Shirley Sherrod was dismissed from her Agriculture Department job because remarks she made almost a quarter century ago about her dealings with a White farmer were perceived as racist. She was offered her job back Wednesday because a full viewing of that speech showed it to be a tale of racial reconciliation.
But put aside the furor and confusion over the employment of the Black woman who headed the USDA’s rural development office in Georgia. The Sherrod affair brings to the fore a simmering debate over whether Black racism is cause for concern in America under its first Black president.
During the campaign, Barack Obama was forced to address the blistering racial remarks of his former pastor. Since then, there have been complaints that Barack Obama presides over an administration that is racial, not post-racial—when he supported a Black Harvard professor who was arrested by a White police officer or when the Justice Department dismissed most charges against a group of Black militants accused of intimidating voters.
“If the Justice Department is really not interested in pursuing cases against Blacks who violate Whites’ civil rights and only go after Whites who violate Blacks’ rights, that is a major problem,” says William Stogner, a 46-year-old telecommunications technician who lives in St. Louis.
Growing up in the 1970s, Stogner was often called “cracker” by Black kids in his grandparents’ East St. Louis neighborhood. Last April, while walking to his car after a tea party rally, Stogner says he heard the same epithet from a group of young Black men. To Stogner, Black and White racism are equivalent: “To me it’s bad no matter where it originates.”
But to some conservatives, there is something special about Black racism: It is invisible in the liberal media and perpetrated by the Obama administration. While White racism is highly publicized, they say, Black racism gets a pass.
“The sheer hypocrisy is maddening to me and is a terrible, terrible double standard,” said conservative radio host Mike Gallagher.
