Our Newest Op Ed

June 26, 2005 | Filed Under Uncategorized |

European Politics, Far More Racist Than America’s
- By Warner Todd Huston

Recently I was scanning a web message board where people from many nations come to post about their favorite political subjects and wrangle with like minded souls or friendly apostates over national and international policy. Something I saw there really caught my eye. It was an exchange over whose nation was more racist. Was it the USA or was it any of the various Western European nations?

An exchange there went something like this:

bigenglish: “Well, obviously the USA is more racist because you fellows have the Ku Klux Klan running around ruling the South.”

USPatriot: “What? The KKK is a nonentity over here and has been for decades. Heck, we don’t even have any Klan members in government yet you guys have whole parties that are based on racist sentiment like the BNP.”

This exchange really gave me pause to think. The American poster was exactly right, of course. Certainly the USA has a history from just prior to the Civil War up until the 1960’s where outright, self avowed racists have held high public office. Of course, the Ku Klux Klan had many of its members similarly holding office in the “bad old” days here in the USA between 1870 and the late 1920s or so.

But those days are long over. When Congress broke the back of the KKK in the 1920’s and drove it’s members out of high public office and back into the back woods encampments they came out of, it signaled the beginning of the end for mixing politics and racists in the USA. And by the time the Republicans helped lead the nation to pass the 1964 Civil Rights bill, it was becoming obvious that racism in politics was on it’s last leg…….

Click HERE To Read On

Bookmark this story to your favorite service: