In a refreshingly honest op-ed piece that appeared in Monday’s edition of USA Today, retired neurosurgeon and Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson pulled no punches in calling the South Carolina church massacre a racist act. In the opinion piece, Carson implicitly criticized most of the other candidates in the Republican field for trying to downplay the racial component of the church shooting spree. Carson wrote:
Not everything is about race in this country. But when it is about race, then it just is. So when a guy who has been depicted wearing a jacket featuring an apartheid-era Rhodesian flag walks into a historic black church and guns down nine African-American worshipers at a Bible study meeting, common sense leads one to believe his motivations are based in racism. When the sole adult survivor of the ordeal reports that the killer shouted before opening fire, “You rape our women and you’re taking over our country. And you have to go” — well, that sounds to me a lot like racial hatred.
Let’s call this sickness what it is, so we can get on with the healing. If this were a medical disease, and all the doctors recognized the symptoms but refused to make the diagnosis for fear of offending the patient, we could call it madness. But there are people who are claiming that they can lead this country who dare not call this tragedy an act of racism, a hate crime, for fear of offending a particular segment of the electorate.
It is hardly radical to declare the South Carolina shooter a racist, but conservative pundits and politicians have found it difficult to do just that. Simply by speaking the truth, Carson appears willing to alienate the segment of his party that wants to pretend racism no longer exists in the United States. That wing includes presidential candidates like Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum and Ted Cruz, who have consistently tried to downplay the significance of race, even where racism is obvious.
Carson’s defection from conservative orthodoxy is remarkable given that in 2013 he was the person who stated:
You know Obamacare is really I think the worst thing that has happened in this nation since slavery.
Yet despite his history of adhering to the party line and making outlandish statements, Carson decided to steer his own course on discussing the Charleston church shootings. Dr. Carson recognized the humanity of the victims. In doing so, perhaps he was shocked out of his own racial complacency, and reminded of his racial identity in a country that has not altogether shed its racist heritage.
This time, instead of dutifully parroting GOP talking points, Carson decided to stake out his own position. It remains to be seen whether his honesty becomes an asset or a liability in the Republican presidential primaries. His recognition of the racial motivation behind the Charleston murders could alienate part of his original Tea Party base, but it also could help him with GOP moderates and conservatives who view his willingness to stick his neck out and say something other Republicans are too timid to say as a point in his favor.
Carson’s willingness to call racism what it is, combined with 2012 GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s calls for taking down the confederate flag in South Carolina, point to a growing rift in the GOP base. That divide between the racist apologists and racism deniers on one side, and principled conservatives who acknowledge America still has work to do on race relations, is one that will play out in the 2016 Republican primaries. Republican voters have an opportunity to decide whether they wish to remain a viable political party that can address complex issues, or whether they want to travel down the narrow bigoted path of becoming a White Nationalist party that is unwilling to face any inconvenient truths about race in America.
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