Dear Friends,
LISTEN TO THIS WEEK’S PROGRAM, with Charles Goldman and Ed Fallon:
(00:37) Republicans have a plan to dismantle US climate policy;
(18:49) Racism, then and now;
(37:39) “Oppenheimer” revisited;
(53:34) Peeling back the leaves of the artichoke, with Kathy Byrnes.
I confess to enjoying bizarre news stories. Woman finds live frog in bag of spinach. Bear caught chilling in a jacuzzi. Baby squirrel adopted by a chicken. I love that stuff!
So, please indulge me for a couple minutes as Charles and I kick off this week’s program with the story of a Texas woman attacked simultaneously by a snake and a hawk while mowing her lawn. Yup. True story. It starts at the 1:15 mark.
But don’t stop there. You’ll want to hear Charles and me discuss the Republican plan to reverse any progress made on addressing the climate crisis — also a true story, and more disturbing than having a snake or hawk fall on you.
What I want to focus on here is the second segment of this week’s program, where Charles and I discuss racism, past and present.
First, let’s be clear about three things: (1) racism and the enslavement of Blacks lie at the very foundation of America; (2) we’ve made some progress toward eliminating racism; and (3) we still have a long way to go.
Second, neither racism nor slavery is unique to the American experience. They are, alas, part and parcel of the human experience.
I look at my own background as a second-generation Irish American. To quote from my dad’s short biography in reference to his parents coming to the US 100 years ago, “Anti-Irish sentiment was everywhere, exemplified most notably by the all-too-common sign, ‘No Irish Need Apply.'”
The cartoons above are instructive beyond anti-Irish discrimination. (See Flashbak for more such cartoons.) Dehumanization is key. Whether Irish, Black, Jewish (check out How Cartoons Brainwashed Us With Jewish Stereotype), or some other “undesirable” minority, haters and the power elite endow the target group with sub-human features. Make them look dirty, drunk, angry, and dangerous. Thus demonized, they become easy targets for political and economic oppression, including slavery. (Yes, hundreds of thousands of Irish men and women were forced into slavery. More on that some other time.)
The Irish have, fortunately, moved beyond being targets of racism and discrimination. No doubt, it helps to be white, and there are plenty of other groups for bigots to target.
As an Irish American, what baffles me is how descendants of a people treated so badly for so long can similarly malign others. Sean Hannity comes to mind. Like my grandparents, Hannity’s grandparents came here from Ireland. Like my father, Hannity grew up in New York. Like me, Hannity hosts a talk show. Unlike me, Hannity uses his podium to spew hurtful, hateful rhetoric, including spiteful tirades against immigrants at the southern border. Clearly, Hannity forgets — or chooses to ignore — the reality his own family faced when they emigrated from Ireland.
Similarly, I’m baffled by Jewish people who support the oppression of Palestinians, given the horrible mistreatment of European Jews over the centuries. You would think that merely recalling the horrors of the Holocaust would compel the State of Israel to end the apartheid conditions that discriminate against the Palestinian people.
Again, as a country and as a species, we’ve made some progress. We still have a long way to go. We need to keep challenging discrimination wherever we find it.
Thanks for reading, listening, and taking action.
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Ed Fallon