, you are as one with the Biblical prophets. You are more likely to be condemned than lauded, and yet your words are no less important. So, keep speaking out. At the very least, some future archeologists sifting through the ashes of this civilization may be able to find evidence that there were some who offered truth as a cure for the disease that destroyed us.”
—Derrick Bell, Professor of Law, New York University
“Tim Wise is one of those rare ‘public intellectuals’ whom numerous authors have suggested are becoming extinct in this society. He is evidence that this is not the case.… In my judgment, he is the very best of the white anti-racism writers and commentators working in the U.S. media today.”
—Joe Feagin, Graduate Research Professor of Sociology, Texas A&M
“One of the brilliant voices of our time.”
—Molefi Kete Asante, Professor of African American Studies, Temple University
“Wise is the nation’s leading antiracist author/activist.”
—David Naguib Pellow, professor of Ethnic Studies, University of Minnesota
“[His] is the clearest thinking on race I’ve seen in a long while written by a white writer…right up there with the likes of historians Howard Zinn and Herb Aptheker as far as I’m concerned.”
—Dr. Joyce King, Benjamin Mays Endowed Chair for Urban Teaching, Learning and Leadership, Georgia State University
“You are to be commended for your brave stance against apartheid. If more young people followed your lead, the world would be a better place.”
—Whoopi Goldberg
DISPATCHES
from the RACE WAR
Tim Wise
Copyright © 2020 by Tim Wise All
Rights Reserved.
Open Media Series Editor: Greg Ruggiero
Cover design: Victor Mingovits
ISBN: 978-0-87286-809-0
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Wise, Tim J., author.
Title: Dispatches from the race war / Tim Wise.
Description: San Francisco : City Lights Publishers, [2020] | Series: Open media series
Identifiers: LCCN 2020036401 (print) | LCCN 2020036402 (ebook) | ISBN 9780872868090 (paperback) | ISBN 9780872868373 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Racism—United States—History—21st century. | White supremacy movements—United States—History—21st century. | Trump, Donald, 1946–—Influence. | United States—Race relations—History—21st century. | African Americans—History—21st century—21st century | Minorities—United States—History—21st century. | Civil rights movements—United States—History—21st century.
Classification: LCC E184.A1 W574 2020 (print) | LCC E184.A1 (ebook) | DDC 305.800973/0905—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020036401
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020036402
City Lights Books are published at the City Lights Bookstore
261 Columbus Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94133
CONTENTS
Racism and Inequality in a Time of Illness and Uprising
I. POST-RACIAL BLUES: RACE AND REALITY IN THE OBAMA YEARS
The meaning (and limits) of the Obama victory
DENIAL IS A RIVER WIDER THAN THE CHARLES
Implicit bias and the burden of blackness in the age of Obama
HARPOONING THE GREAT WHITE WAIL
Reflections on racism and right-wing buffoonery
Protest, privilege, and the power of whiteness
IF IT WALKS LIKE A DUCK AND TALKS LIKE A DUCK