Shelby Steele\'s White Guilt Explain

Shelby Steele's White Guilt

Explain how Steele defines "white guilt," and then, with specific examples from the book, defend or refute Steele's thesis regarding this concept.

In the book White Guilt, cultural critic Shelby Steele makes the controversial claim that racism is no longer at the heart of the oppression of blacks in American society. Rather, Steele locates the problem in the concept of white guilt, the attempts of white Americans to portray themselves as non-racists. However, Steele argues that insisting on one's non-racism is not the same as helping fellow minority citizens. In fact, in the aftermath of the Civil Rights movement, white guilt has done more to hurt African-Americans rather than empower them.

The author supports this contention by first looking at the history of white guilt. Steele locates the dawn of white guilt after the countercultural revolution of the 1960s. White Americans were divested of the moral authority that they wielded since the founding of the country. In the wake of the Civil Rights movements, Steele contends that white Americans felt the need to dissociate from racism. This emphasis on showing that one is not a racist, says Steele, took precedence over treating black people as full human beings.

After 30 years, Steele points to the Bill Clinton - Monica Lewinsky affair as the full realization of white guilt in American society. Had the presidential affair involved President Dwight D. Eisenhower, Steele argues, then American society would have been quite outraged.

It was likely that Eisenhower would have to resign. However, Eisenhower was also well-known for using racial epithets such as "nigger," a fact that was widely-accepted. Conversely, had Clinton uttered the racial epithets, the social outcry would have forced him to resign.

For Steele, the contrast between Eisenhower and Clinton shows the end result of white guilt, the elevation of racism to the ranks of pedophilia in terms of social ostracism. To alleviate the effects of white guilt, the author charges that white Americans avoided being social incorrectness by catering to all forms of black grievances. Steele excoriates what he sees as theatrical "black rage."

This meant that white citizens acquiesced to demands that systemic racism is the source of all problems facing black people.

For black people, the effects of white guilt are also tragic. Rather than seeking empowerment and betterment, many black leaders now define the movement in terms of perpetual victimhood.

White guilt has formed a crutch for many black people. The author insists that instead of overcoming perceived racial barriers, many black people instead blame systemic racism and play on white guilt. These dual effects of white guilt have halted the momentum of the Civil Rights movement to a virtual standstill.

Steele makes cogent arguments, and the strongest part of this book is the articulation of the concept of white guilt.