From Piltdown Man to Magic Negro: Evolve!

Chip Saltsman's distribution of a gift CD featuring the song, "Barack the Magic Negro," has been construed my many as a window into the knuckle-dragging soul of the RNC.

It’s true that Republicans have used racial fears to divide public opinion and manipulate votes over the past 44 years. According to Simon Rosenberg, head of the Democratic organization NDN and one of the most well-versed party figures on racial politics: "They (Republicans) don't have another play in their playbook that doesn't start with the exploitation of racial divisions. Whether it is Willie Horton, or welfare queens and tax and spend, or the way they have dealt with immigration... They are going to have to reject 44 years of GOP politics in order to have any chance in the 21st century America."

One of six candidates running for Chairman of the RNC, Saltsman isn’t the first to snigger and wink to the tune of Magic Negro. Rush Limbaugh aired the song on numerous programs during the 2006 Imus debacle. Saltsman is, however, emblematic of the core stupidity of racism, both in and out of the Republican party.

Racism plays along with progressive views on equality, but at its unevolved, Piltdown Man core, it clings to the assumption that “White” culture, and the power it wields, is inherently superior. This flawed, secret assumption is the engine that generates all the double-speaking, ends-justifying, duplicitous errors made by bigots like Saltsman. For example, it provides Saltsman apologists with justification for his racist act. According to one high-ranking Republican, “…if we are going to fall apart in pieces every time someone yells racism than we are going to lose the next four years.... Because that means that the left is allowed to talk about race but we are not. There has got to be a way to talk about the president's agenda without falling into this trap."

It’s too bad that The Huffington Post, which published the comments, didn’t reveal the identity of this “high-ranking” Republican. If only we knew who it was we could explain… speaking slowly and using very small words… that “Magic Negro” and “race” and “the president’s agenda” are not related concepts. Talk about the President’s agenda all you want, Republicans, but please… before assuming chairmanship of the RNC, learn to differentiate the racist lyrics of “Magic Negro” from a serious discussion of race. It also would be helpful to realize that the President’s agenda is not related to “race” merely because he isn’t White.

As for Magic Negro… the term originated right here in Hollywood, to describe black characters who save the world for Whites. The term dates back to the late 1950s, around the time Sidney Poitier sacrifices himself to save Tony Curtis in "The Defiant Ones." Spike Lee, who satirizes the stereotype in 2000's "Bamboozled," goes even further and denounces the stereotype as the "super-duper magical Negro." For a Black perspective on the term and its cultural significance, visit The Black Commentator.

Can we persuade bigots in the Republican Party and elsewhere that their secret assumption of White superiority is an unevolved throwback to caveman mentality? Perhaps we can by example:

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when anthropologists began uncovering fossil proof that early man originated in Africa, establishment science ridiculed their discoveries based on the belief that modern (white) man must have originated in Europe because of his superiority over black and brown races. This assumption was reinforced in 1908 by the discovery, in England, of Piltdown Man, a skull fossil with a more modern appearance. In 1953, however, scientists revealed that the Piltdown Man fossil was, in fact, a hoax… it had been pieced together from a 600-year-old modern cranium, an orangutan jaw and a chimp tooth. The identity of the scientist who perpetrated this hoax is still unknown, but one thing is certain: He committed an immoral act to avoid accepting that Africa is the birthplace of man.

The Republican National Committee is holding a series of debates in January where members will discuss their ability to reach out to minorities and expand the party.