Summary: Chapters 9–10

Chapter 9

The author recalls a Black History Month presentation in school, when a white classmate said she wished she were Black. Of course, anyone would want to be on the right side of history, McGhee writes. She says many white people want to “free themselves from the debt of responsibility for racism.” However, it is difficult when the system is working for them, and they fear change.

Angela King (born 1975) is a former neo-Nazi. King grew up being bullied and made friends with white supremacists because they didn’t question her anger. When she was arrested and went to prison, she didn’t feel responsible. But, in prison, she met more POC. They became her friends, and she had to face up to the wrongness of her views. However, she doesn’t want white people who aren’t neo-Nazis to feel like they’re off the hook because of that. She feels they should learn how they are benefiting from racism. She says, “[We’re] socialized [to believe] racism is normal, and it’s built into our democracy . . . white people . . . have no clue.”

People who are citizens are also privileged, above those who are undocumented, McGhee notes. They might feel like they have the moral high ground because others are “illegal.” However, McGhee says, people don’t realize that “the ancestors of many white Americans [were allowed to] arrive [in the United States] with no restrictions or requirements save their whiteness.”

Another woman, Melanie, says she grew up poor and was raised to believe that the Bible said Black people were inferior. But her family couldn’t show her where the Bible said that. They also made comments about large groups of Mexicans living in a small house. She thought they should understand since they were poor too.

Color blindness used to be considered the ideal, McGhee writes. However, we now recognize that it is a form of racial denial. White people allow themselves to believe that equality has been achieved. Therefore, McGhee says, “the failure [of POC] to achieve parity . . . in wealth, education, employment, and other areas must mean there is something wrong with them.” But McGhee argues that ignores the social systems that put white people ahead. White people can’t just wish away structural racism.

White people sort of know that the narrative they’ve learned is a lie, but they don’t want to believe it, McGhee writes. She argues that wealthy white Americans have the most unrealistic assessment of the progress the United States has made toward economic equality. They’re also more likely to blame the victim, by saying that POC don’t have good role models or strong families. McGhee states they hate affirmative action and think POC are taking jobs from them, but it isn’t that widespread.

The death of George Floyd made many white people stand up and take notice. But, even there, McGhee writes, many white people came to believe that Black people were overreacting. They talked about law and order. Similarly, white people who believed the police shot too many unarmed Black people still might not have believed in Colin Kaepernick’s protests, even though they were merely symbolic gestures. Some people saw protests against the flag as personal.

It is normal to fear the unknown, which includes people who are different from oneself. However, McGhee says, white people should recognize that fear and keep it in check. Instead, they call the police on people doing ordinary activities, such as waiting for someone or birdwatching. A woman named Peg talks about seeing three large Black men about to go into a flower shop she’d just left and feeling scared for the proprietor. However, she realized this fear wasn’t reasonable. Later, she found out they’d bought a large bouquet of flowers. Some fear stems from the fact that crime in Black areas is more often and more sensationally reported. The author realized that a lot of the fear comes from projection. She says white people saw their own worst instincts and believed that POC would treat them the way they treated POC.

When the author started at Demos, most of her colleagues were white. She wanted diverse opinions but didn’t want to get a whole new staff. However, they had to learn. Similarly, McGhee writes, children should learn about racism in school. Many don’t learn that white supremacy arose to justify slavery or even that slavery was the cause of the Civil War.

Most religions believe that discrimination is wrong and that we should love one another. “[Despite] differences in the world’s . . . religions, they all hold compassion and interconnectedness as central values,” McGhee writes. Religious people should want a society without hatred. Yet, she says, white Christianity in the United States doesn’t seek to blame people for racism. Therefore, racism is costing them more than they know.

Chapter 10

McGhee visited Maine, the whitest state in the United States and one of the two oldest. For years, the state’s governor, Paul LePage (born 1948), campaigned on racist and anti-immigrant rhetoric. Meanwhile, he vetoed Medicaid expansion and issued large tax cuts for the wealthy.

The state’s second biggest city, Lewiston, was a dying town. However, many Somali refugees fled there, and they have revitalized the town, filling vacant apartments and businesses. Phil Nadeau, the deputy city administrator, sees this as a great thing, and so do residents. They have been able to overcome their fear and work together. Nadeau showed the author a photograph of boxer Muhammad Ali (1942–2016) getting a knockout in his match against Sonny Liston (died 1970), which took place in Lewiston, and where Ali first used the name Muhammad Ali, as testament to his Muslim heritage. People in Lewiston, both white and Somali, relate to the fight because they have been knocked down and got back up.

People in Lewiston have tried to make the newcomers feel welcome, through offering ESL classes to immigrants and similar. However, French American Lewiston resident Cecile Thornton has benefited from their presence. Thornton is of French descent but lost her language due to the desire to assimilate. Later, she wished to learn again and went to a local Franco club, but everyone was speaking English. Someone suggested she go to a French club at a housing project where many Somalis lived. They all spoke French. Cecile started to learn French from them and even launched a French club near the community college many of the immigrants attended. Many elderly white people learned from the new Black immigrants.

Ben Chin, who is Asian American, is deputy director of the Maine People’s Alliance. He tells of a woman named Brenda, who went into a Somali clothing store because she liked the clothing there, hijabs and kaftans. Brenda is an excellent seamstress and soon had a job, sewing those clothes. Chin worries that the government is going to ruin the newfound solidarity with racist rhetoric. LePage campaigned, saying he had to cut welfare because of the Somali immigrants. Some people believe that is necessary and believe rumors that the Somalis get free cars and similar.

Chin himself campaigned for mayor and was portrayed as a communist, with signs that said, “Ho Chi Chin.” He was defeated after a leaked email in which he described nice people he had met campaigning and also “a bunch of racists.” But then his opponent, once elected, had to leave office after an even worse and very racist email. Now, some candidates for school board are running on solidarity.

The author sums up what she has learned in her journey. First, the zero-sum model is no good for anyone, and we should push for a solidarity dividend. Second, people need to “refill the pool of public goods.” Third, anywhere that racism is hurting white people, it is hurting their neighbors of color even more. Fourth, we need each other. Fifth, Americans need to move forward on a new story together.

The Covid-19 crisis showed how bad racial inequality is, McGhee writes. Black people were hit hardest by Covid because many had jobs that were considered “essential” while many lacked health insurance. Meanwhile, the government wasn’t prepared to deal with a health crisis because of the drained pool. There wasn’t infrastructure.

Conservative television host Tucker Carlson (born 1969) asks, “How precisely is diversity our strength?” because he believes people get along better with people who are similar and share the same “values.” However, studies have shown that groups make decisions better if they include diversity, because people assume the people who are like them will share the same thoughts. This includes juries. If a six-person jury had two POC on it, they deliberated longer and performed better.

The city of Dallas, after racist police incidents, launched a Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation effort (THRT). This was massively successful and caused many to rethink their beliefs, including a woman who stood up at a school board meeting and told a Black activist, Errika Flood-Moultrie, that she had always thought she was a troublemaker but that now, she realized she needed to be.

The author talks about her mother, Dr. Gail Christopher, who says that we don’t have to believe in racial hierarchy. We can prevail with the creativity of our people. The author believes we must make a choice between a vision in which we are competitive and one in which we admit common humanity. We are better together than apart. “We are greater than, and greater for, the sum of us,” she concludes.

Analysis: Chapters 9–10

McGhee writes that any older white immigrants or children of immigrants believe they or their ancestors are better than current immigrants because they did things “the right way.” However, McGhee points out, they were able to immigrate “the right way” because, often, doing so the right way involved simply arriving in this country and being welcomed with open arms or, at least, nothing close to the restrictions heaped on current immigrants.

The main idea of solidarity dividend is apparent in these chapters. New immigrants revitalized the town of Lewiston, Maine, and because the white people embraced them, instead of letting their racism get in the way, they were able to benefit from that. This is particularly true of elderly people such as Cecile, who got to learn French and be introduced into a new culture.

The term “values” means the ideals and customs of a society, which may be positive or negative. As used by Tucker Carlson, the term is a loaded one. It is meant to imply that people who are like him, meaning white, have good values, like caring for their family and a good work ethic. Why would they then want to mix with people who don’t share those concerns? When Carlson made these statements on Fox, there were many think pieces about why he was wrong, and Carlson felt compelled to double down on his position. The Washington Post cited studies similar to this book and said, “The very idea that people from different backgrounds can’t share common values . . . is self-refuting.” It is true that not everyone is raised the same, McGhee writes. Even people of the same race might have vastly different experiences. But those differences make us stronger. Talking to someone who has a different experience than oneself might open one’s eyes. Those who seek to divide us may wish to do so because they fear what will happen if we come together.