Imagine picking up a copy of the Washington Post (as if you ever would) and reading the headline, “Why White people are afraid of ‘crazy’ Black people.” Setting aside the obvious reasons that would come to mind, you’d immediately realize you were dreaming and wake up, because the Post would never run such a thing.
But it would and did publish the inverse in a column this week by the thickly spectacled Jonathan Capehart. “Black people are not afraid of White people,” he wrote. “We’re afraid of ‘crazy’ White people.”
Capehart, who is black, went on to say he and other People of Color™️ have come to live in great fear of whites who profess to believe in the so-called “great replacement theory,” wherein America’s political leaders are deliberately remaking the country’s electorate via mass immigration. (Up until recently, Democrats and plenty of Republicans simply referred to this as “default policy.”)
He cited a recent survey claiming that 75 percent of blacks are at least “somewhat worried” that they or someone they love will be assaulted because of their race.
“And it’s all because the number of ‘crazy’ White people in America fearing ‘replacement’ appears to be growing,” wrote Capehart, “and they seem ready to do whatever it takes to stay at the pinnacle of American life.”
Anyone can be somewhat worried about anything for any reason at all. I’m often somewhat worried that the airplane I’m in won’t properly lift off. Similarly, that fear isn’t based on the reality that such a thing pretty much never happens.
That whites at large have become blood-thirsty savages ready to violently attack blacks or other minorities isn’t born out by any data. In 2020, the most recent year for which FBI data is available (and what a fun year that was!), the race of the offenders of all violent crime — which includes homicide, rape, robbery and aggravated assault — is split evenly between blacks and whites, 44 percent each.
What should cause Capehart to blush a little is that blacks make up just 13 percent of the U.S. population. In other words, almost half of the nation’s violent crimes that year were committed by members of a race that only comprises one-tenth of the people who live in that nation. What’s more, the victims of those crimes in 2020 were more likely to be white (56 percent) than black (38 percent).
Go back the previous two years, and the numbers are just the same. There’s also the fact that interracial violent crime, at least as far as homicide goes, is fairly rare. Blacks are usually the victims of other blacks, and the same is true for whites. (To that, Capehart said Wednesday on MSNBC, “That’s not the point!”)
So, tell me again— who has more reason to be afraid of the crazy who?
Trick question. Don’t be afraid of people based on their race. Although if you really wanted to make Capehart blush, you’d point out that his husband is white. Hopefully not a crazy one.
Source: The Federalist
