the tragedy that took place in Charlottesville last weekend could not have occurred without the tacit acceptance of millions of ordinary, law-abiding Americans who helped create such a racially explosive climate. it’s the ordinary people — the voters who elected a reality TV star with a record of making racially insensitive comments, the people who move out of the neighborhood when people of color move in, the family members who ignore a relative’s anti-Semitism — who give these type of men room to operate.
”You have to have millions of people who are willing to be bystanders, who push aside evidence of racism, Islamophobia or sexism. You can’t have one without the other. We are a country with a few million passionate white supremacists — and tens of millions of white supremacists by default.” Mark Naison, a political activist and history professor at Fordham University
Many of the white racists who marched in Charlottesville were condemned because they openly said they don’t believe in integration or racial equality.
But millions of ordinary white Americans have been sending that message to black and brown people for at least a half a century.
They send it with their actions: They don’t want to live next to or send their children to school with black or brown people.
Updated 2:39 PM ET, Sat August 19, 2017