4 hours Ago
By Tom Cosgrove In Local Theater’s production of Michelle Tyrene Johnson’s play “Chasing Breadcrumbs,” a Black woman named Serena declares, “You use ‘woke’ as a way to suffocate us into silence, shame us out of the American story.” Her observation captures how the term — originally meaning Black consciousness — has been weaponized into a slur used to dismiss legitimate concerns about inequality. This strategy of inciting white backlash has been repeated since Reconstruction.
Republican “dirty trickster” Lee Atwater famously explained in 1981 how overtly racist slurs, once common after Brown v. Board of Education (1954), evolved into coded terms like “states’ rights” and “forced busing” following the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Today, we are witnessing another evolution in coded language, designed to disenfranchise marginalized communities in America through systematic “Othering.
” The pollster Peter Hart identified “Othering” as the most powerful force shaping American politics and culture. We see the consequences as the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, and the “leader of the free world,” President Trump, define entire groups of Americans as existential threats. So it was no surprise when President Trump, in his address to Congress, declared, “We’ve ended the tyranny of so-called diversity, equity, and inclusion policies all across the entire federal government, and indeed the private sector, and our military.
And our country will be woke no longer.” An American president fully embraced the politics of “Othering,” casting entire communities not as citizens but as threats to be eliminated. Meanwhile, DOGE — headed by Elon Musk — has gutted government programs supporting women, people of color, people with disabilities and LGBTQ+ communities, all under the guise of “efficiency” and eliminating “fraud and waste.
” As journalist Karen Attiah bluntly states, “Let’s call this what it really is: resegregation.” This strategy doesn’t just create separate spaces; it seeks to systematically exclude marginalized groups from federal jobs and leadership roles, pushing them outside the mainstream of American life. When Musk and others claim DEI is “racist against whites” or argue it lowers standards, they employ the same coded language of “Othering” — language that appears neutral but is designed to perpetuate existing disparities and create artificial divisions.
The journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones provides critical context: “It is no accident that the call for colorblindness in the law arose only after Black Americans gained legal access to many of the rights long denied to them.” Similarly, legislative demands for “biological reality” emerged as a political weapon only after corporate America began celebrating LGBTQ+ communities. This backlash strategy thrives on plausible deniability.
Officials claim they are simply promoting efficiency or fairness, while in reality, they are erasing programs that expand opportunity. Trump’s speech demonstrates this approach with stark clarity — framing the elimination of DEI as an end to “tyranny” rather than an assault on inclusivity and equal opportunity. Trump’s Department of Education has escalated this campaign by launching an “End DEI” portal, eerily reminiscent of McCarthyism in the 1950s.
This tool encourages Americans to “snitch” on diversity and inclusion efforts to the federal government, turning fellow citizens into targets . A clear violation of the Constitution’s First Amendment. History is instructive.
McCarthy’s reign of terror ended when government lawyer Joseph Welch stood up to him, famously asking, “Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last?” Today, neither Trump nor Musk shows any such decency. Social media outrage alone won’t stop this attack on the American Melting Pot of inclusivity — we must act. To fulfill our constitutional promise of a more perfect Union, We the People must continue, not abandon, our fight for justice and equality.
As Thomas Paine wrote in Common Sense, “ legitimate government arises only from a compact among individuals. ” Since the 1770s, each generation of Americans has expanded who gets to be We the People through struggle and sacrifice. A year before we celebrate the Semiquincentennial of the United States we have a choice: can we keep perfecting our union, ensuring it includes all Americans, or let “Othering” and exclusion unravel our democracy.
Each of us can call out divisive language when we hear it, challenge official efforts to “Other,” boycott corporations that abandon our values, demand our elected leadership to lift up the power of a diverse America, and speak out against injustice. We the People must keep our nation’s story broad enough for Serena — and for all of us. Tom Cosgrove co-created and produced the 2024 PBS Documentary “Divided We Fall: Listening with Curiosity.
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