NYU Black Renaissance Noire NYU Black Renaissance Noire Volume 16.2: Fall 2016 | Page 7

editorial

My Take

By Quincy Troupe
With the advent of the absurdly comical , dangerously ignorant and racist , reactionary political world of ALT-Right populism , as epitomized by the 2016 Trump presidential campaign , many American Whites ( add a few Blacks and Latinos to this toxic mix ) have regressed into an ideological world many of us thought no one would dare re-enter ( Remember the debilitating Civil War of the 1860s ?), a fantastical Age of Rage that promises to take us all down the road to national destruction .
A road that ignores the fragile experiment that holds this country together : respect for the tenets of a civil society ( caring , empathy , fairness , trust , responsibility for each other ) and the laws governing our democratic republic . If this shift , rooted in an ethnic , cultural White Christian Nationalism takes place , it will no doubt lead to expressions of violence from Whites against people of color and anyone else they feel disagrees with them , as well as by the “ others ” who refuse to wear the role of victim .
Over the last year it has grown increasingly scary to watch Donald Trump and some of his alt-Right surrogates push far-right political , economic , social , race-baiting agendas over television airwaves — all with free coverage worth billions of dollars ! Nevertheless , Trump , a masterful media manipulator and supreme corporate , jackleg politician and scam artist ( jackleg = self-credentialed ) understands better than anyone how television drives up rating and increases revenue for networks . His strange , awe-inspiring political campaign — replete with gargantuan falsehoods , international financial skullduggery , and a chorus of red-faced “ truth-ers ,” “ birth-ers ,” conspiracy loons , gun nuts , neo-kkk-ers screaming “ lock her up ” ( referring to Hillary Clinton ) with no forethought about how the possibility of his assuming the presidency will negatively affect their own lives , let alone the well-being of this country — never fails to amaze and tantalize us insatiable consumers of reality tv .
Today , in August 2016 , while historic flooding in Louisiana damages nearly a 100,000 homes , drowns and destroys untold numbers of people and their livelihoods in that state ; and apocalyptic fires on the West Coast turn hundreds of thousands of homes and acreage into cinders ; while gun violence in inner cities and from home-grown terrorists rip the very fabric of our “ right to the pursuit of happiness ” from beneath our very foundations , Democrats and Republicans engage in a fight to the death ( of this nation ?) power struggle over the future Supreme Court , Citizens United , the right to vote , have an abortion , universal healthcare , immigration reform , and the overall future direction of this already “ great ” America .
1 . Usain Bolt .
On the one hand , the Democratic platform contains a more detailed policy agenda about how to move the country towards a more objective , humane , progressive society — one that emphasizes re-building our deteriorating infrastructure , highways , bridges and creating jobs and embraces racial harmony and civil rights . The Republican platform , on the other hand , is more about an ideology built around maintaining White hegemony that emphasizes loosening — or eliminating — regulations of corporate and banking interests , an uncompromising embrace of gun rights , the outright repeal of the Affordable Care Act ( or “ Obamacare ,” as it is popularly known amongst Republicans ), a law and order agenda ( whatever that means ), the tightening or outright suppression of voting rights , an absolute rejection of lgbt rights , and mostly a rejection of immigration reform . This is what Trump and his hotheaded , blowhard , bullying sycophants , parading before a weak-kneed , cowardly press media , espouse . Yet , less than three months before one of the most consequential elections to face our nation , Trump finds himself on the brink of losing , and he and his supporters grow increasingly desperate , volatile , and more hateful . Whether he wins or loses this election , Trump will leave a bad taste in our mouths and immense social and racial challenges regarding unification going forward .
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