(ThyBlackMan.com) Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, I admit he is the hardest part of so many court decisions for me. He is honestly the hardest part of the Affirmative Action decision. His opinion was gut-wrenching, a stab in the heart and back, and unfortunately it was no surprise. Clarence Thomas has been a thorn in the side and heart of Black people for decades. He has chosen the position of self-hatred on more days than we care to count. As one who reads the opinions and dissents of the Supreme Court regularly, I tend to find that there hasn’t been even a handful of times I have agreed with his assessment of the Constitution or the rule of law. There is a saying in Black Community, “All folk ain’t kin folk”.
However, the problem with that position is it’s what we tell ourselves to numb the pain of betrayal caused by the likes of Clarence Thomas. Even when they prove to be traitors, they are still “kinfolk”, and that is what makes the action so egregious. Clarence Thomas voted to cut down the ladder that allowed him to rise. He was academically qualified, and Affirmative Action allowed him admittance to some of the most prestigious universities in the nation. It is important to note one of his issues with Affirmative Action is the black lash treatment. However, to be fair what he is speaking of is the treatment Black people have endured anytime society is forced to grapple with the fact that we do have great minds in our ranks. His origins and understood knowledge of Black history and culture in this country make his stance mind boggling to say the least.
The issue with Clarence Thomas is not that he’s a Conservative. Granted, after reading his Memoir it was hard to understand how his from left to hard right stance happened. The issue is the hypocrisy of his stances and what appears to be a conscious understanding of such. There might be more understanding towards Clarence Thomas’s position if he wasn’t knowingly descended of the enslaves, grew up within community, lived through segregation, parted with the church behind racism, idolized the likes of Malcom X and other leaders, and experienced fighting for his people firsthand. With all of this in his history how can he see anything regarding America through as, to use his own words, “race neutral.” In his opinion in the striking down of Affirmative Action he tried to say that agencies like the Freedmen’s Bureau in 1866 was not predicated on race.
“The 1866 Freedmen’s Bureau Act then expanded upon the prior year’s law, authorizing the Bureau to care for all loyal refugees and freedmen. … Importantly, however, the Acts applied to freedmen (and refugees), a formally race-neutral category, not blacks writ large. And, because “not all blacks in the United States were former slaves,” “‘freedman’ ” was a decidedly underinclusive proxy for race.”
That position was upsetting because the reason the Freedmen’s Bureau existed was due to the needs of Black people that had just been freed from slavery. How could he for a moment think that something directly affecting Black people was race neutral. One can argue there is nothing that Black people do or are allowed to do that is race neutral. Clarence Thomas has seen such firsthand. Thomas stated, “Those policies fly in the face of our colorblind Constitution and our Nation’s equality ideal. In short, they are plainly — and boldly — unconstitutional “, when speaking of Affirmative Action in his opinion. When I heard him say it, and then read it to make sure I heard him correctly I admit I was ready to scream!
It is hard enough to have to sit down with various different people and have to defend policies such as Affirmative Action due to the racism in this country. The question is simple: if you want Affirmative Action struck down cool…what you do suppose we replace it with because the racism and bias still exist. It’s bad enough that too many people would literally rather fight facts, research, documentation, and truth to uphold a position that is detrimental to the existence of Black people in this country. However, is it an absolute slap in the face, and insult to the intelligence of Black people all over this country that a Black man that is as intelligent as Clarence Thomas would do the exact same thing.
I don’t know what traumatic situation, or self-hatred, would make him reject facts and truth about the state of this country in a manner that he would rob other Black people of opportunities he was not robbed of. To think when he was appointed, he was replacing the Great Thurgood Marshall on the Supreme Court, someone that advocated for his people, and all people. It’s a slap to the memory of this Ancestor, and it is a shame before all of us. Well, I could go on for days about the betrayal and such, but the truth is unfortunately we expected nothing led from Clarence Thomas…and never will.
Staff Writer; Christian Starr
May connect with this sister over at Facebook; C. Starr and also Twitter; MrzZeta.
Also via email at; CStarr@ThyBlackMan.com.
