White people, why are so many of you so fucking fragile?

I recently heard a term used to describe a behavior that at first perplexed me. I had to think about it for a second, and then it clicked home instantly.

The behavior I’m referring to is deep indignation at the accusations I recently leveled at my fellow white people. To sum up, I called most of white America in on the carpet, and blasted them with both barrels for the horrid way in which we white Americans have treated people of color. I repeatedly referred to white America as “we”, even going back to pre-Civil War slavery’s era.

But oh, wow…are there ever a lot of white people (almost all of them men, I’ll point out) who responded with practically a word-for-word response: “Ididn’t do any of those things. I’mnot a racist.”

The very idea that I would have the nerve to lump them in with blatant overt white supremacists was just way too much for them to handle. They felt I had no right to label all white people (meaning them) as racist, slave owners, white supremacists, or any other term that might cast an aspersion on their goodness and decency. After all, theynever owned slaves. They never lynched a black man.

So, as an olive branch to those of the Caucasian persuasion who took my rant personally, please accept this medal for good behavior. You may print it out and wear it around your necks as a symbol of your greatness, your excellence, your wonderful decency:

I hope that helps. After all, I cannot defeat racism alone. I’ll need the help of any award-winning whiteys out there who see themselves as good people.

For the rest of you, please allow me to introduce you to the subject of this piece. The name assigned to it by wiser, wittier persons than myself is White Fragility.

Just as ridiculous as it sounds, ‘white fragility’ is the apparent inability of many white folks in America to accept that they are complicit in one of the worst forms of degradation we can point to in recent history. That is, of course, the disgusting treatment of black America by white America.

“Now just hold on there one cotton-pickin’ minute,” some of you might be saying to yourselves right now. “I’m not a racist. I don’t go out picking on black people because of the color of their skin.”