Nora Ephron’s ‘White Men’ Rant Colored by Hate
The romantic comedy writer said that the Democratic race will come down to whether white men hate blacks more than they hate women. Here's why she's the one filled with hate.
I have long held that intra-racial, rather than interracial, divisions are the biggest barrier to blacks and whites getting along in America. More direct evidence supporting my contention was provided this weekend by the words of ashen-hued commentator Nora Ephron in a column she wrote for the Huffington Post.
It was creatively titled “White Men” and highlights the ways in which a major subsection of Caucasians remains devoted to libeling their racial conspecifics whenever possible. Mrs. Ephron, a lifelong feminist and author of romantic comedies, has recently embarked on a new career as an oracle of politics.
Reporting from Delphi she shared insight concerning the likely outcome of the Pennsylvania Democratic primary. Well, not actually the outcome, but the factors that would figure into it.
Unburdened by justification and relying wholly on confessional declaration, she observed, “It’s suddenly horribly absolutely crystal-clear that this is an election about gender and race” because “this is an election about whether the people of Pennsylvania hate blacks more than they hate women. And when I say people, I don’t mean people, I mean white men.”
Let us stop at this juncture because already there is much to refute. First, note the line “I don’t mean people.” No, certainly she does not. She seeks to impugn males alone. Are men fully human? Well, that depends on what feminist you talk to. To some, males have the same relationship with humanity that viruses do with living organisms: they aren’t really sure where we fit in or if we do at all.
Second, now that the ballots have been counted, nothing is “crystal-clear” about “gender and race” having determined the winner. As a white male my views on genitalia and skin color are an afterthought — really, a non-thought — in regards to politics. When evaluating a representative’s stance on contentious issues, their secondary personal characteristics are an irrelevancy.
Third, why does hate have to play a part? If its presence were so obvious then why did no evidence for it exist? A candidate’s unpopularity is generally a result of his or her own inadequacy rather than a product of the electorate’s dysfunctionality.
Post-defeat, isn’t politician A or B being an unworthy leader a more viable hypothesis? Phantom racism, sexism, or any other ism should never be one’s default when assessing underperformance. The null hypothesis here is that Senators Clinton and Obama lack those characteristics that make them worthy of leading the nation — at least in the minds of those voters who rejected them.
To those of us on the right, there is a plethora of reasons for spurning them, and the identity of their ancestors or ability to breastfeed is not among them. Most compelling is that they are both statists who inhabit the far leftward terrain of the political spectrum.
Indeed, their ideas for change consist in expropriating more earnings from American workers in the hopes of further bloating the size of the Leviathan. Certainly, the frontrunners do acknowledge our economic problems, and Obama even observed that we are “sliding into recession.” Yet the solutions they proffer will turn our financial sickness into a terminal condition, and morph recession into depression.
At present, we are debilitated by a nine-trillion-dollar national debt along with an oppressive annual federal budget priced at three trillion, so this is not the time to experiment with new entitlements, expand social programs, and overhaul our health care system.
Yet such mandates are what these public sector evangelists will pursue if elected president. Four to eight more years in which nothing is done about Social Security and Medicare will be a debacle, as the two ventures are on the verge of breaking us.
Most importantly, obsessing over genitalia and skin pigmentation is the characteristic of extremely shallow people. Indeed, this writer would be only too happy to vote for a pygmy mouse lemur should the creature display a devotion to cutting the size of the Federocracy, have solid advisors, and acknowledge that the government’s girth jeopardizes our future.
Mrs. Ephron goes on to lament that white males will be the kingmakers in our upcoming election and from there quickly descends into the absurd:
A lot of them will [vote for John McCain]: white men cannot be relied on, as all of us know who have spent a lifetime dating them. And McCain is a compelling candidate, particularly because of the Torture Thing. As for the Democratic hope that McCain’s temper will be a problem, don’t bet on it. A lot of white men have terrible tempers, and what’s more, they think it’s normal.
While conservatives regard the existence of human nature as being a foregone conclusion, again we find that the left thinks otherwise. Mrs. Ephron is no different from her colleagues in this respect.
She believes that certain subsets of the population are innately good while others are innately bad. Apparently, apart from light-skinned males, the rest of the population is reliable — which clashes resoundingly with our collective experience.
And what of Senator McCain? Indisputably, he has led a life few have the courage to emulate, but Mrs. Ephron reduces his accomplishments to the “Torture Thing.” Yes, withstanding torture at the hands of his North Vietnamese captors showcases fortitude and honor, yet his rejection of early release renders him quite extraordinary. It places him on a plane above practically every other citizen.
And while I cannot comment on whether he has a “terrible temper,” I do know that anger is not race- or sex-specific, as Mrs. Ephron’s rant demonstrates.
Mrs. Ephron further alleges that whoever wins the next two primaries will be the one who overcomes “the bias of a vast chunk of the population that has never in its history had to vote for anyone but a candidate who could have been their father or their brother or their son, and who has never had to think of the president of the United States as anyone other than someone they might have been had circumstances been just slightly different.”
This is preposterous. That Al Gore is old enough and white enough to be my dad has nothing to do with my feelings towards him. In fact, I vastly prefer Hillary [seriously] over that Powerpoint icon of global warming hysteria. The same is true in regards to Jimmy Carter, for whom I would no more pull a lever than Britney Spears. Moreover, I regard Mr. Gore and Mr. Carter as being far more different from me than Thomas Sowell or Walter Williams — either of whom I would support at the polls over nearly every other white man alive. Her assertion that Hillary’s hope is to “attract more racist white male voters than Obama” is profane, and an allegation devoid of substantiation.
To Mrs. Ephron and her ilk, quips alone are enough to prove racism and sexism. If the public does not like your candidate, then they must be bigots. The likelihood of leaders being unattractive as a result of their positions and associations is deemed the most convoluted explanation, and one which must be condemned as a leap of logic. Contrarily, when leftist candidates are dismissed, the most plausible conclusion is that they have been victimized by undetectable spite and hatred. It is an Oliver Stone version of Occam’s Razor.
In my opinion, Mrs. Ephron’s ruminations concerning the election are merely an excuse by which she can pursue her greater goal of expressing antipathy towards half of the Caucasian population. No one will shun her as a result because hate is never hate when showered upon white males.
Mrs. Ephron has projected her own obsession with cursory attributes onto the psyches of those men living in the Keystone State. Personally, as a fellow Midwesterner, I can honestly say that I have encountered few guys as supercilious and one-dimensional in their analysis of human motivation as Mrs. Ephron.
This article is leagues from being legitimate political discussion. Foisting pathological personality characteristics upon innocents is not the change we’ve been waiting for. Just as with the majority of Americans, racist and sexist beliefs are quite rare among the white male population. Unfortunately, one cannot be so optimistic in regards to our tormenters.
Bernard Chapin wrote Women: Theory and Practice and Escape from Gangsta Island, along with a series of videos called Chapin’s Inferno. You can contact him at veritaseducation@gmail.com.
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33 Comments
1. jvon:Excellent analysis.
As for Ms. Ephron’s complaint about her troubles dating white males, I’d suggest that if enough of them were familiar with her views she would have considerable less trouble with dating, if she was able to find a date at all.
Apr 27, 2008 - 1:48 am 2. Justin:How do racists/sexists like her keep getting taken seriously by the left? They have a reverse version of the KKK building up in their ranks and yet they don’t face any sort of stigma for it. This is why I will probably never vote Democrat. I want to get along with people, even leftists, but they are, simply put, evil.
Apr 27, 2008 - 7:49 am 3. CJ:Back in college, my friends and I referred to this as “Lee’s Assumption,” after Spike Lee. As in, “maybe I didn’t like the film because it was a bad film and I had no idea what the director’s color is.”
The co-assumption for Ms. Ephron is that black and female voters are free of hate since they obviously only need vote for the person who looks the most like them, without regard for shallow things like policies, experience or public behavior. This, of course, isn’t racist or sexist since only white males are capable of those sins. It also isn’t supported by the polls and statistics any more than Ephron’s assertion.
Apr 27, 2008 - 8:05 am 4. Mommynator:Ms. Ephron would conclude that men are evil, having probably dated loser liberal men all her life and never finding a solid, decent man to whom she could commit for a lifetime.
Yeah, that’s sound judgement with which to condemn men, specifically white men.
Apr 27, 2008 - 8:15 am 5. venividivici:People like Ephron live in a political Never-neverland, where something that once may have been a half-truth regarding their political opponents becomes fetishized into an eternal verity. I read people of her ilk not for analysis, at which they have little to no skill (as pointed out, not a single data point mars the otherwise analysis-free essay by Ephron), but simply to know what the loonies think. Even that, however, is wearing on the soul. If Ephron WANTS white men to start hating others in the way she postulates they already do, she is insane. The level of actual, as opposed to postulated, devastation that would wreak on this country is enormous, although, if the final result were that the future political landscape would be free of Ephrons, I’m not sure the price paid would be too high, just as the price paid for eliminating those who supported slavery from the landscape was high, but worth it in the long run.
Apr 27, 2008 - 8:44 am 6. Rubicon:There we have it, the new acceptable racism according to the left….. hatred of whites, specifically, white males. Basically what we are being told is, “if you do not support the candidate or position ‘I’ choose, you are a racist, a bigot, a xenophobe, etc!”
Apr 27, 2008 - 10:00 am 7. Diana:This “racism, is designed to demean and diminish the voices of any who happen to have an opinion that does not lockstep support the collectivist mindset!
A U Delaware guide for freshman students implied there cannot be “reverse racism,” only the racism of white men who hate all others. Fortunately, the college wised up & removed this despicable booklet & have hopefully recognized that hatred is a two way street. (Nothing like indoctrinating the newest class into the fold, huh?)
Obama’s candidacy has now devolved into an attempt to marginalize opposition by attacking them while ignoring tremendous serious policy differences that would always cause some to vote for another.
The Global Warming crowd is trying to push their theory using this same logic. If you have questions about any part of the theory, you are a denier who should face a Nuremberg style trial. Even if you subscribe to 99% of the theory, you are still persona non grata because you have not jumped into position in the collectivist lockstep.
Problems cannot be solved unless all jump into the collectivist line, accept “our” definition of what is wrong & our means to solve it, & agree all will be happy when all just do what they are told, by “US”!
If Obama would govern based on race as his primary decisive factor, or if Hillary would govern based on feminism as her primary decisive factor, then we need neither of them. They seem to be significantly focused on only finding fault & making social corrections based solely on “their” beliefs, & not on governing this nation for what is best for “ALL” of us!
Ms. Ephron sounds like she is espousing a hatred by condemning all due to the color of their skin, w/ no respect or consideration for the content of their character. Others do this by condemning based on gender, rather than character. Its the same point, & results in the same hatred.
So long as folks “use” race, color of skin, gender, etc., or other human differences to determine who they vote for or what they believe in, we will have false solutions.
So long as differences are “USED” to justify why someone lost or why their plans failed, we will keep stumbling along missing opportunities for real solutions.
It seems that Ms. Ephron only opens her mouth to remind people how dumb she is. Without white men this country would be doomed. Most white men work everyday while being the most discriminated against group in America. Every other group in this country have laws to protect them against discrimination except white men, every day it’s do or die for the white male in America. It’s no wonder she has lived a life of dating, men don’t like being reduced to the nothingness of existence where she wants them to wallow. Politics of the intellegent voters has nothing to do with race or gender but hopefully the big picture of making America an even greater country!
Apr 27, 2008 - 10:14 am 8. David Thomson:“As for Ms. Ephron’s complaint about her troubles dating white males”
Nora Ephron married Carl Berstein—and he cheated on her constantly. She even wrote a thinly veiled screenplay regarding this failed marriage. It starred Meryl Streep and Jack Nicholson. The movie is called “Heartburn” and came out in 1986. Watching it should help explain everything to you.
Apr 27, 2008 - 10:26 am 9. bellurgan:You mean this essay wasn’t meant as deeply ironic? Oh, of course, there is no humor in leftists, unless they’re skewering their usual suspects.
Apr 27, 2008 - 12:04 pm 10. MaryAnn:The white males in my life have been examples of hard-working, fun-loving, live-and-let-live kind of guys. Oh, wait, they respect women, too. Why do feminists attract all these losers? Maybe because thinking that men hate everybody attracts exactly that minority type?
Apr 27, 2008 - 12:58 pm 11. Dark Helmet:To stupid to know any better or just too far gone to even try to hide it any longer. Straight, white men have been under attack for…. almost 40 years now. I think it was Pat Buchanan who wrote in ” A Republic Not an Empire” that ‘a man with a guilty mind is unable to speak out when the one he has wronged is doing the same thing ‘ That’s a poor paraphrase of course and I don’t have the book in front of me but you get the idea.
Everyone should practice reverse discrimination, we would all get along.
Apr 27, 2008 - 2:14 pm 12. Nicolo M.:John the Libertarian is quite wise. Even a tiny look below the surface reveals McCain is taking a smart tack here - condemn the attack ad while answering questions thoughtfully on Ayers and Wright when asked. McCain’s job is not to be Sean HAnnity. Let Hannity be Hannity. The way things are going, if the Arizona Senator plays his cards right, he will be president presumptive by August, not just the Republican nominee.
Apr 27, 2008 - 2:34 pm 13. AJ:BC, spot on analysis, as always. Over and over, you hit the proverbial nail on the head.
Do Efron and her fans not realize that:
1) THEY are the true racists and sexists by keeping this hate-filled, erroneous discourse alive?
2) America, for its many events in history, is the LEAST racist, most tolerant nation on earth? If they actually left the bistors when they visited Eurabia, they’d see how racist and intolerant that beloved place is. Or they could heed history, but literacy and interest in topics other than Hollywood and Whole Foods, are not traditionally common amongst the Left.
3) That America is not about “race” and “class.” We know their history begins and ends with the 1960s—-you know, when Ike and the GOP finally brought their 150 years of racism, slavery, Jim Crow, segregation and the KKK to a thankful end—but what about AMERICA’s proud history? The one with Antietam, Yorktown, Cantigny, D-day, John McCain, freeing billions, and so on. Nope, they, like their horrific heroes the Obamas, prefer to ignore that and look to “progress in terms of race.”
Silly. I blame the media, academia, Hollywood and ignorance in general for all these follies. We have lost an entire generation to Spike Lee, Mikey Moore, the Obamams and fools like Ephron.
Apr 27, 2008 - 2:52 pm 14. jvon:Mr. Thompson,
Thanks for the info on this woman’s former marriage. Perhaps she should see a therapist to get her hostility against her ex-husband sorted out, so that she does not spew venom at every person that looks like him. I’d hate to think that someone, somewhere, is taking her opinions seriously.
If she felt this way about white men before marrying, her husband’s infidelity is understandable, if not entirely excusable.
Apr 27, 2008 - 3:35 pm 15. Sam:Nora,
Apr 27, 2008 - 4:11 pm 16. Valerie:You can call me a racist or a sexist until you are blue in the face, but I’m still not going to vote for your candidate.
I cannot forget that white, propertied men voted to amend the Constitution to extend the rights of citizenship to landless black people, and to women.
Bless ‘em! They came through for me when I needed them. They passed Title Vii and Title IX of the Civil Rights Act just in time to prevent some fake big shot from keeping me out of graduate school. Because of the white, old guys, a desperate, able young woman could provide for herself and her family when her husband decided that he could not. And, she (me) has paid her debt in full. I paid the full amount of my tuition as soon as it first came due, with a single check and a smile. Then, I paid the full amount of the debt EVERY YEAR IN THE INCREASE OF MY TAXES ALONE. It’s been decades, now. Year, after year, the increase in my taxes alone repays the entire tuition debt I incurred. God bless America, land of opportunity!
God Bless the White Men. God Bless them for their kindness, for their fairmindedness. God bless them for their open hearts, and for extending political power to those they could have excluded.
Apr 27, 2008 - 7:15 pm 17. Justin:Valerie:
Most white men, like my self, are good, honest, fair minded people. You wouldn’t know that by listening to what so many on the left, especially at colleges where they know they can do the most damage, have to say. You would think we were all horrible monsters that the rest of the world needs to be protected from. making blanket assumptions on an entire race/gender of people is bigotry, but it is the bigotry upon which the left smiles. The left can go to hell for all I care, and if you really feel that much contempt for white males than so can you.
Apr 27, 2008 - 8:10 pm 18. william:To Norah and Valerie and others like you,
Apr 28, 2008 - 6:22 am 19. william bob:First of all your bitterness and anger are from an extremely immature and selfish view of the world. You also exhibit an incredibly arrogant sense of importance,
as if you are the only ones that have ever had a problem or had to work hard. It’s hard to take anything about you seriously, and most women see the same error of your ways that men do. However I do blame men (http://www.strongerthandeath.net/2008/03/i-blame-men.html) for the current state of the world with these immature feminists getting so much attention.
To date there have been only two non-Anglo-Saxon white men who were elected President: Eisenhower and JFK. Eisenhower was German. Since he had been the architect of victory in Europe it was impossible to hold his teutonicity against him. Moreover, his ethnicity was more Army Officer, (i.e. WASP) than anything else. It is impossible to visualize Eisenhower in lederhosen, gobbling bratwurst. The other exception, JFK, was nominally Irish Catholic, but he had the cool reserve of a WASP aristocrat. He simply was not Irish Catholic in the way of his father Joseph. Joseph was not pro-German so much as anti-English. Irishmen of that generation saw in Churchill not the face of Western democracy but of British Imperialism. The people of Britain despised Joseph Kennedy. JFK never disowned his father but his familial relation was left tactfully unmentioned during the campaign. Even so, Joseph caused him loss of support among liberals such as Eleanor Roosevelt. I am not a WASP and I cannot do a convincing imitation of one. Am I entitled to be as bitter and alienated as Nora Ephron?…….. Note to Obama: You are perhaps the WASPiest black man in public life today. Good idea. If Eisenhower had a Lutheran pastor who was active in the Bund prior to WWII, voters would have counted it against him. Ditto with JFK: if he had given speeches about all the crimes of British Imperialism, he would not have been President. To the extent that Obama can appear WASPy, he is credible as President. To the extent that Obama is a black man with all those grudges he loses credibility as a President.
Apr 28, 2008 - 8:55 am 20. Andrew:“Most white men work everyday while being the most discriminated against group in America.”
As a white man I can definitively say that it is by far the easiest demographic to be. Please poster go ahead state why you don’t agree with Nora Ephron but save us these poor white man sob stories.
Apr 28, 2008 - 9:19 am 21. Colette:Justin and William, I think you might want to take a second look at Valerie’s comment and then perhaps apologize. She was being quite sincere in her appreciation of white men and of America.
Apr 28, 2008 - 12:39 pm 22. Justin:I could have sworn that she was being sarcastic. If I jumped the gun than there are no words that I can say that would excuse what I said. *Bows head* I am sorry.
Apr 28, 2008 - 2:49 pm 23. Justin:The only defense I can offer is that I have never heard anyone say something like what Valerie said while being sincere. Usually it is only bitter sarcasm from some leftist who thinks WM are just a terminal disease.
Apr 28, 2008 - 2:51 pm 24. AJ:Andrew,
Why dont you explain how eays it is to be white? I am a white male and I agree 100% with Diane and think you are totally full of it. It is darn near impossible to land a job when unqualified “minorities” take them from me. and as a Jew, I AM a minority, but because, like asians, we succeeded, we don’t get affirmative action. That is racism. So, Andrew, big shot, tell me how easy you have it. You’re a liar, just like Ephron, who only has her success with her limited brain b/c she is a woman.
Apr 28, 2008 - 2:54 pm 25. Captain Hate:“Justin and William, I think you might want to take a second look at Valerie’s comment and then perhaps apologize.”
I think your sarcasm meter needs to be recalibrated.
Apr 28, 2008 - 3:35 pm 26. Andrew:AJ you sound bitter. I hope there are no guns lying around your house. If being white isn’t the easiest than what is? Black, Asian, Latino? Which one would you trade places with? White males are the most privileged demographic and to say we aren’t is completely and factually ridiculous. If you aren’t getting the job its not affirmative action. Be better at what you do its that simple. Maybe those employers (who are overwhelmingly likely to be white men) see you as a sad bitter man who blames women and minorities for their failures.
Apr 28, 2008 - 4:52 pm 27. william:What do I apologize for?
Apr 29, 2008 - 9:15 am 28. william:If Valerie is sincere I will certainly apologize!
Apr 29, 2008 - 4:03 pm 29. kevin:The liberal Democrat party is the party of racist elites, what’s a surprise here? I also have yet to understand why ‘minorities’ overwhelmingly subscribe to the party of racism. “Racism” is a staple of the liberal party’s rhetoric, so it is imperative that they do whatever they can to keep its existence.
I still can not believe that in the 21st century humans actually disseminate themselves based on something as trivial as the color of the outer layers of our protective skin. Imagine sitting down with someone who has been blind from birth to explain as to what ‘race’ is as we know it and it will sound completely ridiculous.
Apr 30, 2008 - 12:27 am 30. JOHN:I remember sitting at my white family kitchen table and hearing the most vile racist things being said about jews and blacks. That was in the 50’s and early 60’s. Now at our kitchen table that talk would not be tolerated. The old generations of bigets and people fighting against bigetry are dying away to be replace by a new generations of people who are seeing racism for what it is (as sin against God and man) and I have real hope for these young people, but then I hear from the Wrights, jacksons and Nora Ephrons of this country and see the same crap only wrapped in a different box. Racism and sexism is racism and sexism and it is NOT exclusive to the American white male. Just ask the people in Sudan. This country isn’t perfect and has done some pretty rotten things just like everyone else (we have also done some really wonderful things too) but we are getting better, were learning to be more excepting other people. But some of this garbage just keeps knocking us back.
May 1, 2008 - 10:15 am 31. Mary Stella:I thought elections were about issues! Issues have no color or gender!
May 1, 2008 - 5:54 pm 32. Tropic of Saturn:To me, war on terror, defeating the ideology of jihadism, the judges and the courts are the most important issues, therefore, I suppose, McCain is my guy!
Elections are about issues. Good Point Mary.
May 1, 2008 - 10:59 pm 33. Ruby McKenzie:Can’t imagine more boredom than visiting with Ms. Ephron.
Feb 8, 2009 - 9:00 am