THE WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD
(apologies to Keith Olbermann)
Arkansas State Rep. Jon Hubbard (R)
As you grow older, you’ll see white men cheat black men every day of your life, but let me tell you something and don’t you forget it - whenever a white man does that to a black man, no matter who he is, how rich he is, or how fine a family he comes from, he is trash.
- Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird
It takes a very special kind of ignorance and racism to reframe the suffering of an entire race as “a blessing in disguise” and to believe that slavery got a bad rap. After 10 years in southeast Texas, I saw firsthand that racism is alive and well, albeit kept under wraps and employed with a subtlety that makes it even more insidious. Racism is hardly the exclusive province of the Deep South, but there’s a reason so many of the struggles from the Civil Rights Era took place there. Racial equality, while perhaps steadily improving with the passage of time, remains a far-off goal. The gap between Whites and The Other still exists in the minds of many good, God-fearing southern White Christian patriots.
Rep. Hubbard no doubt represents many in his district who look upon his views as undeniably true. Evidently, it seems that some Whites haven’t evolved to the point where they can judge a human being on the content of their character instead of the color of their skin (apologies to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.). Some of those folks hold seats in Congress and state legislatures. If that isn’t an indictment of attitudes toward racial equality, I don’t know what would be.
For reasons known only to himself, Rep. Hubbard thought it would be an awesome idea to write a book containing the letters to the editor he’d written over the years…one that he titled “Confessions of a Frustrated Conservative.” I’m not about to be downloading it to my iPad anytime soon, but thankfully, Steve Benen has done the dirty work for me.
“… the institution of slavery that the black race has long believed to be an abomination upon its people may actually have been a blessing in disguise. The blacks who could endure those conditions and circumstances would someday be rewarded with citizenship in the greatest nation ever established upon the face of the Earth.” (Pages 183-89)
African Americans must “understand that even while in the throes of slavery, their lives as Americans are likely much better than they ever would have enjoyed living in sub-Saharan Africa.”
“Knowing what we know today about life on the African continent, would an existence spent in slavery have been any crueler than a life spent in sub-Saharan Africa?” (Pages 93 and 189)
One could examine that last sentence and come up with a reasonable facsimile that would demonstrate what a narrow, brain-dead bigot Hubbard is:
“Knowing what we know today about life in America, would an existence spent in slavery have been any crueler than a life spent in Arkansas?”
It’s a question every bit as valid as the one in Hubbard’s book…not that he’ll see it that way, of course.