Summary: White, Black, Class: Chapters 10–12

Chapter 10, “White,” addresses anti-white racism, which Kendi says is classifying those of European descent as “biologically, culturally, or behaviorally inferior” to other races or asserting that white people are all associated with racist power.  

It was November 2000, and the presidential election had just been called for George W. Bush (born 1946). Ibram X. Kendi and his college friends were furious at the outcome, which they believed was unfair. Kendi explains that in many places, Black people were kept from voting because of various nefarious, government-sanctioned measures. Racism is the only reason Kendi can think of that would explain why 10 times as many Black votes were rejected as white votes. After the election, Kendi began to hate white people. He even flirted with the Nation of Islam’s belief that white people are of the devil, but he ultimately rejects it. He concludes that white people are wrong when they say they are not racist while supporting racist policies but are not inherently evil. He says that antiracists don’t see white racism as a characteristic shared by all white people. He feels it is important to distinguish between powerful racist policy makers and all white people, some of whom may be trying to be antiracist.  

Kendi describes how powerful white people see policies that are not biased in their favor as being racist. He understands why such attitudes lead Black people to react with anti-white racism. The problem is that anti-white racism just inflames more white anti-Black racism. He warns against concentrating hatred against ordinary white people because it takes the focus off of racist power and policies. He also explains how white supremacists are essentially anti-white because they oppose policies, such as expanded health care, that help more white people than Black people. He believes that, ultimately, white supremacy is anti-white.  

In 2003, Kendi began writing for his college newspaper. His articles on race impressed the editor of the Tallahassee Democrat, who offered Kendi an internship as a journalist on the city paper.  

In Chapter 11, “Black,” Kendi takes on the highly charged subject of the use of the racist slur “n—–” and how it relates to racism. He explains that Black comedian Chris Rock (born 1965) addressed the issue in a TV special by satirizing how the word is used. He said “I love Black people, but I hate n—–s.” He then went on to list all the bad attributes ascribed to them, such as being loud and ignorant. The comedian was making a distinction between Black men and “n—-is.” But Kendi notes that by making this distinction, Black people are creating their own racist hierarchy of inequity. He explains that for Black people, all the “bad” behavior Black people engage in is attributed not to Black people but to “n—–s.” He sees this as not unlike white people distinguishing themselves from Black people in a racist hierarchy and suggests it is the “real Black on Black crime.” 

Kendi once thought that Black people couldn’t be racist because they had no power. He now rejects that as the “powerless defense” because it prevents Black people from wielding the power they do have to fight for antiracist policies. Black policy makers who wield power are undermined by the powerless defense and may avoid engagement in antiracist activities. This defense also hides the fact that Black people do have at least limited power to support antiracist policies. Kendi argues that the erroneous notion that Black people have no power robs Black people of attempting to exercise the power they do have. For Kendi, powerful Black people who use their power to undermine Black people and strip away Black power should be openly labeled racists.  

In 2005, Kendi moved to North Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to start graduate school at Temple University. His apartment abutted two of the poorest and most crime-ridden neighborhoods in the city. In Chapter 12, “Class,” Kendi discusses racism in terms of class, race, and the Black “ghetto.”  

Kendi uses the term race-class to describe the intersection of these characteristics. Poor people are a class, Black people are a race, so poor Black people are a race-class. When a policy harms Black people, it’s a racist policy, and when it harms poor Black people, it’s a policy that conjoins class and race, or class racism. An antiracist works for equity among race-classes and understands that the cause of class racism is policies, not individual people. White people use class racism (e.g., “white trash”) just as Black people use class racism (e.g., “n—–s”). Whichever group creates the hierarchy of class racism always puts itself at the top. White people use class racism to elevate their self-esteem the same way Black people use class racism. 

Kendi debunks the idea that the behavior of individuals in poor neighborhoods causes the poverty and crime there. Instead he explains that the blame lies in political policies and economic conditions. Kendi cites Martin Luther King Jr. as a Black leader who recognized that capitalism plays a crucial role in racism. There is an unmistakable intersection between racism and exploitative capitalism. Kendi insists that antiracist policies must include anti-capitalist policies, not just policies that target class racism, because the two are linked. Kendi asserts that capitalism today means having the freedom to exploit people and to treat everything, including people, as commodities. Together, these “freedoms” keep poor people poor—especially Black people. Capitalism and racism are intertwined—to fight racism, one must take on capitalism as well.  

Chapter 12 ends with Kendi criticizing himself for his racist embrace of the Black people in dangerous Black neighborhoods. He says he perceived poor Black people as being more authentic and therefore superior to other people. In doing so, he was using poor Black people to bolster his own sense of Blackness. When he began to see this as racist, he says, he decided to concentrate his graduate work on Black studies.  

Analysis: White, Black, Class: Chapters 10–12

In Chapters 10 and 11, Ibram X. Kendi extends the discussion of racism as action to support racist policies and ideas or being silent on racist policies and ideas. He does this by describing his own belief that not all white people are racists but that white people are racist mainly when they support racist ideas and policies and then deny that they’re racist. That is, racism is not inherent in individuals but in ideas and policies and in the actions of people who either support these ideas and policies or are passive or silent on them. This allows him to channel his hate toward white racism rather than toward white people generally—which he suggests is itself a form of racism. As always, Kendi distinguishes between hating the policy makers’ racist policies and hating ordinary white people.  

Kendi also spends quite a lot of time dissecting the ways Black people inadvertently support racism. He notes that hating white people instead of racist power prolongs and reinforces the racist policies harming Black people. He explains how proud Black people hold racist ideas about the poorer members of their race and dismiss them with a racial slur, again upholding stereotypes that perpetuate racism. He explains how characterizing Black people as being without power when, in fact, they do have some power enlarges the sphere in which white power can enact racist policies.  

Chapter 12 develops the main idea of intersectionality by discussing the intersection of race and class. Kendi asserts that capitalism is inextricably linked to racism because it’s a form of exploitation that rejects policies leading to equity. Antiracists will succeed only if they confront and eliminate the exploitative capitalism that dehumanizes and impoverishes poor people. He calls capitalism and racism the “conjoined twins” that sustain and enforce American racism.