Race in a Polarized USA

One of the big political sticking points of the 2016 US presidential campaign was immigration. Many on the Left viewed Trumps campaign promise to build a wall to keep out illegal immigrants coming across the Mexico-US border as discriminatory, xenophobic, hateful, and bigoted. Those on the Right viewed it as a common sense approach to addressing a legitimate issue of concern. Race and ethnicity colored the topic exceedingly, even though for those on the Right the issue was framed as one of security; those on the Left viewed it through the lens of race and inequality. With the rise of political correctness in the US, since the 1990s, race, ethnicity and inequality have been totems that have seemingly sacred significance for some and that repulse others. This has led to a polarized US, with those on the Right rejecting (in its latest expression) topics like Critical Race Theory, and those on the Left fully embracing and promoting it. The corporate world has embraced the Left-leaning perspective: Coca-Cola was recently accused of promoting an employee training seminar in which white workers were told to try to be less white (Del Rio). Nike hired activist ex-NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick to be the face of its brand to promote social justice (Popkin, Atkinson). In reaction to both events, people...

And with Trump having identified Critical Race Theory as a problem in todays schools and corporations, people on the Right are calling for its ban. The George Floyd death, Chauvin trial, BLM/Antifa protests and riots, and calls for defunding the police have only exacerbated the situation. The country is now polarized and divided down the middle, with races more suspicious of one another than ever as leaders on both sides (whether Trump on the Right or Maxine Waters on the Left) and the mainstream media continuing to stoke the flames of polarization.

Polarization is problematic not only because it is divisive but because it leads to tribalism and the entrenching of beliefs that perpetuate bias and ill will. A polarized nation is one that stops looking for a way to get along with people who hold differing views. It is a nation that wants only to fight itself and spread antagonism. Families and communities come under severe stress in such an environment.

Over the past decade, racial dynamics have intensified, contributing to political polarization by pushing those who see the race card as disingenuous to embrace the platform of the Right, and those who see racial inequality and systemic racism (especially in the justice system) as a problem to embrace the platform of the Left. As people join sides and take up the mantle of their respective camp, political polarization in turn shapes racial and ethnic…