【N.J】 You don’t fix every -ism by creating a new -ism (JEFF EDELSTEIN COLUMN) – – – New Jersey News

How the Democrats will lose the country, Vol. XXVII …

I have long considered myself to be socially liberal. You name the situation, I think the socially liberal side is correct. Marijuana? Legalize it. Gay marriage? Legalize it. Transgender rights? All day long. Equal pay for women? Duh.

It just keeps going, and it even dips into my wallet. I see kids who are economically disadvantaged, I see kids who come from broken homes, I want to see my tax dollars go to help these kids rise up, to help these kids get a better chance to succeed.

I cannot think of one social rights cause that I don’t support.

So I want to be abundantly clear: I know that marginalized people and groups deserve the same opportunities and the same respect that the non-marginalized get. Period. There is no wiggle room here. Every human being living in the United States of America deserves the same rights and freedoms as everyone else. I cannot be clearer.

But …

But if I’m — and more importantly, my children, specifically my son — are going to be actively singled out, actively set aside as the “other,” then it puts me in a very bad position. How can I “fight” for the marginalized at the expense of my own child — and myself?

The math doesn’t add up.

Quite frankly, the pendulum has swung way too far to the left, and if the Democrats aren’t careful, they’re going to turn the country back over to the Republicans. Which wouldn’t be “such” a disaster if this was 15 years ago, but today’s Republicans are … well, the Republicans are still Trump, and I don’t know about you, but I’m not too keen on a second go-round, and by “not too keen” I mean “I think I might peace out of this place should he win.”

Now: About this “singling out” I was speaking about earlier: I came across a program sponsored by American Express and Main Street America. It’s a great program — to nutshell, it’s a grant program for small business owners to help them recover from the effects of COVID-19. To date, over $1.6 million has been handed out to 330 businesses.

So who’s eligible for this grant? I’ll copy and paste: “Grants will be awarded to business owners who identify as Veterans, People with Disabilities, Women, Members of the LGBTQIA+ Community, Asian American and/or Pacific Islander, Black and/or African American, Hispanic and/or Latinx, Middle Eastern and/or North African, Native and/or Indigenous, Immigrants, Refugees, and/or Forcibly Displaced.”

Basically, everyone is eligible for this grant program — except non-veteran white dudes.

This is a problem.

If this grant was only for the Black community, wonderful. Only for the LGBTQIA+ community, awesome. Only for people with disabilities, lovely. I’d have zero issue.

But this grant is for literally (yes, literally) everyone — except white men.

Now again, to be clear to the point of Windex: I don’t want people walking away from this thinking I’m some kind of “white power” dude. I happen to think people who buy into any notion of “white power” are scum, and stupid.

I also don’t think white people are, in any way, marginalized. I mean, hello? Look around.

But I just don’t understand how you fix centuries worth of racism and sexism and anti-gay rhetoric every other -ism by tossing another group out the caboose. All it will create is anger, and it will send former compatriots in the fight for “civil rights for all” over to the other side.

Can you imagine how this story would play on Fox News? Out the mouth of Trump? I mean, this corporate kumbaya is feeding right into the “angry white man” narrative. It’s practically begging the Ben Shapiro’s and Tucker Carlson’s of the world to sink their teeth into it.

Let’s be real: I’m sure there are straight white men out there who own struggling businesses that could probably use a little grant money. But American Express and Main Street USA don’t think they’re eligible for their program. It doesn’t take a social scientist to consider what that white male business owner might start thinking.

In short: You don’t solve discrimination by discriminating against a heretofore non-marginalized group. That just seems like a recipe to further tear the social fabric of this country apart. It’s a terrible, short-sighted policy.