In a World Where Trump Could Be President...
...there really isn't much room for a satirical Angry White Guy.
The last time I can recall the country going through such a humorless and knee-jerk offense period was just after 9/11/2001. People were so polarized and so consistently angry that the very idea of making a joke that might do what jokes do - expose a truth and crack you up - became the scariest thing in the world. Bill Maher paid for it as a high profile example but he managed to pull himself out of the mire of ugly, neo-McCarthyism and get an HBO gig.
Today, in response to some very real examples of public inequity and police brutality and the system of racism that is baked into the glaze of modern American society, the climate has tipped from being a good and productive discussion of race and gender and fairness to using the same discussion as a means to eliminate all who could possibly disagree or present anything that may offend the most reactionary of us.
The disheartening aspect to this is that there are so many examples of actual racist behavior on display that for some to use the charge to execute personal vendettas is both a slap in the face to those experiencing truly odious behavior and a diminishment of the very accusation itself.
My belief (and understanding it requires a bit of intellectual nuance that so many lack) is that a racist is someone who benefits from a fundamentally racist societal model. I can't remember where I heard that first or I'd give credit to the source but that definition makes sense to me. Thus, every white person in America is, by that definition, a racist. Bigotry is the belief that one race or social model is superior than another. All races, creeds and ethnicities have bigots within them. If you call me a racist, I'd agree with you. If you call me a bigot, I'd disagree with you. It is not possible for a Black American to be racist but completely routine for thatcsame Black American to be a bigot.
Unfortunately for me, that is NOT the definition by which most people believe. The charge of racist becomes the charge of bigotry and the problem with that is that, in today's strident rage at inequity, racist equals being white and having an opinion that differs from someone non-white.
Donald Trump is a parody of The Angry White Guy - his shtick is so over the top that actual angry white males across the country can't see the farce and only see the mirror. And so many of them throw their support his way because they believe in the fiction that America was only for them.
In a world where Donald Trump could be the President of the United States, there is no more room for a satirical Angry White Guy.
