White Privilege Conference Speaker: Tea Party is ‘Bald-Faced Racists’

This year’s White Privilege Conference “WPC” has started out in a very controversial fashion. Labeling members of the Tea Party as “screw-loosers” and “bald-faced racists, president of the Institute for Research & Education on Human Rights Leonard Zeskind made his thoughts about the Tea Party very clear on the first day of this year’s White Privilege Conference in downtown Louisville, Kentucky. Zeskind’s expertise lies in the analysis of the white nationalist movement. He believes that racist sentiments have taken hold inside of the Tea Party since Obama was sworn in office in 2009.

The White Privilege Conference (WPC) is a conference that analyzes the concepts of privilege and oppression and offers various solutions and strategies to build a more just society. In addition, it claims that its conference is not used for attacking, disparaging, or beating up on white people.

WPC is open to everyone irrespective of their, gender, sexuality, class, disability, etc. The underlying philosophy of WPC is one that is dedicated to promoting “understanding, respecting, and connecting.”

Despite the proactive rhetoric of WPC, Zeskind went on with his attacks on the Tea Party. Zeskind claimed that Tea Partiers are “not overly concerned about the economy” and that all their talk about constitutional governance is a “smokescreen” for a more racist agenda.

Such poisonous rhetoric used in an event that is supposedly a peaceful forum that promotes insightful discussions on controversial issues is not a very rare occurrence. The “check your privilege” and “Social Justice Warrior” movement’s MO is to disparage whites, upper classes, and other groups that supposedly enjoy higher privileges.

Despite their good intentions in combatting hate groups and other injustices, the social justice warriors in effect turn into the very hate groups that they are purportedly fighting against. Zeskind’s rhetoric is absolutely contradictory to the WPC’s mission of promoting the “understanding, respecting, and connecting” with people of different classes and backgrounds. If the WPC is truly about tolerance and lives up to its word, one would expect it to condemn this type of hate speech. That remains to be seen.

For a movement that considers itself “progressive” and “forward-thinking”, it takes various steps back in the time machine by employing such collectivist and prejudiced rhetoric. Zeskind’s behavior is no aberration; it’s the logical course of action that these organizations take when they view people as “classes”, “groups”, and “races” instead of individuals that come from diverse backgrounds with different tastes, goals, and preferences.

Privilege in of itself is not an invalid concept. But the way it is defined by many in the social justice movement and their ilk is very vague. It’s filled with race baiting, gender tensions, and countless other substantiated claims.

Want to talk about privilege? Let’s talk about the real type of privilege that is pervasive in our society: State privilege. The State is an institution that enjoys the monopoly of violence and dominates practically every sector of society, whether it be how money much it takes from citizens through taxes, how long it takes for people to set up a business, the food we eat, the drugs we can consume, who we can marry, the wars it can wage, and a list of other privileges. To add insult to injury, the bureaucrats and politicians that work for the State enjoy higher pay than their private sector counterparts, despite providing inferior services.

This is privilege. One needn’t look further at the damage that the Drug War and the public education system has done to minority groups to realize that the State is the most privileged institution to rule them all in the U.S. Unfortunately, this type of analysis escapes the minds of many people in the social justice fold.

Collectivist thought and group pigeonholing are merely atavistic traits of the more primitive past that mankind existed in. The revolution that many of these groups seek is one that consists of elliptical motions, of running around endlessly in circles, forever repeating a past that they are doomed to repeat.

What libertarians put forward is a vision that is truly evolutionary. The way to break free from this ellipse of misery is to use the proactive means of the marketplace and individualism to combat State induced ills and other social problems. If the WPC is truly tolerant, they would be inviting Tea Partiers, libertarians, and other related groups to their discussions. They should be willing to hear out other ideas and perspectives, as their mission clearly states. Collectivism is a relic of the past that must be thrown away for good in the 21st century.

It’s time to evolve, folks.

1 comment

Leave a Comment