Reply #65: It is, in part. [View All]

[tpsbmam]

A good report for you to read (or skim) is the NAACP report that came out last year.

People speak about the "Tea Party" as if it's one entity. It's not. It's made up of different factions, groups started by different people for different reasons. Unlike those here who say it started as grassroots, that's oversimplifying the nature of the Tea Party. Read the NAACP's "Origins of the Tea Parties" That will give you a good idea about origins of the various factions and the degree of differences between the groups.

Some of the groups were formed and/or are headed by radical militia member types. Some appear to just be run-of-the-mill racists. For example, this is Dale Robertson, who was at the time chairman of the 1776 Tea Party (as far as I know he's not part of any radical group but clearly shares the views of a number of them):



Most of the tea party factions have many local groups associated with them, and you'll find that some of the local groups have been started by people who are white supremacists, nationalists, "patriots," etc. (An explanation of "patriots" can be found here at the SPLC.)

The tea parties are infused with militia and radicals from all of the various hate groups -- members of those groups have seen prime opportunities to sign people up and share their lovely theories. Frankly, they've seen people open to their way of thinking and are exploiting that.

Anyway, I suggest you skim the report to get a better feel for the teabaggers. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) also has lots of very interesting information. This editorial, for example, is pretty interesting:

Unsweet Tea: Exploring the Ideas of the Antigovernment Movement:

<snip>

Polled by CBS and The New York Times this spring, some 18% of Americans described themselves as supporters of the Tea Parties. Sounding in many ways like the furious, government-hating Patriots, they described their top issues as opposition to the health care reform bill, a belief that the government does not represent real Americans, high levels of government spending and the economy. Like the Patriots, too, they were far more likely than most to call themselves "angry."

It seems clear that the Patriot resurgence has been fueled, in part, by demographic changes in this country — specifically, the predicted 2050 loss of a white majority, a change that was brought home to many by the election of a black president. Now, there is new evidence that race is playing a part in the Tea Party movement as well, even as it begins to claim some real political power.

<snip>

A subsequent poll by the University of Washington Institute for the Study of Ethnicity, Race & Sexuality found that white supporters of the Tea Partiers were 25% more "racially resentful" than those who were not supporters. White backers of the Tea Parties were less likely to believe that African Americans are intelligent, hardworking or trustworthy, and their perceptions of Latinos were similar.

In Ohio, scheduled speakers at a Tea Party rally organized by leader Brian "Sonny" Thomas fled after he suggested in a tweet that he wanted to shoot Latino immigrants — or, as he wrote, "spicks." Thomas' Tea Party site linked to White-pride.org, and CNN found a photo of him wearing a "White Pride" T-shirt.

At teabagger conferences, there are all kinds of racist kins of forums, though they don't see them as racist. There have been neo-Nazi speakers at meetings, etc etc. I suspect those who don't think they're racist just think the way they do so naturally that they see nothing wrong with it. Frankly, with the racism that pervades most of the groups (some of it more subtle than the big racist signs), can you envision yourself being part of any of those groups? Even if I agreed with some of their politics, the rampant racism would keep me far, far away.

So, there's lots of information out there and it's not as simple as looking at the "tea party" as a whole. Their influence as a whole is one thing, but it's important to understand that there is not only an ugly underbelly to the tea party, there's a dangerous fringe and within the tea party.