Does Calling Something Racist Need Objective Evidence of Intent and Meaning?

Recently, a few football players for the University of Texas put forth several demands to the school on Twitter.  If such demands are not met, they said they would no longer participate in activities such as recruiting new players.  One of the demands caught national attention, and that was the removal of the school song, “The Eyes of Texas are Upon You” for allegedly being racist.  On a grand scale, this issue is obviously not that important because it’s just a song, and it’s not the end of the world to compose another one.  However, with college athletics being so wrapped up in school pride and tradition, it has proven to be a major sticking point for many.

The contention that the song is somehow racist is based on three things: One, the first recorded public performance of the song was in a minstrel show in the early 1900s, and minstrel shows routinely had performers in blackface, though it is not certain if this song in particular was performed that way.  Two, the famous tune of “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad” (which “The Eyes” shares) evokes images of immigrants or slaves working on railroads, and there’s a minstrel version of it as well that dates to the late 19th century.  Three, the phrase is derived from a saying by former Confederate general Robert E. Lee when he was president of a university after the Civil War.  He told graduating students, “The eyes of the South are upon you” (edit: a friend of mine who teaches history emailed two leading Robert E. Lee scholars to ask if there was any primary source evidence that proved that Lee actually said this phrase; they told him there was not, so take that as you will). A future UT president heard it and used “The eyes of Texas are upon you” in his commencement speeches.

On the other side, many UT fans are arguing that the school song has no racist content at all, and there is no evidence that it was composed with any racist intent.  In fact, the song was originally created by students as a way to make fun of the phrase, satirizing the UT president, though it eventually morphed into a song that has been sung proudly by Longhorn students and alumni for decades (look here for a good article written by a friend of mine defending the song).  Very few, until maybe over the last ~10 years due to what they’ve been taught, associated the song with any sort of racism.  Some players apparently have had even clearly wrong ideas about the song, such as that the words “Do not think you can escape them [the eyes of Texas]” were intended towards slaves who could not escape the watch of their masters.  This is simply not true, and it indicates that misinformation might be partly responsible for some of the players’ opinions.

Some of these points may even be conceded by those in favor of jettisoning the song, but they still feel like the potentially iffy history of the phrase, tune, and original performance makes it racist enough to be a problem.  To not feel the weight of this history is the result of “privilege,” and many argue that if several black student-athletes feel like it’s a problem, then it’s a problem.  Everyone else, especially white people, need just to shut up and listen.

I bring up this relatively minor issue because it is a microcosm of the discussion regarding race these days, and there are different understandings of what “racism” entails.  There are many aspects of the usage of “racism” that I could discuss, but for space considerations, I’ll just focus on this question: For something to be racist, is all that is required is that a few minorities feel that it is or that it has a vague association with some racist element, or does some objective test of content and intent matter?  I’ll argue that we cannot abandon such objective standards or else a lot more is at stake than a school song: A lot more things can get torn down that really shouldn’t if we let this kind of methodology run amok.

Where the Church Failed, Something Unbiblical Filled the Void

I am not afraid to call out what I do not think is consistent with biblical truth, whether it is Trumpism, far-left progressivism, or critical theory.  Each of these things bring in something both foreign and incompatible with biblical Christianity that I think Christians need to be wary of.  That many Christians have swallowed one of these wholesale without biblically and critically thinking through them is sad indeed.

However, I think it is important to admit that it is not entirely their fault.  Where Christianity, particularly evangelicalism (which was supposed to carry the mantle of biblical Christianity after the “mainline” ones went off the rails), failed in terms of addressing serious injustices and problems and teaching Christians to be both faithful and active, something else swooped in to capture the minds and hearts of Christians who felt like something was missing.  In the battle for the theological soul of the Church, this can’t be overlooked.

Christianity and BLM: Not Comfortable Bedfellows

A friend of mine recently posted something on Facebook that sounds novel but really shouldn’t be: You can agree with the statement “black lives matter” without supporting the organization Black Lives Matter.  The former is a proposition that is true; the latter is a group or movement that also carries with it a bucket of agendas and beliefs that go beyond that simple statement.  Many of those beliefs may prove to be problematic upon closer inspection, and they certainly are not required for one to be against racism and police brutality.  Since my friend’s intersectionality score is moderately high (he’s a Mexican married to a Korean and has a biracial kid), nobody was willing to challenge him publicly, though I do not doubt that it irked some more progressive-minded folks or just confused others who thought #BLM was just the virtuous thing to propagate.

The reason he said this, and why other minority Christians like this gentleman have said similar things, is because if you do a modicum of research into Black Lives Matter (BLM), you’ll find out that it has troublesome premises and agendas.  The issue is that few people are willing even to read what BLM says on its own website, and the peer pressure is strong on social media: Crazed personal attacks are the norm, and there are many out there who would rather find any excuse to call someone who disagrees with them a racist than do some self-reflection and critical thinking.  To many, disagreeing with BLM is tantamount to disagreeing with the statement “black lives matter,” even though they are clearly distinct.  This is either based on confusion or ignorance, or it may even be a product of blatant intellectual dishonesty.

The Hope of the Kingdom That is Not of This World

The year 2020 has seemed to be a year of upheaval, leading to a few amusing memes of people wishing to reset the year like a video game.  The coronavirus made the entire world screech to a halt and claimed many lives, and now, it seems like several American cities are tearing themselves asunder due to their outrage over what happened to George Floyd.  The government, from the local government on up, largely hasn’t helped, with police sometimes even escalating situations unnecessarily with surprisingly aggressive tactics (while sometimes not bothering to protect innocent people who need it).  As people look for leadership, the politicians used the opportunity for finger-pointing and blame-shifting.  President Trump, far more suited for getting into Twitter fights or nicknaming his opponents than he is at unifying, triggered anger with some tweets and has made largely useless symbolic gestures like visiting a burnt down historic church.  I’m not sure what he was aiming at, but most evangelicals were not impressed, to say nothing of everyone else.