I recently read Half-Blood Prince: Barack Obama’s Story of Race and Inheritance, Steve Sailer’s analysis of Obama’s autobiographical “Dreams from my Father,” and I found it to be a great exposé of the character of the candidate. Because I can relate closely to several key aspects of his early life, I am quite interested in Obama’s life story. Sailer, in his dedication, makes it clear that he cannot relate, yet he remains interested in Obama nonetheless. Although Sailer’s book (completed in only two months) contains a wealth of sharp analysis, one key aspect of Obama’s childhood was given far less attention than it deserves.
In the chapter on Obama’s mother, Stanley Ann, Sailer writes:
It was in Indonesia, strangely enough, that his white mother, as a stratagem in her passive-aggressive war on Lolo, her unsatisfactory Asian second husband, painstakingly instilled in little Barry Soetoro the black racialism that pervades all 460 pages of Dreams from My Father. [Half-Blood Prince p.52]
Sailer identifies the correct time and place in which Obama’s obsession with race took root, but he overestimates Stanley Ann’s influence. Fortunately, Sailer includes a short sketch of the background of Indonesia during Obama’s stay:
After the horrific events of 1965-1966 in which a Communist Party uprising led to a bloody crackdown by the army, and the leftist blowhard President Sukarno was pushed out by the rightist General Suharto…
Horrific is a perhaps an understatement for what was going on in Indonesia at the time. Political and racial violence had been raging for nearly twenty years. Ethnic cleansing and racial violence resulted in the exodus of hundreds of thousands of “Indo-Europeans” (in Indonesia this means people of mixed European and Indonesian blood), and untold thousands of Chinese were butchered in the streets and in their homes.
It is telling that Obama’s mother tells her son she “hadn’t heard about the scenes of mass slaughter in Indonesia during the putsch” [Half-Blood Prince p.54]. Given Stanley Ann’s education and intelligence, not to mention interest in Indonesia, she must not have been telling her son the truth. Perhaps she meant to deflect her responsibility for what her son went through in this political climate:
Obama was routinely subjected to racist violence by local lads: “All say he was teased more than any other kid in the neighborhood—primarily because he was so different in appearance.” He was frequently attacked by three Indonesian kids at once, and one time they threw him in a swamp. “Luckily, he could swim.” [Half-Blood Prince p. 54]
Sailer posits that Obama, who clearly has a great deal of ambivalence about his mother, was indoctrinated into Black Nationalism as a part of a passive-aggressive war his mother was waging against her second, Indonesian husband Lolo Soetero. I don’t think Stanley Ann ultimately had that kind of influence on Obama, but the daily ridicule and frequent beatings from Indonesian kids certainly did. The anti-colonialist struggle in Indonesia was largely a racial nationalist effort. Obama, a mixed-race boy of half-European heritage, probably fell into a classification approximating that of the hated Indo-Europeans, who were seen as the mestizo elite that collaborated with Dutch overlords.
Innocent little Obama couldn’t escape racial abuse, and certainly often wished he could look just like the Indonesian kids who taunted him. Over time Obama likely internalized some of the resentment toward Europeans that characterize Indonesia. He probably resented his white mother for taking him there; she may have regretted doing so. Perhaps this explains why he was left with his grandparents in Hawaii. Obama may not have written much about this experience because, as is often the case with children of flawed parents, it is the deepest regrets and most painful memories that are most carefully hidden.
Ultimately, it was the trauma of his experience in Indonesia that left Obama with a deep need for a racial identity despite spending his adolescence in tolerant, multiracial Hawaii. Per America’s racial rules, Obama’s default identity was black, and he embraced it with a passion. Obama’s racialism, rather than being an outgrowth of his mother’s troubled marriage with Lolo Soetero, was forged in the seething cauldron of post-colonial Southeast Asia. One should never underestimate the effect abuse and alienation can have on a little boy.
11 responses so far ↓
1 Lukobe // Nov 3, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Obama is hardly a black racialist/black nationalist… not, at least, in comparison to those in this country who really deserve the label. I honestly think Obama will turn out to be far less “liberal” than people think.
2 Bill // Nov 3, 2008 at 9:37 pm
Well sure. I think it’s pretty obvious that he isn’t a fire-breathing radical. But my point is that the factors that instilled some radicalism in Obama are universal, and they ought to be acknowledged as such.
The same process that led to radicalism in Obama as a young man would do the same for a white kid, Hispanic, Jew, etc. But here in contemporary America we have this skewed attitude toward ethnic identity: it’s all about black and white and the narrative is loaded to the neck.
A lot of people think Obama will bring us out of that, but I don’t think that’s possible without some hard analysis.
I actually welcome the debate, but I just don’t know how this will all turn out. Not well, I suspect, but as you know that’s because I see other trends interfering with resolutions to such atavistic social fissures.
3 roissy // Nov 3, 2008 at 10:33 pm
this is an excellent point you made, welmer, and one i agree with. while stanley ann may have harbored deep resentment against her beta provider second husband lolo, it is obama’s childhood peers who would have left the biggest impression on him.
4 Justin // Nov 6, 2008 at 1:03 am
Wow, very nice analysis.
5 T. AKA Ricky Raw // Nov 12, 2008 at 5:27 pm
Have you read his biography? Because I find it’s only people who haven’t read his biography who seem to think calling him a black radical is an exaggeration. He doesn’t talk that talk now of course because he wants to get elected, but it is a part of his character.
6 Lukobe // Nov 13, 2008 at 12:12 pm
I must admit to not having read his biography. However, I have to think that if he were a modern Farrakhan or unreformed Malcolm X, it would have come out, and this country wouldn’t have elected him.
7 Fabian // Nov 14, 2008 at 10:54 am
One of the biggest problems with this last election cycle was the fact that so much of the mainstream press refused to do its job and thoroughly bring Obama’s past radicalism to light and question him about it. It was certainly brought out in plenty of places in print, but most people don’t read, so they never really knew about it. In terms of mainstream TV media, only Fox News tried to bring these issues to light. Of course, the rest of the media called it “fear mongering” and “racist” to even bring this stuff up.
8 Fabian // Nov 14, 2008 at 10:55 am
I might add that Obama’s handlers did a masterful job of keeping him away from members of the press who would’ve really pressed him about his views in person.
9 Lukobe // Nov 14, 2008 at 12:21 pm
I guess we’ll see how things turn out. Even if Obama is a “black radical,” Congress sure isn’t.
10 Bill // Nov 14, 2008 at 4:19 pm
Lukobe highlights an important point here. We really have no idea how internal divisions in the Democratic party will play out. I can only say that I expect them to be entertaining.
I wonder how many in Congress have read Obama’s book. Probably not very many. I’d guess somewhere around 2%.
But before people jump Obama for defending his own, I think it’s worth asking “what’s wrong with that?” Surely there are some problems with it, but it’s also a good opportunity to cut through hypocrisy and give people an opportunity to decide how they want to define their own interests. Do they revolve around class, race, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, nationality or what?
Seems to me that people in America, for the most part, are pretty confused about this. It’s about time that these issues came out in the open, and Obama offers the perfect opportunity for their exposure.
11 T. AKA Ricky Raw // Nov 25, 2008 at 10:27 am
You’d be surprised how wholeheartedly white limousine liberals will embrace black radicalism if it’s presented sexily enough. Read Tom Wolfe’s short book of essays “Radical Chic and Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers” for a true and humorous example. Or just google it to get a gist…
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