Just as I thought I had posted the best entry in relation to the US elections, the speech from Barack Obama comes along. For someone who, throughout his election campaign, had been trying to avoid talking about race, this speech has to be seen as a major compromise. In many ways he had to make a response once the media was determined to focus on the sermon (in which he asked the congregation to pray that God would damn America) from the pastor of his church of many years.
The Times referred to it as ’race speech’ and included a review in the Review section as if it was some theatre which it was, referring to it as ‘a presidential performance’. It has since included an extract of the speech.
Andrew Sullivan in his ever excellent Sunday Times column offers a fairly unique perspective. He points out that Obama’s identity must lie somewhere along a continuum – not wanting to forget that he is black and yet not wanting to be seen as just a black man at the expense of all other dimensions. Drawing on his own gay identity, Sullivan points out: I relate to this a little as a homosexual. I neither want to be totally defined by my gay identity, but nor do I want to deny it.
Both the Guardian and its sister paper, the Observer have drawn parallels between the US and the UK in terms of the way forward on politics of race and victimhood.
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Submitted by karamat on Sat, 2008-03-29 00:44.