The Troubles
“This morning from a dewy motorway
I saw the new camp for the internees:
A bomb had left a crater of fresh clay
In the roadside, and over in the trees
Machine-gun posts defined a real stockade.
There was that white mist you get on a low ground
And it was deja-vu, some film made
Of Stalag 17, a bad dream with no sound.
Is there a life before death? That's chalked up
In Ballymurphy. Competence with pain,
Coherent miseries, a bite and sup:
we hug our little destiny again.
-Whatever You Say Say Nothing."
― Seamus Heaney, North
In his 2002 book, Irish author Tim Pat Coogan noted that what are referred to as "The Troubles" began three centuries before Columbus landed in the Americas. I have been watching as the news reports on events in the United States, that suggest that a domestic version is an option that this country is heading towards. As much as I love reading Irish history, I am hoping that we can turn this around.
My late friend Rubin "Hurricane" Carter often said that there is only one race -- the human race. Though not an orginal thought, he would expand on this theme based upon his own insights. Within our race, he said, there are several tribes: the black tribe, the brown tribe, the red tribe, the yellow tribe, and the white tribe. The white tribe was subjected to extended-family conflicts over the centuries, such as when the French fought the German, or the Irish fought the English. Yet, for most of history, if one of the non-white tribes attack one of the white families, the entire white tribe would unite to devastate that non-white tribe.
In American history, there has been resentment from many in the white tribe against those whites who advocated for, and even stood with non-white individuals and tribes. It led directly to violence, for example, during the Civil War and the Civil Rights Movement. Thus, the violence we see spreading throughout our country -- our "Troubles" -- has been here since Columbus sailed into the Americas.
My son bought me a copy of a book that I've been wanting to read. The book is, "White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America," by Nancy Isenberg (Penguin Books; 2016). It documents a "family secret" that played a role in American history, which we inherited from British society. Just as the ruling class in Britain believe the white tribe was superior to all non-white tribes, they were convinced that the white tribe was stratified in terms of value as human beings. They refered to those they defined as the lower levels as "white waste," and eventually as "white trash."
By the late 1600s, the British elite were loading the "white trash" onto large boats, and sending it across the Atlantic. There were investments on the potential to exploit the "New World's" resources. They had anticipated an experience as easy as the Spanish had in Central America at first, and were caught off-guard by the red tribe's people, who practiced a woodland form of democracy. The resulting conflicts would mark the birth of the first twin of America's Original sins. The second twin, of course, was the importing of slaves.
The colonial era up through the 1880s, the American experience is best understood as red, white, and black. By no coincidence, Gary Nash's 1974 book, "Red, White, and Black" provides fascinating information on the inter-relationships between these three tribes. Whites viewed blacks as domestic animals, to be kept on plantations for commercial exploitation. And the whites recognized the risks involved in blacks held in slavery learning to read. Whites viewed Indians as wild animals, creating problems for whites intent upon taking (re: stealing) their lands. Besides hunting Indians, there were efforts to "civilize" them, including by teaching them to read -- this at a time when literacy was not a common feature among white trash.
The single biggest conflict in US history came with the Civil War. The south wanted to expand slavery into the new territories. Lincoln, among other reasons, wanted to use these new territories to expand employment opportunities for the growing number of European boat people arriving on American shores. The result, with some significant exceptions, was a fight between the south's Scotch Irish and the north's more recent immigrants from the Irish starvation ships. This resulting in the freeing of the blacks held in slavery, and unleashed violence on those Indians living in a manner on their territories that got in the way of "manifest destiny."
This planted the seeds of resentment among much of the "confederacy's" white trash and elites. The resentment has flowered over the generations, and even pollinated white trash in other regions of the country. Thus, in the 20th century, other than being involved in two huge family feuds known as WW1 and WW2, the American elite whites were in an ongoing competition that involved the European elites of the white tribe to control and exploit the non-white tribes.
This included the domestic non-white peoples. To do so, the elite whites relied upon a trick: turn the white trash's resentments towards the non-white people. This was highlighted by the white trash's violent resistance to the Civil Rights Movement. In many parts of the country, it was impossible to tell the difference between the police and the KKK. Those alive at the time remember this; younger people are aware of this today.
A curious dynamic began after WW2. While there had long been a fringe of the white tribe that advocated for non-white people, the Civil Rights Movement increased these numbers, especially among the white youth. There were still some issues -- members of the black and red tribes recognized that they could identify leadership within their own communities, and some whites had difficulty in understanding why this was essential. But over the decades, a significant balance -- not perfect, as it involved human beings -- began to form.
An important part of this process began during the 1960 presidential campaign. Martin Luther King, Jr., endorsed John Kennedy, and soon the majority of black Americans became Democrats. Soon, LBJ passed the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts, although he knew his party would lose the southern elite and white trash that had long been Democrats.
Though imperfect, the Democratic Party began to represent the non-white minorities. The party would find both leadership and an important voting block among black citizens in particular. The republican elite -- almost exclusively white -- determined that they would need to create more hostility among the white trash, in order to win elections. And here we are today.
The connections between "race" and economic class warfare on the part of the white elites, would cause them to lose their grip on power, should white trash learn should white trash -- and the white middle class -- realize they had more in common with most non-whites, than with the self-appointed elites. That would take the fuzz right off their peach. And so the white trash in particular has been encouraged to think that they have more in common with a Donald Trump than a George Floyd.
The white trash cannot tell the difference between King's March on Washington and the Watts riot. And some middle class whites say that good people should use King's tactics to advance, woefully ignorant of either King's economic message or the terrible violence that he and his followers were met with. Both have an inability to understand that the riots, with burning and looting, is not connected to the Democratic Party.
The white trash today, in identifying with Trump, also view the non-white peaceful protesters as dangerous, and the white ones as traitors to the white tribe. Thus, we are seeing the white supremacists -- often with at least low-level support and cooperation from some police -- are convinced that they have license to attack and kill the "enemy." As this cycle increases in strength, we are moving as a society to a domestic version of "The Troubles."
We have three options. We can say, "That's terrible" when we see reports of the increasing violence, and hope we are not the next victim. We can put into practice Malcolm X's say,"In the jungle, there are hunters. There are also those who hunt the hunters." Both lead directly to The Troubles. Or, we can engage in non-violent activities, those covered in the Constitution, and work to revive a civil society. That is the only way.
Peace,
H2O Man
= new reply since forum marked as read
I had never seen this explanation of the different tribes, until I read your post. It is a perfectly clear and rational explanation of what is going on.
I'm bookmarking this so I can read it again, and so that I can intelligently comment on it to others.
Thank you so much!
Thank you WaterMan 
What a wonderful piece of writing, H2O Man. I'm just sorry that it both could and had to be written. 
