What Cypher Taught Me About Black Conservatives
Because ignorance, is bliss.
Broken Bad
White denial is something fierce. White denial of racism is so prevalent in America, it technically becomes it’s own stereotype of white people:
White people tend to get treated as if they harbor any scale of subconscious racism towards nonwhites until proven otherwise.
The automatic assumption holds every white person as bigoted. This isn’t exactly fair judgment to place upon 223 million people, but as a nonwhite this type of thing functions as a survival mechanism. Meaning, knowing what you can say and with whom. How to respond to law enforcement. The list goes on.
With this denial system comes the notion that racism doesn’t exist at all. Just like how a bulimic doesn’t see skinny, those who inflict the most racism are those who fail to identify it.
But what if, for some reason, there was a nonwhite fellow — a black person — who claims to have never seen racism?
On Onyx Truth Live, episode 14, Ricky L. Hinds, the founder of Americans United Again stated that a man of color who claims to have never seen racism (towards those of color) has to be delusional. While there’s a sliding measure of what it means to be delusional, I conclude that a person of such only claims to not see racism because they are in AGREEMENT with the said racism at hand. Looking at OTL ep14 past the first hour, it looks like I might be correct.
After listening to the totality of OTL ep14, Myles (the white supremacist black guy) allows everyone an honest peer into the eyes of a die-hard black republican/conservative. Myles, a man of color, seemed to advocate for biracial (and/or lightskinned?) people to be a specific one race. Most of his motive seems to be to remove any concept of “blackness” from his being, as if being black is a social pathology. At first he seems to be a misguided but reasonable man, but after an hour we find out that he goes to the Fox News School of Debate; he attempts to yell down Ricky Hinds the majority of the time, he deflects and refuses to answer basic questions, launches a thousand red herrings, totally misses the point, and frequently breaks continuity of discussion. He also exercises no empathy, registering as sociopathic. And the scary thing about this guy is that he claims to be a counselor of some sort.
This video was supposed to be a very complex view on Afro-American colorism, but it became something else.
Upon realizing that our black conservative is very aware that lighter skinned people are treated differently (as in, less of a threat than darker people) you will find later that he doesn’t seek to tear down this inequality, he seeks to upkeep and benefit from it.
Cypher on Wine
I always had a theory on why black conservatives (who deny/defend white supremacy) continue to exist. It’s very similar to Cypher eating steak and wine.
Ignorance is Bliss
In the Matrix, Cypher, a pursued and “aware of the system” hacker realized one thing: Being a revolutionary, sucks. The hours are long, it’s a thankless job. You stink, and eat horrible tasting food. You can end up with loved ones giving up on you, or even killed because of their proximity to you. You can even be killed yourself. The fact that you are up against forces far more powerful than you are may make things seem futile. Seeing no progress makes things worse. The “System” controls all elements that facilitate comfort.
Ignorance, is bliss. Cypher, if you’ve seen the Matrix, wants to remove all knowledge of an oppressive system, and simply live a comfortable life. He doesn’t even want to remember friends who have suffered. The sad thing is the fact that he cleanly states “I know this is not real.” He gladly accepts comfort, even when he knows it’s not reality.
Black conservatives remind me of Cypher: it doesn’t matter if the knowledge is out there. It doesn’t matter if their arguments are made of straw. It doesn’t matter if the liberal or revolutionary has a point. The black conservative, much like Cypher, only wants to live in comfort, and if comfort means conforming and ignoring a suppressive and oppressive system, then so be it. It doesn’t matter how many people suffer from it; if I’m treated only slightly better, then I’ll take that “slightly better” over a fight for total equality.
To a person fighting for equality, one would hold that it’s nonsensical for a black person to live a life hopping through hoops to, for his entire life, to ensure white people — who suffer from acute afrophobia — are made infinitely comfortable. To the black conservative, as illustrated on Onyx Truth Live’s 14th episode, one holds that it’s an obvious fact that black people need to infinitely worry about how they are perceived by others, which means infinitely worrying about things that white people never have to worry about, to ensure whites, who worry less about racism, are always comfortable. All for a few Scooby Snacks.
Sorry, but I just can’t do it. I cannot just, accept second class citizenship. I like to thank Myles for being radically honest that day. But wow… I just cannot fathom being broken as he is.
