“The Hair” and The Not So Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations

    There are some moments in politics that inspire a sense of shame in the observer. I’m not talking about the common experience of being merely embarrassed by someone’s humiliating statement. What I mean is, that a political figure can occasionally make you a kind of accomplice in his transgression. I felt like that a while back, for example, when Trump was running for president in 2015. You might remember he had just insulted John McCain for having been captured in Vietnam. (And if you didn’t realize right then and there that Trump was a degenerate, piece of shit human being, I can’t help you.) And even though I am on the political right and Trump, as I have said before, is no conservative, I still felt somewhat complicit in the horror just by virtue of my proximity to the political culture that created that moment. I got over it, but it was not a good feeling.

    Why do I bring that up? Well, thanks for asking. Not too long ago, I got that same feeling after watching a clip of California Governor Gavin Newsom speaking on a Saturday evening with Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens, a black man, before an Atlanta audience. Newsom, or “The Hair,” as he is known by many people in his home state, was in Atlanta to promote his memoir, Young Man in a Hurry: A Memoir of Discovery, and here is what he said to ingratiate himself with the ethnically diverse crowd: “I’m not trying to impress you, I’m just trying to impress upon you, I’m like you. I’m no better than you. You know, I’m a 960 SAT guy. I’m not trying to offend anyone, act all there if you got 940, but literally a 960 SAT guy.” He’s like black people, you see, because he gets low scores on standardized tests. Another point of shared struggle between Newsom and the audience, he wanted them to know, is his inability to read: “You’ve never seen me read a speech because I cannot read a speech.”

    Newsom is a liberal - I am not. But I felt ashamed this time because his comments reminded me that more than a few white Americans remain, as the great Norman Podhoretz put it in 1963, “twisted and sick” in their feelings about black Americans. And it is a truth that I tend to hide from in order to persevere in my conviction that our nation is on a long trajectory toward racial peace, however difficult to achieve that conviction may seem at times. 

    I mean, it’s bad enough to hold that black people en masse are illiterates and academic failures. But it is indeed twisted and sick to believe that they appreciate your low assessment of their intelligence and must want to hear you say you are as deficient as you think they are.

    The most interesting part of Newsom’s comments was that bit about not trying to rub his 960 score in the face of those who scored 940. That is where he showed everyone the depth of his cluelessness, if not outright stupidity. What he said isn’t particularly offensive to those who scored 940. It is most offensive to those who got high scores. He is telling them that he does not recognize their individual achievement because of his assumptions.

    Newsom is the whitest guy in politics; and that’s saying something. To be clear, I don’t believe in what some call “white privilege.” But if you do, he’s your poster boy. He grew up in a politically and socially connected family that paved she way through a ridiculously charmed life. Yes, he’s just like you. After all, didn’t you get a college letter of recommendation from former California Governor Jerry Brown? Were you not bankrolled in your early entrepreneurial endeavors by the heir to the Getty fortune? Didn’t he see you dining at the French Laundry during Covid lockdowns?

    It is because Newsom has been comfortably wrapped in an infected liberal bubble that he’s never received a sufficient dose of the antidote to the sickness; extended exposure to the real America populated by flesh-and-blood black people in ALL their diversity.

    We must not, however, single out “The Hair” here. White Democrats of a certain vintage frequently get it wrong when they try to identify with black Americans. In 2016, Hillary Clinton appeared on a radio show with a largely black listenership, and bragged about carrying hot sauce in her bag - an apparent nod to a Beyonce lyric. Of course, in 2020, Joe Biden (before he really started losing his mind) told radio host Charlemagne tha God, “If you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump, then you ain’t black.” The “ain’t” was a nice touch. Not surprising from the man who also said, “Poor kids are just as bright as white kids.” Unbelievable... Not to be outdone, New York Governor Kathy Hochul once declared, “Black children don’t know what a computer is.” “The Hair” has a lot of esteemed company in his party.

    I’ve gotten over my shame. The question is whether “The Hair,” and those like him, will ever find theirs.

Write to Peter: magtour@icloud.com