Whiteness is a Hungry Ghost

Buddhist tell a story of a spirit with a insatiable appetite, filled with greed — a hunger that will never go away because it has a pin-hole sized mouth, suggesting that no matter how much it consumes, it wants more and is never satisfied. They call it the Hungry Ghost.*

It’s a frightening scene to behold in the spiritual dimension. But we need not look far off for ways in which it’s more real than we could imagine. As we speak there is a hungry ghost on a rampage for power and control throughout our land. It’s moving through the state legislative processes across the nation. It’s feeding on fear and grabbing for power, seeking to rip democratic power right out of the hands of citizens in order to feed its insatiable appetite. But unlike the traditional notion of a ghost, who remains mysterious and veiled — this ghost has a name and a host body it has occupied.

It’s called Whiteness and Its host body is the GOP.

Now its important to note that whiteness is not a tone of skin or racial identity, rather it is a social construct created and maintained for the sole purpose of leveraging power and privilege of one class of people (mostly white) over another (mostly black and brown). This dis-eased form of consciousness has been around a long time (originating in the late 1680’s), and for much of that time it has been in sole position of the levers of power, privilege and wealth in this nation. But this perch of power has been slowly eroding with the diversification of the American…