There was the Civil War and Reconstruction. And then there was “Redemption.”

There was the Civil Rights Movement. And then there was “the conservative resurgence.”

There was the election of Barack Obama as President of the United States. And then there was Donald Trump and the Make America Great Again movement and all it represents.

According to Wesley Lowery in American Whitelash: A Changing Nation and the Cost of Progress, we should not have been surprised.

Lowery is a reporter and most of the work presents his reporting work talking with people who have been significantly impacted by white violence which was spurred on by the acceptance of white supremacist ideas and tropes and fostered within reactionary communities, especially online.

He speaks of such things in terms of a “whitelash”: the backlash of response by certain white people in the wake of the election of Barack Obama as President. He profiled the death of an Ecuadorian immigrant at the hands of a group of teenagers on Long Island, and how the perpetrator’s defense lawyer tried to minimize the racism involved. He considered the story of the white supremacist who attacked a Sikh community in Wisconsin by means of a reporter who had communicated with him frequently before. He returned to the scene of Michael Brown’s shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, and all that situation exposed. He interviewed the mother of Heather Heyer and profiled what was taking place in Charlottesville, Virginia, before and during 2017.

The author throughout is attempting to bring to the fore the various conditions and processes by which all of these things could come to pass. It’s a sobering read, and it is hard to argue with the premise that we are indeed living through a period of “whitelash,” and that any time there will be material advances for those who do not look like me, there will be people who look like me who will take great offense and will go to almost any length to re-assert the supremacy they think they deserve - or, perhaps even worse, imagining they are fighting for an “equality” which never was equal and which they fear they are losing.

Note well how there is all sorts of outcry against Critical Race Theory and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion movements, presuming them to be “racist.” And many of these same people bitterly resent the removal of Confederate monuments and not only want to act as if there is not much of a legacy left to white supremacy in America, but somehow have convinced themselves that they are the ones who have suffered discrimination and prejudice. How is that not part of said whitelash?

The election (and re-election) of Barack Hussein Obama as President of the United States did indeed seem to break the minds of many in America, and we have endured the effects of that breaking ever since. The heady idealism of 2008 is quite dead and buried. We have seen the ugly power of those with privilege who are afraid they are losing their privilege, and who prove even more afraid of it being done unto them as they and/or their ancestors have done unto others.

A book worth considering to help properly frame one’s understanding of the events of the past 15 years. ( )

interviewed 6/27/2023 on Alex Wagner

American Whitelash by Wesley Lowery looks at the more recent increase in white terrorist activity through both a current events lens as well as a historical one.

By realizing the nature of white fear and violence as being predictable whenever there appear to be advances in equitable social, cultural, and legal conditions, the reader can see that this isn't something new and different, but something that has been woven into the American fabric, at least as far as many white Americans are concerned.

That isn't to say there are no differences or that there is nothing new about it. An openly racist President (the orange menace in case you weren't sure) and the ability for a small number to seem so much larger on social media spreading false information for those "doing their own research" certainly gives this cycle of white terrorism some new clothes. But at its core it is still the same racism and ignorance at play, with the idea that the country does and should belong to whites, namely white men.

Lowery looks closely at what has been happening since Obama's election and at what happened during and after the "two reconstruction periods." It is in looking at these similarities that it becomes evident that while these periods mark dramatic upticks in violence, the racism and institutional violence never left, it just became more hidden and subtle.

Highly recommended for those wanting to look at our current domestic terrorist threats through a longer lens, taking history as well as ideology into account.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley. ( )