the feminist librarian reads

The idea that Obama is a racist reads as baffling to most Americans, but it makes sense if you understand the particular racial beliefs of conservatives. If the liberal perspective on racism is that racial inequality is a genuine fact of contemporary American life—and requires race-specific remedies—then the conservative view can be expressed with a line from Chief Justice John Roberts’s opinion in Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1: “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.”

In other words, only the “colorblind” are capable of stopping racism. What’s more, the inverse is also true: if you’re not colorblind, then you are incapable of stopping racism. Which leads to a final conclusion: anyone who treats race as a social reality is a racist. The corollary to this—seen here, for example—is that accusations of racism are more troubling than actual discrimination against minorities.