I’m Just An Old White Guy

I decided to become a writer sometime around my sixtieth birthday.  My successes in this endeavor have been minor and infrequent.  My first book was published by Motivational Press and the editors of the Democrat & Chronicle (D&C) have graciously published my guest columns from time to time.  At least one of those – expressing the frustration of a political moderate in a Deep Blue state – was picked up through the Gannett network and published in the Des Moines Register. None of these successes have enabled me to make a living as a writer.  But I have learned a lot during my journey.

A love of language is essential to becoming a writer and there is no place language is more important than in our news media.  During my brief stint on the D&C’s editorial board, I observed true professionals as they worked to capture ideas without creating false equivalence whether writing about a sexual harassment scandal at the University of Rochester or deciding how to endorse or not endorse a candidate for mayor.  

Sometime in my journey, I created a  hashtag for myself #justanoldwhiteguy.  I fantasized that it would be followed by many on Twitter and it was NOT.  Maybe it doesn’t resonate with others as it does me or maybe other old white guys don’t know what a hashtag is for.  Whatever the reason, no one seems to care.  I am compelled to consider it in a new light this week as the media refers to white nationalism and angry white males in the wake of two mass killings within 24 hours.

The phrase ‘angry, white males’ can create a false equivalence.  It may accurately be said that the Dayton and El Paso shooters (both extremists one a conservative, the other a liberal) are both angry, white males. But that doesn’t mean all white males who are angry are likely to became mass murderers.  The broader context in which white males may become angry relates to the word ‘just’ in my hashtag.  Indeed, it’s the word ‘just’ that makes my hashtag work.  It’s obviously not meant as an adjective in the sense of being righteous.  Certainly, there are old, white guys who consider themselves righteous, render judgment and, in some cases, mete out punishment.  But, in my case, it is rather an adverb meaning ‘merely,’ as in “I’m just a temp,” the Cri de Coeur of those whose employment is not long term. 

My Cri de Coeur is that of a demographic being increasingly blamed for all the ills of society, both real and imagined.  Being a white male is now treated as an original sin as though the constitutional form of Republic asserting the equality of all and rule of law were not also created by white males.  

The word ‘old’ is also a significant factor in my feelings about such shifting social attitudes.  I am of a generation that protested the war in Vietnam but not Jimi Hendrix’ playing of the national anthem at Woodstock.  Students for a Democratic Society called for revolution, a call that was quelled as the war wound down and boomers started getting married and having babies (much as Millennials are today).  Just as the WWII generation saw us Boomers as an ungrateful lot, we have raised the generation of ungrateful rabble-rousers who now complain about our governance.  

And so, I am not justan old white guy.  I am also an angry white male.  I am angry that the Republican Party has provided us with a President who consistently fails to provide the moral leadership we need.  I am angry that the best alternative the Democrat Party can offer is a slate of candidates hellbent on destroying our prosperity through government control of the economy.  Most of all, I am angry that we are saddled with an electoral process that offers no relief.  

I’m not a gun owner or a member of a nationalist group.  I won’t find an outlet for my anger by committing mass murder.  My anger can only be resolved by political leaders who share my belief in a free American society.  Reproductive freedom means women should make their own moral choices. Social freedom means that all citizens should be entitled to equal opportunity but not equal outcomes.  Economic freedom means that capitalist transactions between a willing buyer and a willing seller should not be subject to government interference.  

Find me a candidate who embraces those ideas and I will no longer be an angry white male.  But I’ll still be #justanoldwhiteguy. 

WHO WILL LEAD?