If I were Mayor of Oakland and announced a Christmas party to which only White elected officials were invited, I’d get tarred and feathered and ridden out of town on a rail. And with good reason: I’d properly be accused of racism.
Yet that’s exactly what happened in Boston, where an uproar quickly followed Mayor Michelle Yu’s disastrous announcement of a party for “electeds of color” to which no Whites were to be admitted. The invitations to the secret party were only supposed to be sent to a smallish group of elected people of color, but one of Wu’s aides mistakenly sent it to the entire City Council, which is composed of six minority members and seven Whites. Oops! After the mistake was realized—about 15 minutes later—the aide notified the council that she was rescinding the invitations to the Whites, and apologized “if my email may have offended” anyone.
By then it was too late. The news went viral around the world: in India, in Great Britain, and across the U.S. Within 48 hours the backlash had become so severe that Wu had to issue her own apology. It was “an honest mistake,” Wu said. “I think we've all been in a position at one point where an email went out, and there was a mistake in the recipient." Well, that’s not how most Bostonians saw it. Reaction there has been almost totally negative, with nearly everyone condemning Wu—who is Chinese-American—as an anti-White racist.
Wu’s history suggests this is true. In true Progressive form, last Spring, in touting her accomplishments, she told a group, “I'm getting used to dealing with problems that are expensive, disruptive and white," and she called White people “snowflakes.” There was an audible gasp of horror in the audience when Wu spoke these words. (Wu is both the first female mayor in Boston’s history, and the first person of color.) The Boston Herald, one of the city’s leading newspapers, called her a “progressive darling.” When Wu was elected mayor, in 2021, the New York Times—still reeling from the election of the moderate Eric Adams as New York’s mayor—called Wu “one conspicuous bright spot…for progessives,” and praised “her plan to make the city into a laboratory for progressive policy.” Massachusetts Congresswoman Ayanna Presley, a member of The Squad, endorsed Wu in the election, lauding her “vision for our city.”
In one sense, Wu’s party for “electeds of color” (a new woke euphemism?) was politics as usual. Politicians are always pandering to various racial, religious and ethnic groups whose support they hope to gain. But in another, and far more troubling, sense, Wu’s little party reflects the gestural politics of wokeism that simply further divides and inflames the electorate. As one person tweeted, “This is DEI on steroids! She is helping to foster racial tensions that don’t need to be there. Keep dividing us on race and your [sic] perpetrating hate.” In fact, Wu’s POC-only party gets to the essence of what wokeism is: singling out people of color, time and time again, as a constituency that needs to be favored, even as Whites are literally not invited to the party. Little wonder than Wu has offended so many. She’s the Sheng Thao of Boston, just another muddle-headed politician obsessed with race.
All of this leads directly to the subject of this post: reverse racism. It’s long past time that we called out the 800-pound elephant in the woke’s bedroom. Typical of this pernicious form of discrimination is Carroll Fife, who has a long record of anti-White outbursts. “I don’t ever want to hear another White, Yellow person, whatever, talk about what my ancestors experienced about being enslaved…,” she once complained. Another time, she said, “…gun violence in East and West Oakland…a rise in robberies and assaults…it’s all coming from the same sources: capitalism and white supremacy."
From the book of Fife, which is the book of Michelle Wu, the rule is: Always blame White folks for everything bad. Well, the public is beginning to resent Fife’s racism, and the similar racism of other wokes who know that White people, especially men, are the last group it’s okay to denigrate.
Steve Heimoff