*The accolades of Roland S. Martin are extensive. From CNN to TVOne to his online magazine “Roland Martin Unflitered,” and on all methods of mass communications, Martin has been out front in discussing the politics, race and culture from an educated Black perspective for 30 plus years.
His outspoken oratory on said topics is passionate and enlivened, to say the least. Recently, EURweb was invited to speak with Martin about his new book, “White Fear: How the Browning of America is Making White Folks Lose Their Minds.”
In our discussion, Martin speaks about the impetus for the book, what the country is up against in a post-Jan 6th dialectic that finds its roots in white fear of becoming a racial minority in the not-too-distant future.
Read on for our Q & A with Roland Martin.
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EURweb: Please tell us about the impetus for writing this book.
Roland Martin: Well, to be very clear on what it’s about. Also be looking at that cover. I purposely chose the title as well. You have the white man who protested on January 6th, is really saying is, all of this is ours. That cover came from January 6.
And what people don’t understand about January 6 Is that January 6 was all about anger at black voters. When Donald Trump was complaining about the election, he was specifically talking about four cities.
He will often say, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Milwaukee, Detroit.
Well, what do those four cities have in common? Black people. That’s what he was talking about. So, the folks were out there protesting in anger.
What we have to understand is that these are attacks against diversity, equity and inclusion, against the 1619 project, against multiculturalism.
It is constituted as an attack on this nation becoming a nation of majority people of color. It is a desire of a lot of white Americans to hold on to the power that they have had since the country was founded.
And so we must understand what’s going on here. We have to understand it’s also fear that “they are going to do to us what we did.”
This literally was what Patrick Buchanan (special counsel to Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, and Gerald Ford) wrote about all those years ago, he wrote about this very issue.
In effect, Mitch Landrieu, in his book, addressed it as well. There’s this fear among white folks. They know what they’ve done to us and it’s like ‘”h my goodness if they get power they’re going to do that to us!”
And so it’s important in everything, we’re here about January 6th is like ‘Oh, we need to understand these voters.’ And it’s like ‘No, no, no! We know exactly who they are!’
Black folks are real clear on who they are because we’ve had to experience this all these years.
We are simply calling this thing out where it is. And that’s what is unsettling to some other people. They don’t want to have to deal with this reality that we know all too well.
EURweb: This job is hard at times. You know, to be the Clarion Caller. I’ve written extensively about race over the years but you’ve done so on a much broader, stronger spectrum. I can only imagine the type of intestinal fortitude it takes to be Roland Martin and to write a book such as this.
Roland Martin: I mean, to be perfectly honest, I don’t look at it that way. I’m just being honest. William Monroe Trotter was honest, Martin Delany was honest, Ida B. Wells was honest.
The reason, to this day, that you can’t find her Memphis newspaper is because they bombed her office and the archives were destroyed. That’s what you have going on.
We’ve always had truth-tellers in the black community. In fact, in Dr. King’s book “Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community,” he writes that there are four institutions that are positioned to liberate Black America: the Negro church, the Negro press, Negro fraternities and sororities, and Negro professional and business organizations.
What he says specifically about the Negro press, he said, the Negro press must maintain its militancy and not revert to being conservative.
That’s literally what MLK says in his book, and so when you understand that that’s what the mission is, your job is to fulfill the mission.
All too often though we’ve had too many black media outlets, as far as I’m concerned, that have fallen for the silly, the ridiculous, focuses on entertainment and reality shows, that become the primary focus. What ends up happening is our people are not being properly informed of the issues going on, and then we’re lost.
EURweb: What was your initial reaction to January 6th and the aftermath?
Roland Martin: I laughed and the reason was because we have been telling America, and America and the world finally got to see what we’ve been saying for years.
We said this was going to happen. We said, look at the history of America. Whenever white folks don’t get their way there’s going to be a violent reaction. Guess what? That was a violent reaction. And so people were “oh my god, we can’t believe this happened.”
Nah, we (Black folks) can (believe it) because that’s our history. I think the challenge now for so many people is to have to come to grips with that there are people in this country who believe in the rule of law, except when it applies to them.
And so, the hypocrisy is being shown. But what it also requires though it requires those who believe in righteousness, who believe in truth, who believe in fairness, and decency to now step up.
Roland Martin’s “White Fear: How the Browning of America is Making White Folks Lose Their Minds” is available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and wherever books are sold.
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