Dana Milbank sees some hopeful signs in the fact that a few “conservatives are now calling out those who pronounce on “sluts,” “wetbacks” and “filthy” gays.” But the larger question is whether the Republican Party can exist if it isn’t constantly fanning the flames of real, existing, sources of racial resentment. Take, for example, the renaming of an Philadelphia institution: Chink’s Steaks. This cheesesteak joint opened in 1949. It was named for it’s owner, Samuel “Chink” Sherman, whose almond-shaped eyes had caused people to call him “Chink” all the way back in grade school. Protests against the name began in 2003, and the controversy has resurfaced on a regular basis for the last decade. Yesterday, the name was formally changed to Joe’s Steaks & Soda Shop. A lot of white folks in the neighborhood are resentful about the outside pressure and political correctness that forced the change.
In Wissinoming, however, once almost exclusively a white working-class enclave, the passing of Chink’s has stirred deep resentment. Defending the rightness of the name and the right to maintain it, residents mourned times when, they said, everyone had thicker skin and people were not forced to walk on verbal eggshells.
“I just think it’s ridiculous,” said Eleanor McGonigal as she sat on a step, watching the sign come down. “C’mon,” said McGonigal, a 60-year-old warehouse worker who has lived in the neighborhood all her life. “Cracker Barrel hasn’t had to change their name. I mean, that could be made into a racist thing.”
It would be a mistake to think the controversy is limited to the name of this restaurant. It’s rooted in a broader change in the neighborhood, the city, and our society.
“This place has a tan,” said [William] Ulrich, a 51-year-old postal worker, who wore a wireless phone device in his ear and shorts that revealed a large cross “in the colors of the American flag” tattooed on his calf.
Over the last 15 years, he said, crime has soared, and he blamed African Americans and Hispanics who have moved in, especially those in government-subsidized housing.
“If you say anything, you’re a racist, when you’re just a realist,” he said. “You’re supposed to be politically correct? Try walking down Torresdale Avenue after 8 p.m. without getting robbed.”
I don’t have statistics to bolster or rebut Mr. Ulrich’s claims that crime has exploded in his neighborhood, nor to address his claim that blacks and Latinos are primarily responsible. My point is that his worldview connects the crime problem with race and the name-change with cultural defeat. These feelings are real and they are widespread in our cities and in our suburbs and rural areas. The question is whether these feelings should be exploited for political benefit. Should these resentments be stoked and turned into political passions? Should a political party do its best to exacerbate racial tensions or to examine the causes of those racial tensions and seek to mitigate them?
For too long, the Republican Party has sought to drive a wedge between voters like Mr. Ulrich and the Democratic Party by pandering to his worst instincts rather than trying to do things that would actually benefit him, like reexamining the Drug War or going after straw-purchasers of the firearms that have flooded Philly’s streets or finding ways to make smart urban investments that will lead to better options for our street kids than gang life. The GOP has basically abandoned any urban policy other than charter schools and disinvestment.
It’s a cynical strategy than seeks to benefit by increasing people’s dislike for each other. And, after forty-five years of constant use, this strategy is so ingrained in the conservative movement that it isn’t clear that it can be unlearned. But when conservatives talk about doing minority outreach, what they need to do is to go into our city neighborhoods and really talk to people, including the white folks. They need to take their problems seriously and stop just demagoguing the crime issue and playing on racial fears and resentments. They need a progressive/reform urban policy that is inclusive and that seeks to pull people together. As long as our demographically diverse cities are pitted as the enemy of conservatism, minority outreach will be little more than a bad joke.
