On a balmy day in May of 2014, a time capsule cracked open,
revealing two relics of a bygone era: a pair of wealthy, old, white men
displaying what was once a more common form of racism than the invidious,
subtle bigotry of the post-racial 21st century.
Cliven Bundy is a Nevada rancher who has grazed his cattle
on government land for two decades without paying grazing fees like thousands
of his fellow ranchers. Some might label him a freeloader or moocher. Not me,
of course. A rich guy like Cliven can afford much better lawyers than I can, so
I wouldn’t want to offend him. On the other hand, when you’re rich, like old
Cliven, you don’t necessarily care whom you offend.
I knew Cliven had stepped out from a time capsule when he
told a crowd of reporters his views on “the Negro.” That word, commonplace
during my youth, had fallen out of vogue decades ago. But Cliven didn’t stop
there. “The Negro,” Cliven told the reporters, “abort their young children,
they put their young men in jail, because they never learned how to pick
cotton.” The 67-year-old added, “And
I've often wondered, are they better off as slaves, picking cotton and having a
family life and doing things, or are they better off under government subsidy?”
This statement was a particularly impressive display of ignorance, because
slave families were routinely shattered when their members were sold to
different owners. The irony of Cliven equating “family life” with slavery was
almost as great as that of a freeloader
complaining about others living on government subsidies.
Yet, the time capsule was filled with irony. Its other
occupant, Los Angeles Clippers basketball team owner Donald Sterling, told his
girlfriend he didn’t like her posing for photos with blacks: his half-black,
half-Mexican girlfriend. My irony cup runneth over. The married, 80-year-old’s
much younger eye candy (obviously dating him for his good looks and sexual
vigor and certainly not for gifts like the $1.8-million Los Angeles duplex, the
Ferrari, the two Bentleys, and the Range Rover he had given her) had posted a
photo of herself with black basketball icon Magic Johnson, prompting him to
tell her: “It bothers me a lot that you want to broadcast that you're
associating with black people. You can sleep with [black people]. You can bring
them in, you can do whatever you want (but) the little I ask you is ... not to
bring them to my games.” We know Sterling said this because his girlfriend was
prescient enough to record the conversation. And therein lies the true issue
that should concern us.
We should not be surprised to find that all individuals
harbor some degree of prejudice within their hearts. We are all tainted with a
patina of prejudice; it stands to reason, some men raised 60 or 80 years ago might be clothed in a heavier coat of bigotry
that they've failed to shed in the ensuing years. But, if they wish to think
this way, that is their right. It’s as much their right to hold their own
opinions and beliefs as it is yours and mine. Freedom of thought is a precursor
to all of the First Amendment freedoms we hold dear: speech, press, religion, assembly, and petition.
Expression is preceded by conception. One cannot speak or write an idea until
one has thought of it. Freedom of thought is the most important freedom of all,
and the first to be eradicated in totalitarian societies.