Are We Suffering
from White Male Arrogance
or
White Privilege
or Both
It always come to a
point where someone does something and there is fallout and the
public gets exhausted by the revelations and just when you think you
haven’t been surprised by it all, another episode comes forth and
there is moral indignation and outrage until the next chapter begins
just as that one is closing. Such is the case of our latest chapters
of what has been going on for quite a few centuries, well, two things
really.
One is white
privilege and the other is white male arrogance. Both of these
traits came along in this country with the Europeans started to
invade the Native Americans’ lands and claiming the land and
everything it held for their own private use. If the Native
Americans wouldn’t accept their offer, just call out the U.S.
Calvary and take the land. If the Native Americans were up for
negotiating, just give them some useless trinkets and call it a fair
deal. If the Native Americans don’t want to leave their lands just
so the white settlers can have a place to homestead, just force them
to march for hundreds of miles to a so called Indian reservation
where famine and disease has taken hold. If the U.S. government
signs treaties with a nation for better relationship and cooperation,
then why did they break so many treaties with the Nation of Native
American Indians without any penalty? Why was the U.S. government
being sued by Native Americans for $3.3 billion dollars on 100
lawsuits that started over a century ago? In a nutshell, arrogance
and privilege. History is replete with such tales of arrogance and
privileges from the ruling majority and it still runs rampant in
these 21st century rights of passage. The rise and fall
of the Roman Caesars, the U.S. Revolutionary War with the British,
Britain's role and conflict with India, the early European wars with
just about everyone during the medieval era, Holy wars, Vietnam war,
Gulf War, U.S. Civil War, all are steep with a form of arrogance and
privilege.
I have been
pondering this topic for a while now and it seems like a good time to
take a look at two incidents that highlights the topic of arrogance
and privilege. And I would also like for you to weigh in with your
thoughts on the subject because trying to understand this and the
rationale behind it has become quite a puzzle.
The first case is that of one Alex
Kompothecras. Now
to be fair, I’ve never hear of him before because he is suppose to
be some reality star novice on some
MTV
show
called Siesta
Key..
I stopped watching MTV years ago for a variety of reasons and
this show is nowhere on my radar.
It appears that Mr. Kompothecras went on a little fishing expedition
in federal waters and while he was out there, he caught a hammerhead
shark. On the surface, that looks like an above the board fishing
story but there is more to this. You see, Mr. Kompothecras pulled
out a pistol and shot the hammerhead while it was still on the hook.
And he filmed it, genius. As you see him pull the shark closer, he
calmly pulls out the pistol and pumps a few rounds into the animal as
blood pours out of the animal. Not very sportsman like by the
ensuing outrage that followed. I do not know what possessed this man
to pull out a gun and shoot
the animal but by examining the footage, it appears that for him that
he is not suffering
from
any
consequences of
his actions as
it
appears to be
far and removed from his thinking.
The
second case is that of John Alex Fields, Jr. Mr. Fields rose to
infamy over the past August weekend by running over a group of
protesters rallying against hate and bigotry from a white supremacy
group. Mr. Fields was a supporter of the white supremacy group and
he plowed his car into the group killing one to date and injuring
nearly three dozen victims. As you watch the footage from several
cellphone cameras in a variety of angles, there was no attempt to
apply the brakes, there
was no sense of compassion sympathy for the victims as he backed up
rolling over some more victims s he fled the scene.
In
both of these cases there is a common thread of either white male
privilege or white male arrogance or both. There should be no
surprise in their actions for it’s been pervasive for quite some
time. It’s been discounted sometimes
as boys being boys. If
you are a person of a particular status, you’re given the benefit
of doubt if there is either sexual misconduct or financial
malfeasance is the contributing factor. But why do we give the white
male this power of arrogance and privilege?
We
elected a president because he was arrogant and privilege. We
watched as Bernie Madoff ruined his son’s lives, ruined the lives
of many who invested into his ponzi schemes as he washed away
billions of investors dollars down a vortex of faltering promises.
We watched as 18 Penn State frat boys tried to cover up the death of
one of their 19 year old pledge as he suffocated
on his own vomit
from alcohol poisoning. And while there is the moral outrage from a
beleaguered public, what more can be done?
It’s
not a crime to be arrogant or privilege. We do sometimes celebrate
it. Celebrities
get a pass for being arrogant and cocky. Musicians are bigger stars
for being arrogant. Sports figures get a pass for being arrogant and
privilege. Muhammad
Ali showed a bit of arrogance while
he was the reigning heavyweight champion but he lived in an
era where black men weren’t suppose to be prideful or boastful
about anything. He
may have appeared to be arrogant but that was a facade as he battled
the racism that plagued him for a majority of his life
including his incarceration for being a conscientious objector to the
Vietnam war. Ali’s arrogance was a false arrogance unlike the pure
arrogance of one
Donald
J.
Trump.
Here
is a man who broke every rule in the book when it came to running for
the highest office in the land. Everything he did defied any
conventional norm. He made statements that were controversial in
nature. Audio recordings of him uttering the phrase “grab them by
the pussy” and one would think that this would be the nail in the
coffin of his presidential bid but low and behold, they chose him,
the arrogant, privilege, petulant, ill tempered man over the
arrogant, privilege, petulant, untrustworthy woman.
Being
arrogant and privilege could manifest itself into a literal word of
words as President Trump escalate the rhetoric of words brought
on
with North Korea’s dictator and despot, Kim Jong Un as
they keep measuring themselves as to who has the biggest nuclear
missile.
And
as we can see, it’s not solely an exclusive white male phenomenon.
Un is perhaps the most modern of aggressive, petulant, obnoxious,
strident, privilege and arrogant person in the 21st
century to date so far. During certain wars, the male arrogance and
petulant and privilege
characterization had no bounds. Japanese leaders were full of
arrogance and aggression and privilege during
World War II after they attacked Pearl Harbor in Hawaii.
Adolf Hitler and the Germans who followed him were full of arrogance
and aggression and privilege. Hitlers principals are still in
practice by those who follow his twisted doctrine of white
superiority. Hitler has never gone away. He is like a scourge of
cancer that infects the living tissue as
the soul turns fully black with hate. Hitler’s
aura is like some Hollywood horror sequel that can never be killed.
Just when you think it’s gone away, it comes back with a vengeance.
I
cannot speak on behalf of every black person in this country and I
will not. I have had my fair share of acts of racism enacted on me
and it becomes a part of who you are. You learn quickly on
how to bury those feelings and
tamp them
down and you also learn that only a few white people feels this way
of
contempt and hate and loathing just because you exist.
But it is those few that leave these indelible marks that scar those
moments in life that you will never forget. And you somehow find
within
yourself to forgive them up to a certain point. The anger is still
within you and the feeling is something you will never forget but
there is a
capacity
to move forward and not let that incident define who you are. That
is the forgiving part. Not
every white person is the so called “blue-eyed” devil.
Looking
back on the past few years with the number of incidents that
involves
cops killing young black men, I wonder if that privilege and
arrogance was a factor that wasn’t taken into consideration? Some
of the cops may have been conditioned through years of passive
indoctrination that they were unknowingly taught to be privilege and
arrogant. It’s just a theory. Maybe some social engineering
student may want to do a thesis on the subject and uncover some
fascinating detail about privilege and arrogance? It’s not just a
white thing, it’s an
everybody’s thing, only it’s male white people who are winning
the race as
they lead in the medal count with more gold.
