Gary Lineker was addressing the issue of this World Cup being in Qatar due to its lack of gay rights (he has been opposed to it being staged here), but also took aim at the next host, the USA, calling it an “extraordinarily racist country”
www.telegraph.co.uk/world-cup/2022/12/13/gary-lineker-reignites-row-bbc-qatar-calls-usa-extraordinarily/
Historically it is racist of course, but is it still?
Background for context, some quotes:
Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence, Natives “merciless Indian savages”.
www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jul/05/facebook-declaration-of-independence-hate-speech
The dehumanising “savage” label for the Natives would also be seen with statues erected outside the US Capitol (a building built by slaves) which stood for over a century until they were pulled down in the 1950s.
Thomas Jefferson in Notes on Virginia, 1785: “The blacks, whether originally a distinct race, or made distinct by time or circumstances, are inferior to the whites in the endowments of both body and mind.”
Same book, on race mixing with whites: "The improvement of the blacks in body and mind, in the first instance of their mixture with the whites, has been observed by every one, and proves that their inferiority is not the effect merely of their condition of life".
Abraham Lincoln: “There is a physical difference between the white and the black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together... while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any man am in favor having the superior position assigned to the white race.”
www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-quotes-statesmen-race-idUSKBN2471YA
Theodore Roosevelt: "I don't go so far as to think that the only good Indians are dead Indians, but I believe nine out of every 10 are, and I shouldn't like to inquire too closely into the case of the 10th."
www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2010-01-17-chi-10-things-racism-story.html
The Constitution also contained the Fugitive Slave Clause (put into effect with the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793, signed by George Washington), enabling him and other slave owners such as Jefferson to place adverts in newspapers to recover their escaped slaves.
Thats just a little snippet as there’s loads more like the race laws (white only citizenship (1790 naturalisation act), white only vote, anti-miscegenation (no interracial marriage), segregation (white only schools to white only graveyards), white only immigration (which lasted until the 1965 Immigration Act). etc etc.)
The racist past is well documented, but is it fair to call it “extraordinarily racist” today?