Civil rights veteran Bob Woodson rejects claims of 'systemic racism,' says black struggles issue of class

foxnews.com ^ | 6/2/2020 | Sam Dorman

[rktman]

Former civil rights activist Bob Woodson issued a sweeping indictment Tuesday of both the Black Lives Matter movement and the idea that "systemic racism" is the cause of African-American hardship in the U.S.

"I don't know what systemic racism is. Maybe someone can explain what that means," he told "Tucker Carlson Tonight." Carlson responded by asserting that it was "a way to make people be quiet and stop asking questions about economics, as far as I can tell."

Woodson's interview came as protesters across America marched for another night to protest police brutality against George Floyd and other African Americans -- something many have described as a result of systemic or institutional racism.

Earlier in his interview, Woodson, a former head of the National Urban League Department of Criminal Justice, told Carlson that the civil rights movement promised that if black people led institutions, "all of black America would be better off."

Woodson told Carlson that he left the movement because he "realized that many of the people who suffered most -- poor blacks -- do not benefit from the change -- that they're demographics were used by some of those leaders."

[Albion Wilde]

Class doesn't exist. It's not a "thing".

I think he means it in the American sense – a type of behavior – and not in the traditional, sense of no mobility from the circumstances of your birth American "class" has to do with accepting opportunities and making the effort to join the system, working the system and providing for oneself and one's family, behaving civilly, not expecting to be taken care of nor to get away with bad behavior.

Americans have heretofore prided themselves on "class mobility" -- being able to rise because of achievement, to be able marry up if you are worthy, to be promoted or achieve prosperity by hard work.

There was indeed systemic racism under Jim Crow laws, when blacks could not get jobs, serve alongside whites in the military, or join trade unions, let alone country clubs or move to white neighborhoods. And the social habits died hard; it took a long time even after equality laws were fought for and changed for a percentage of whites to change their discriminatory behavior. But half a century and several generations have passed now since the end of segregation and legal double standards. It's really time for both races to stop going to race as their first explanation for everything having to do with human interactions.

[Arones]

Cops are civilians.

[Amberdawn]

Yes, but it’s also a guilt trip against whites, even though many asians of all stripes do better economically than whites. We’ll never hear leftists saying that because asians are more successful, that it’s due to racism.

[A_perfect_lady]

I think Blacks have pretty much decided Asians are just white people with slanty eyes.

[Amberdawn]

I think it’s a case of “asians” acting white by getting good test scores, sadly.

[Truth29]

Woodson was on Lou Dobbs last night and was very clear that BLM is not a bout black lives, but about destroying America and that blacks and companies who can’t appease fast enough are destroying America and replacing it with their dream of a dictatorship that would hurt poor and working blacks the most of all.