Read it, if you haven’t heard it.
A few quick reactions to open the discussion:
- Holy shit. There hasn’t been a speech of this high a profile on the subject of race in America in my memory.
- It’s also probably going to be the defining speech of the campaign, and clearly one of the most important of Obama’s career.
- What’s amazing about it isn’t its analysis of race, which is commonplace in left-liberal circles (and you can’t expect a presidential candidate to say anything new, ever), but the audacity of the presumptive Democratic nominee presenting the left-liberal analysis of race in quite a bit of complexity. Obama could have done the usual distancing dance in response to Rev. Wright’s controversial remarks; instead, he decided to try to explain things like the dynamics of the black church, the resentment of African Americans of Wright’s generation, and the racial resentments of working-class whites, among other things, while getting in digs at South Carolina and Geraldine Ferraro.
- Obama faces a particular problem that the Wright controversy exacerbated: there are a lot of racist white people in this country, and awareness of this fact has created doubts about Obama’s electability. He still hasn’t completely wrapped up the nomination, and he’s shown weakness among white voters, especially working-class white voters, in certain states. So he needed to reassure Democrats that being black wouldn’t sink him with white voters. He was also looking at the general election, in which he needs to win independent, suburban white voters who don’t think of themselves as racist but are turned off by candidates who are “too black.”
- Obama tried to solve these problems in this speech by putting his own race into the context of both the inspirational narrative of the Civil Rights Movement and into his campaign’s themes of unity and economic opportunity. I found this very effective.
This is where we are right now. It’s a racial stalemate we’ve been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy – particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.But I have asserted a firm conviction – a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people – that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.
- I was amazed that he took on racist Reagan Democrats by name: “Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren’t always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition.”
- And yes, our old friend American exceptionalism shows up: “I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.” Really?
My reaction to the last question is: What does he (or you) understand by “My Story”?
I heard the opening 10 minutes or so and the last 5 or 6. I still need to read the whole thing. But I was amazed at his willingness to put it out there: This nation was flawed — wounded — from the word go. No apologies for saying so, either. I was also moved by his straightforward articulation of both what it means to be mixed race (and I found his statement that his family — siblings, uncles, aunts, inlaws — includes every hue under the sun to be moving as well) *and* what it means to be black, even if his mom’s white. I saw the first bit on CNN and only overheard a little of the pre-speech show, but I was struck by the fact that all the CNN correspondents were black and wondered how many white people out there were going, “Huh. I never really thought about how many CNN correspondents there are who are black out there.” They seemed to be having a pretty frank discussion, too, but I really only heard bits of it.
He says what he means by “my story”:
But I don’t think this is the most important issue about the speech by a long shot.
I’m glad there was a good discussion on CNN — that may be a first. Certainly we can hope that this speech triggers a lot more frank discussion on race. It says a lot of things that often remain unsaid.
I know what he said — I was being a little glib. But can you tell me another country where that story is possible? Does it have to lend itself to American Exceptionalism in the sense you used the term in your morning post?
Don’t quote me on the CNN evaluation — I was sitting in a doctor’s reception area and didn’t have full hearing.
I was also putting a little pressure on the common place use of the word “story.” As in, what are the generic conventions governing this portion of his speech? Would he have to articulate his “story” this way if he were running for president of a different country?
Oh sure, maybe he’s being slyly ironic about it. “I will never forget that in no other country on earth would I have to pander to such a pervasive City on a Hill myth to remind people that racism is bad.”
I think a similar story is possible in Canada and the U.K. I suspect a similar story is not possible in Russia or Ukraine, a couple of other countries I’m familiar with.
On the Unfogged thread on this topic, Katherine (an Obama supporter) pointed out that American exceptionalism has two rhetorical uses: to excuse and hide our deplorable behavior, and to call our citizens to a higher standard. There’s certainly a long tradition of this second use in civil rights and other left-liberal activism.
agreed with Katherine’s points, though I don’t care for either version. i don’t think he was being coy. i think presidential campaigns demand that kind of rhetoric. what they *don’t* demand are the franker moments in his speech. He took a hell of lot more risks — and I think was more honest — than Mitt Romney was in his nauseating speech on religion, for example.
re: “no other country” — sure you could have a child born to a Kenyan immigrant and a white woman, but you don’t have the peculiar legacy of US slavery, which has created a different racial situation here than anywhere else that I can think of. Other sites of “new world” slavery don’t have quite the same legacy. England doesn’t have a legacy of slavery the way the US does, even though its slave trade ended less than a century before the US civil war. I think it would be wrong to suggest that there *isn’t* something exceptional about the history of race in America.
Urgh — but the force of “no other country” clearly isn’t to suggest America’s unique sins but its unique greatness. The phrase has a positive valence: “for as long as I live, I will never forget…”
Agree about the honesty. And the Mitt comparison is apt. The expected response to this kind of thing is to dodge and pander. Obama decided to just go for it, put the whole racial issue out there in a really complex, challenging way. Incredibly bold.
Honestly, I hear the “no other country” line working both ways. After all, he’s just laid out the country’s unique legacy of slavery and racism, including the fact that his wife has the blood of slaves and slaveholders running in her veins. His version of America isn’t all city on the hill — in fact, his narrative has a lot more of the Atlantic world economy written into it than US politicians and pop historians typically grant.
I fear Obama will lose the general election. McCain has liabilities and hopefully will falter but I’m already starting to play the blame game in what should have been a winning year for the good guys.
The fact that Obama had to make this, otherwise impressive, speech in the first place is one huge reason why.
Remember how good Gore’s heartbreaking “concession” speech was?
I loved reading this speech and would gladly teach it in a high school Civics class but I cringe at the thought of trying to sell it to certain key voters in certain key states. Obama is preaching to the converted and we all can praise him for being brave enough to articulate what most of us already know or feel but it’s a risky argument in the long run. The reason a speech of this high a profile hasn’t been given on race is that it is a losing proposition. The two are light years apart in terms of quality and content but just as Romney’s “Mormon” speech failed to make the issue go away the fact that this speech had to be made in the first place is what will, tragically I fear, make it the defining moment of this campaign.
Re: Sptizer, ideology, and political effectiveness, it should not Obama’s role to lead a national conversation about race, history, and heallng. At least it’s not the job of a winning candidate.
And has anyone seen the reaction to Paterson’s sudden elevation as a precursor to the trouble that Obama will encounter?
Last thing: I think the grandparents line falls flat. Many of us can claim grandparents with incredibly All-American biographies but I fear that his name dropping of Patton’s army and bomber assembly lines in Kansas may only heighten the gulf between his maternal line (misty-eyed Greatest Generation crap that I would roll my eyes at if it came from the other side, by the way) and his own reality growing up in Hawaii and Indonesia. If part of his point is that he’s not like everyone else I think he’ll fail if he simultaneously tries to reassure us that he is.
Here’s the speech on YouTube.
#4: Bryan (and all), my suspicion is that the “story” that Obama tells isn’t acording to some candidacy genre conventions– those that exist here or in outside the U.S., but it does seem to be particularly American. My reasoning has to do with the one year I spent working with an organizer for IAF (Industrial Areas Foundation– a national workers/immigrants advocacy group) while I helped to create community leadership and “organizing” among the parents at the schools where I work. One of the first principles of organizing (of which Obama is very familiar) is to “tell your story” in order to create “real ” relationships, seemingly, from the story, built on trust and understanding– or at least a type of transparency. IAF trained me (and others) to repeatedly “tell our story” and teach others to do so, so that “self interest” is clear when working on “real” social change. I see a lot of organizer strategy coming from Obama in general, but it’s particularly evident in today’s speech. Maybe by repeating the story rhetoric, he’ll reach at least some of those “certain key voters in certain key states” that Ruben identifies…That is, if it doesn’t make them “roll their eyes.”
One of the first principles of organizing (of which Obama is very familiar) is to “tell your story” in order to create “real ” relationships, seemingly, from the story, built on trust and understanding– or at least a type of transparency.
That’s exactly what I meant by the generic demands of the campaign stump speech. Organizing and stumping for office require pretty much the same bag of rhetorical moves. I’m not saying it’s conscious or disingenuous — it just may explain why this bit of American exceptionalism is so easy to slip in a speech like this.
I guess, if that if organizing and stumping for office require pretty much the same bag of rhetorical moves, I’ve never been so aware of a candidate’s “story” before. I mean, what type of story could Bush (or Gore for that matter or…Nader!) have told to pull on our psyches enough to trust his authenticity? Instead we look at “experience” and “position” on issues. I definitely agree that the move to tell a story is an American one– and Obama’s got a much more interesting story than Bush or Gore to tell. So does McCain for that matter. I think the difference for me is that Obama is, in his way “organizing”– and I mean in the union worker sense. This is unprecedented in a presedential campaign during our lifetime, right?
Bush was born again! That’s quite the story, when you think about it!
#5: Canada, yes. UK, not so much. They’re pretty classist over there. How many PMs have been up-from-the-bootstraps types?
The US is deeply flawed, but I do think it’s true that it’s easier here than in other Western societies for a person to ascend from humble beginnings to political or economic heights.
Wasn’t Thatcher a humble shopkeeper’s daughter? (Wikipedia says no — her dad owned two grocery stores. But she was a scholarship girl at Oxford!) The aforementioned Unfogged thread mentioned Paul Boateng.
We do have the sense here that you can rise from humble origins to great heights, and my sense at least is that European societies tend to be fairly ossified class-wise, but all of this is just a sense. Anyone have any data on it? We need sociologist readers!
Bush: born-again former drunk — a pretty compelling story. Made most Americans pick him as the candidate they’d most like to have a beer with.
Gore’s story *was* less compelling by comparison, but he still had to make himself seem sort of normal, even though he was richer and smarter than most Americans. His story included, when convenient, growing up in DC or growing up on a farm, his son’s death, and his sister’s death from lung cancer. After he lost he learned how to tell better stories: his “conversion” to environmentalism at the hands of a prescient teacher, of course.
Kerry: another born-again narrative, but this one from soldier to anti-war activist.
I’m not arguing that storytelling in politics is uniquely American, just that Americans expect certain kinds of stories from their politicians. Why else do they have to dress like lumberjacks when visiting the Northwest and chop wood to show how manly they are?
I think Clinton and Dean organized in ways that seem to have paved the way for Obama. What’s unique about him, though, is that his story is all at once brand new for presidential politics and, in many ways, quintessentially, if ex-centrically, American. Or rather, he moves the margins to the center. What could *be* more American than his story? Maybe we should call it “strategic American exceptionalism,” to parallel Spivak’s old “strategic essentialism” concept.
#16 — this is more than just “up from humble beginnings.” Like it or not, and in spite of the fact that his father is from Kenya and not seventh-generation US born, his story is often taken to stand for “up from slavery.”
I’m going to be boring here and bring up the issue of race – setting aside issues of political strategy and American exceptionalism momentarily.
I thought Obama’s speech was elegant in its acknowledgment of the complexity of race in this country. (It kind of reminded me of artist Kara Walker’s work in that way.) He placed Williams in context, giving dignity to his outrage while also acceding that his approach is counterproductive.
“This is the reality in which Reverend Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up… For the men and women of Reverend Wright’s generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years… And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright’s sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning.”
Exactly! I’d be pissed if I were Williams, too! And I’d probably do inappropriate things like spout off occasionally over the pulpit. So yeah, Obama puts his pastor’s remarks in the context of his his good works — everything else he’s ever done to bring people together and heal his community. But no one should be surprised if a black pastor loses it over the pulpit every once in a while. I think what people found most disturbing is not that he didn’t hold back or that Obama is associated with him; it’s the possibility that many people of color think the same thoughts. That we have all this unruly, unfinished emotional business that we’d all just rather sweep under the rug.
I think the most important part for me is that he is trying to start a conversation about race, something we’ve been sort of trying to do awkwardly for… decades? A few hundred years? And we still haven’t figured it out! And it still hurts us! And we NEED to keep talking with each other.
“But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now… The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we’ve never really worked through – a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.”
We haven’t gotten very far in dealing with race because people have such strong, unruly feelings about it. Some people want to say “hey, I’m not a racist, will you shut up about it already, I didn’t bring you here and enslave you. Can’t you just get over it?” Other people say “You make me feel like less than I am, and I hate you for it.”
I’m being really inarticulate here. What I’m trying to say is we have a really hard time facing the ugly, violent feelings. But we can’t just go around them and keep wishing everyone would just be polite and stop making each other so uncomfortable.
As for what it means coming from a presidential candidate and how it hurts or helps Obama… I think an effective leader defines the national conversation and sets the tone of the discussion. In that way I think he’s already won. Well, he’s won me, anyway. Will it hurt is candidacy? Well, unlike Romney he isn’t bringing up race to “make it go away.” He’s brining it up to keep it alive. Maybe it was his elegy. I think it makes him look stronger and more inspiring, but that’s coming from a Mexican-American lefty living in Brooklyn.
How the rest of the nation reacts depends a lot on what shape our conversations take on. And that’s why I hope we all keep talking about this.
Bleh, after thinking about this speech all day long I’m annoyed that I can’t succinctly articulate why I thought it was important.
Never mind, I think I’ll just go have some Yes Pecan ice cream instead.
Noooo, Adriana! Come back to political discourse!
I completely agree with you. I’m beginning to lean towards the judgment that this was a great speech. It will be remembered for as long as the United States is around, and it may actually do some good. (It may not! Jury’s out!)
I think, though, that the Kara Walker comparison definitely won’t play in Peoria. “You know, that New York artist who makes pictures of white men raping their slaves? That’s who Obama’s speech reminds me of.”
Oh I know, you’re right. No one even knows who Kara Walker is. Ugggg, that’s the problem!
Actually, ever since dropping out of the academic world because I felt like my studies had nothing to do with the “real” world I find myself continually bouncing between a complete disregard and disdain for Peoria and an almost shameful identification with Peoria. I’ll say “we have to get in touch with what the rest of America thinks” and then say “who cares what America thinks, they’re all ignorant nitwits.” This is a classic liberal dilemma, right? Anyhoo
After commenting I went around reading commentary around the blogsphere and it all started to make me feel like a literal-minded, naive boob. I think the one that bit the hardest was a cynical “I don’t even think Barama really wants to have a discussion about race.” Ouch. Really? Is he a more critical reader? Am I just reading what I want to read? Are we just going to wake up tomorrow and carry on as usual?
And what exactly are we supposed to say in this conversation about race? I guess I just need to listen a lot. But what more can be said that hasn’t already? Do we need Obama to lay out the talking points for us, like he’s leading a book club discussion? Why have words not gotten us there so far? Is it really a matter of having a political figure start the conversation? Will he follow up? What will that look like?
I mentioned on a friend’s blog something Oprah said years ago when she produced the movie version of Beloved. She produced it because we’d never really dealt with our legacy of slavery. The movie flopped. I remember feeling very frustrated by that. It really stuck with me. (I say this while opening my Oprah defensive umbrella — don’t throw tomatoes TGW readers, she’s a significant cultural figure no matter how you feel about her!)
I’m still holding out for the Tai Chi effect — that because Obama is flowing with the attack instead of resisting he will become stronger.
There are plenty of places in the world where you can succeed politically despite coming from nothing. Some of those places you don’t even need to have money to run for election. Some places it doesn’t matter what you are. (Within reason, one assumes. Known criminals are generally discouraged from standing for election.) In the government here (NZ) the PM is a woman, the Education Minister is openly gay and there is an MP who is a transsexual. There are MPs of numerous ethnicities, several of whom lead their respective parties. None of this is new. It is true that we do have a very different history from the US, particularly in the matter of race. But people have still had to fight for rights because of their gender, race, sexual orientation, or even just because they’re just a little bit peculiar. We haven’t been particularly insightful as a group, just lucky at a few key points in our history.
But I think whether or not Obama’s story is possible outside the US is completely irrelevant to what Obama said. He’s making an appeal to voters, not the world. It makes no difference to him if someone in Europe or the southern hemisphere froths at the idea that the US is the only place in the world a person of mixed race can thrive. He is just talking to you. And by telling his story he is making himself familiar. I think it’s also about making the good things that one is proud of in being American encompass him as well by association. I think a lot of people respond to feeling blessed that they live where they do. Australia calls itself the lucky country. New Zealand is Godzone (which is God’s own, not so much God’s Zone). So I think it’s true that Obama is preaching to the converted, but he is also attempting to make himself appear less of a threat to those who might be spooked by him. It’s a really difficult thing to pull off both things at once. Of course a lot of people aren’t going to think about it as hard as we are. They’ll be left with a feeling, which may or may not influence their vote. I’d imagine that Obama is hoping it is a good feeling.
After thinking about it for awhile, I’ve decided that I really admire Obama for giving this speech. He could easily lose his chance of nomination by this speech. I’m happy he gave it; I think he’s gutsy for doing so. There are some brilliant, if not a little overly sappy, examples and stories there.
#3 It would have been possible in every country had it been historically predisposed to the current events as America has been. What can and cannot happen within a country is largely shaped by its history and its geographical position. But for those of us that don’t care about a person’s skin color and have far overcome the issues of racism, it would be more interesting and galvanizing to hear the real solutions for the real problems.
Hey Bryan thanks for the youtube link,
Trixie: Is that the first time he’s made you cry? (watching me teary-eyed)
me: Yeah. I guess so.
That was quite a speech. What honesty. God, I hope he stays alive for the next few years. We need him. Proud to be just a few blocks away during that speech. God bless him. Made me realize that I have to change me affiliation by nest monday from independent to Democrat so i can vote a month from now. Go obama!
Kate gets it right: “He could easily lose his chance of nomination by this speech.” Obama has made a breathtakingly risky move — with his honesty, he has done more to make himself unpalatable to Ruben’s “certain key voters in certain key states” than his opponents ever would dare. If he wins now, he explicitly wins on those terms — despite America’s racism and because he was able to bridge the divide. He cannot win any other way now.
I repeat: Holy shit.
Farrell — go change your registration TOMORROW, you dork.
to paraphrase michelle obama, for the first time in my adult lifetime, i am really proud of a presidential candidate.
And my students are all emailing me: “Did you hear he quoted Faulkner!!!” Can you imagine George Bush quoting Faulkner? I’m sorry, I know this speech has its cheesy moments, but I didn’t feel anything but the very unfamiliar stirrings of long-dormant . . . dare I say pride?? I still believe McCain will win, and Obama is a little cruel for breeding those lilacs out of this dead ground . . . but in this moment it really feels good.
A couple of excellent posts on Obama: on his “theory of change” and on the speech and communitarianism. (Via.)
That Faulkner quote was so goddamn perfect.
I lieu of the discussion that’s been going on regarding Obama’s speech, it felt kind of weird to write such a darkly tongue-in-cheek post for today. I love it when earnestness rears its head ’round these parts.
I’m sad to report from Cynicland that better words were never more eloquently wasted on a less deserving public — most of whom will never hear that one of the most important speeches regarding race was given yesterday, but will know who was knocked out on Dancing With the Stars.
The report from Earnestland: I shed many a tear, and I do think this speech will be reproduced in American political theory texts for some time to come.
Back to Cynicland: I just with the guy had a chance, but I doubt it considering the low press priority given to McCain’s monumental gaff over Iran and their (non)relationship with al Qaida. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmXaEeuHmig
#32 — mccain’s gaff got less press because it accidentally overlapped with the press given to obama. but today’s headlines and editorials all seem to have painted obama as coming out of this on top. i’m glad you distributed the link to the mccain bit. i read about it in the times. we need to keep these moments alive — the same way the “bomb bomb iran” thing needs to haunt him all the way to november. same with “50 years, or 100.” because when it comes down to it, the majority of the country wants us out of iraq.
most of my extended republican family would vote for obama over mccain. not all, but most. and we’re talking arizona republicans here.
mccain is dangerous. from now until november, that message needs to be stepped up as much as possible.
does joe lieberman remind anyone else of grima wormtongue, whispering in mccain’s ear?
We need to spread a new meme: You know how sometimes your grandfather puts on one black shoe and one brown shoe, and how your great aunt can never remember where she put her car keys? That’s kind of like how John McCain thinks Iran is training al Qaeda.
Ageism can work for us!
Also, Godfree and swells: you put the “defeat” in “Defeatocrat.”
One more irritating note: last night’s local (Los Angeles) news categorized Obama’s speech with a little picture next to the announcer’s head that said “clean up his mess?” I’m like, it’s your mess too, dude.
LT: You know that when the car chase segment of the local news is over, you’re supposed to switch over to King of the Hill. Sorry to blame the victim an’ all, but…
right, right, but i had to stay tuned. they were gonna do their regular segment of “Brit-watch.”
Scott, if you’re going to call out Dancing With The Stars…
Everyone knows that this first week consisted of one night of all the male stars dancing followed by one night featuring all of the female celebrities.
NO ONE was knocked out, silly. The double elimination is next week…
While we’re being high brow-this is not a good looking group on this season’s Bachelor.
ruben — you’re the only person i know who uses reality TV to keep it real.
Scott and Steph — Let’s hope this description of reaction to the speech in a white Atlanta suburb suggests that your pessimism is at least a little unwarranted. (Thanks to my friend JB for sending me that link.)
I hope you all understand that my pessimism is purely self-protective, because I want it so bad and get hurt so bad. After all the tears I shed over Kerry’s loss–or should I say Bush’s “win”–when I wasn’t even JK’s hugest supporter, having already had my heart smashed by Howard Dean’s being railroaded out–I am just too afraid to have the audacity of hope, but rest assured, it’s in there somewhere, just dying to stop being repressed. That blog about Atlanta choked me up. Do I dare?
Have y’all read Obama’s foreign policy speech from today? Great stuff. He’s not disappointing me yet. (I’m sure he will eventually.)
I love that many of you out there in Whatsitland are hopeful about not only Obama’s chances, but in the potential restoration of America’s standing in the world. It’s really good for me (and swells) to be around.
You are all so very special to me (and I say that without any irony). Yes Ruben, this goes for you too.
Uh-oh, Dave, am I rubbing off on you? Don’t come down this road.
I don’t know, swells. You’re kind of far away to be rubbing. Should we fix that?
Barber, you really know how to make a girl blush. I take it back–come on down this road.