Deprogramming from Leftism for Anglo Canadians

Part Three: When Black Replaces White

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By

James Pew

Way back in 2023 the BBC aired an episode of the beloved British Sci-Fi series Dr. Who, in which a black actor is featured in a special appearance of the pasty white English mathematician and physicist Sir Isaac Newton. In December of that year, Paul Golding, who, as it states in his X bio, is the “Co-Leader of Britain First, the UK’s fastest growing patriotic and nationalist political party,” posted the following to X: “The BBC has turned Sir Isaac Newton into a black man. Historical revisionism at its most sinister. #AbolishTheBBC.”

Below is an image of Golding’s X post, re-posted with a comment, “why do white people lose their minds when you change the race of a fictional character,” from Skyler Higley, who, as it states in his bio, is a “standup/staff writer @midnight. formerly CONAN…” It is not clear if Higley is serious, if he really thinks that Sir Isaac Newton was a “fictional character.”

If one looks closely at the image above, it is not difficult to determine that Paul Golding is a white British citizen who appears to be patriotic and protective of the heroic figures from English history. While Skyler Higley, the former staff writer who worked for late night talk show host Conan O'brien, appears to be a black American with something of a sense of humour.

Golding and Higley are free to express their opinions on the matter. Or to make fun of whomever they like. This is what free speech is all about. Free and open discourse is the liberal democratic way. In fact, in my view, and, concerning the work I do — generally, exploring and defending the history and culture of the West — it is free and open discourse itself that is so fundamental to Western uniqueness. The implications concerning its preservation and protection are part of what has me so wrapped up and enraptured with this work. I write about things I love, that I fear may be taken away.

So in this liberal spirit allow me to riff on the swirl of thoughts the above image sets spinning in my head. First off: the optics. Higley is a black American speaking with apparent ignorance about a sensitive topic concerning the cultural heritage of the British. In my view, since Higley is a comedian, his opinion on the matter is most certainly a joke. The optics themselves make it so. I am not quite sure though that a few laughs and likes was all that Higley was interested in. Since not enough can be determined from this one X post alone (which is all I’m going on), the analysis that follows is generalized and may not fully apply to Higley.

On that, here is something to analyze: Has the reader noticed, especially in the post-George Floyd/BLM era, that the type of optics pointed out above have held different social consequences, and have generally been dealt with selectively, unfairly, depending on whether the white perspective was seen as properly denouncing whiteness or otherwise properly promoting blackness (usually both)? Or, has it been noticed what happens when the perspective of a white person is even loosely associated with something deemed anti-black? Such as re-posting a positive sentiment about Trump on social media, as did Michael Korenberg, chair of the University of British Columbia board of governors in 2021, shortly before being forced to step down.

I wrote about several race-based illiberal firings of white men in November of 2021, including Michael Korenberg, in a piece for my personal Substack, The Turn, called The Cancelling of Canadian White Men. The piece also made mention of Stockwell Day, a former conservative cabinet minister forced to resign in June of 2020 from both the Telus board of directors and a business law firm for comments he made on TV about racism. Day opined on a CBC panel that “systemic racism is not an issue in Canada.” Since at least 2020 this perspective has been seen as anti-black among institutional elites so captured by Critical Social Justice activism. A white guy who held this view, like Stockwell Day, was likely to be cancelled out of polite society, as he was.

Also featured in the piece mentioned, Don Cherry and the late Rex Murphy. Murphy had a National Post opinion piece removed and apologized for because he had the gall to declare Canada not a racist country. While Don Cherry’s case was even more infuriating. The Hockey Night in Canada broadcaster was forced out of his role for referring to Canadian newcomers as “you people,” when imploring them to wear a poppy on Remembrance Day. Shameful treatment of a beloved Canadian icon.

Returning to Golding and Higley’s views on the sketchy casting of Dr. Who. Does the reader think Higley notices the general double standard unfairly applied to white people (mostly white men)? How could one possibly know? One could assume, I suppose, and make an educated guess. Going on the little we know about him, how much generosity of spirit – a thing I recommend one extend liberally – should be granted to Higley for the hypothetical empathy he may or may not be capable of demonstrating concerning the anxieties that many white Westerners feel about the three hundred and sixty degree assault on their history, culture and skin colour?

Last week I posted to Facebook a similar image juxtaposing Sir Isaac Newton with the BBC’s black actor who played him. I simply captioned the image: “The BBC has depicted Isaac Newton as a black man. Seriously BBC!?”

When do we ever see race-reversed casting which places white actors in the roles of black or any other non-white historical figures? We do sometimes, rarely, as discussed below, see white actors play a variety of non-white roles. But everyone knows we far more often see it the other way around. How come so many people, white people included, think there is no problem with any of this? A minority of white people think that an actor's role should simply go to the best person for the job. To their credit they believe in merit. However, they are blind to white persecution, or would rather not deal with it. That is, not deal with the one-sided nature of replacement, where historical white figures are commonly replaced with non-white figures. If one notices this – and how can one not notice it? – but still claims to believe that the “role should go to the best person,” what does that say about one's character and integrity? About their attitude concerning equality for white people? About their liberal values, and sense of fairness? About their moral compass?

Image taken from X

My Facebook post received mostly comments that echoed my frustration over BBC’s anti-white casting of a black actor in the role of Sir Isaac Newton. However, at least one comment disagreed. Professor Mark Mercer wrote: “I don't see why we should care. The quality of the depiction is all that matters. If the black actor rocked the audition, give the role to the black actor.” A thoughtful exchange occurred between several people (I mostly stayed out of it). Most people do not feel that the “quality of the depiction is all that matters.” In my view, there are many reasons why we should care, here is one from a FB commenter. The political writer Stuart Parker said: “some of us like faithful historical adaptations, not people repurposing history to jack off to the petty obsessions of the present.”

A similar type of exchange occurred on Paul Golding’s X post, where a minority of people didn’t seem to care, and might even think it's racist if you care. However, the majority thought the BBC’s choice of a black actor to play a white historical figure is offensive identity politics at best, and white replacement at worst.

Here are a few example comments:

“I would not mind the color of Newton's actor at all had the left not been trying to make us color obsessed.”

“I saw a series where King Arthur was black. It seems that while race isn't important, it IS important to erase the contributions of whites.”

“Woke channel, Probably ran by purple haired leftists. Why do they hate their own country?”

“The people who can't shut up about ‘cultural appropriation’ have no problem replacing white historical figures with blacks. The Woke are strangely deranged freaks.”

“Where are all the cries of cultural appropriation?”

Another comment from the Golding X thread contains a sentiment I found echoed in other places: “This is designed to make us mad & then when we get frustrated for inaccuracies they accuse us of racism!” On the website Quora, under the headline question, “Why is it nowadays, white historical character are often played by black actors? Wouldn't black people be angry if it's the other way around?,” a blunt comment by long-time Quora user Brian Schmidt, reads as follows (try not to let Schmidt’s tentative grasp on grammar including his sparse use of punctuation distract you):

“It's deliberate it's intentional it's done to be provocative it's done to marginalize it's done to insult it's done to write us out of History what else could it be ? Apparently black people don't have very much in the way of accomplishments and therefore somebody feels as necessary to appropriate the accomplishments of others and attribute them to black people if I was black I would be even more offended than I am as a white man are we to believe that black people are incapable of doing things on their own that they can be proud of..”

In an opinion piece for Newsweek about the popular HBO series The Last Of Us, called “Making White Characters Black Isn't Progress—It's Pandering. And It Insults Black Fans Like Me,” black writer and Navy Veteran Alex Miller wrote that he was “deeply disappointed to see the latest episode feature a white character from the game, Maria, played by a Black actress.” Miller also commented about Disney, saying they “decided that what we needed was the token representation of palette switching, (by) announcing a Black Ariel in their live action remake of ‘The Little Mermaid’…”

Miller wonders why Disney is not making films about “real black princesses.” He mentions his favorite “Mami Wata, a water spirit well-known in West, Central, and South African folklore. She's like Ariel, but better: She can possess people, she has kinky, curly hair, and sometimes abducts her followers.”

The double standard around race-reversed casting can be seen in the way the popular website Ranker deals with the issue. On the one hand they have an article called 32 Characters Who Were Whitewashed By Hollywood. Here, Ranker has indeed demonstrated that race-reversed casting does sometimes take the form of white actors playing non-white people — they found 32 examples! Admittedly, some of these examples seem to demonstrate genuinely poor casting choices that do indeed appear culturally insensitive. But other examples are telling. Many are from the 1950s and 1960s, way before race-based political correctness took hold of society. But also, included in the list of 32 is the film Stuck, which is based on a true and horrific story. A black woman named Chante Jawal Mallard “became embroiled in a stomach-churning incident whereby, following a car accident,” she left a man “to slowly bleed to death while trapped inside her windshield.” A white actress named Brandi Boski played Mallard in the film. Not quite the same as race-reversed casting of beloved historical figures like Sir Isaac Newton is it?

On the other hand, another Ranker article called Black Actors Who Played White Characters, tells us they see race-reversed casting in an entirely different light when black is replacing white. From that piece:

“Color blind casting, or non-traditional casting, has opened up opportunities for Black actors, albeit slowly. There have been many Black actors who played white characters, but there’s still room for more diversity in Hollywood overall.”

So, it’s “Color blind diversity” when black replaces white, but “white-washing” when white replaces black. Got it? sigh…

Turning again to the Golding X thread. As mentioned, the example comments from that thread (and my own FB thread) represented the spirit of the majority. However, there is always another side. And when it comes to white/black race relations, there is always a few black people around to call white people racist, like OI Mate, who’s X bio explains how he is “Colder than polar bear pussy out here,” and who commented the following regarding black Sir Isaac Newton (a comment receiving 11 thousands likes!): “You so racist you don’t even know what race you talking about.” For real? Does it really matter which non-white race? The actor playing Sir Isaac Newton is non-white and looks nothing like him, isn’t that enough to understand why those with British ancestry might be a wee bit miffed?

Here is another comment I mostly disagree with, but I feel is at least thoughtful:

“Unless you also complained about Mickey Rooney playing Mr. Yunioshi, Johnny Depp depicting Tonto, Angelina Jolie portraying Marianne Pearl, or Natalie Wood as Maria STFU and stop whining — pretty please, with a cherry on top.”

Personally I do not object to an actor playing a role of a different ethnicity as long as they look the part. Natalie Wood, a white American actress, is believable as a Puerto Rican in a way she would not be as an African, Asian or Indian. Johnny Depp, on the other hand, at least to my eye, can’t really pull off an indigenous character. However, wasn’t the spaghetti Westerns of Sergio Leone, like The Good, Bad, and the Ugly, full of Italian actors playing Mexicans and American Indians (because those films were made in Italy, and the available supply of Italian actors could generally pass for the Wild West characters they portrayed)? Is it bad that I like that film?

I suppose I can understand if some indigenous people would prefer that indigenous historical figures be played by indigenous actors. The same goes for Mexicans and all other people groups. This is no different than my own preference that European historical figures be played by people with European ancestry, although, personally I take no issue with, for example, a Puerto Rican or any mixed race person who looked the part, playing any historical European figure.

A thought experiment: For Anglo-Canadians – and all Canadians who love Canada – imagine a black or Asian actor playing Terry Fox in a bio pic. How would you feel about that?

I digress. The thing that really bothers me is the deliberate de-centering of whiteness, which comes from, among other sources, the backwards notion than North America is “Euro-centric” and therefore must be subject to processes of diversity which aim to cull the artefacts of our Western ancestral heritage in shallow pursuit of such schema as Trudeau’s post-national multicultural dystopia.

For the record, and this should really go without mentioning, all of this applies just as much to white actors playing black historical figures. I would hate to see a white or Asian actor play Miles Davis, Muhammad Ali, Michael Jordan, Barack Obama or any other black icon. No one in their right mind would attempt it. But this is not a concern. The phenomenon really only goes one way. Whether you want to call it antiwhiteism, white replacement, or white persecution, it is clear that white people are positioned firmly on the unjust side of a blatant double standard.

Those who declare they “don’t see race” or think we should all just get beyond race, are not helping. On the contrary they are making the situation worse by pretending it’s beneath them. The constant anti-white drum beat that comes from leftists prevents the organization of groups that could advocate politically for the rights of white people. A white rights group could oppose DEI hiring quotas which exclude white men. The anti-white contingent knows this. Like a predator in the jungle tracking a wounded and unprotected animal, they have all the power and can strike their prey with deadly consequences whenever they like.

Multiculturalism creates a jungle-like atmosphere where many white people live in fear of an unintended mis-step that could lead to a critical social justice inspired cancellation. This is leftism, virtually synonymous with multiculturalism. What else could possibly explain American women’s basketball sensation, Caitlin Clark’s recent public apology for her white privilege?

What makes things so outrageous in Clark’s case is that she has been the victim of both individual and institutionalized anti-white racism which pervades her basketball league and the media who report on it. She has been repeatedly physically assaulted by several black players who are resentful of the attention Clark’s talent has attracted. A disgusting discourse in the mainstream media has Clark’s success attributed to her white privilege and has provided cover for the awful discriminatory treatment she has faced. But Clark has made things so much worse with her unwarranted and foolish apology. She achieved nothing save for reinforcing the racial identity politics of critical social justice. Her apology will not be accepted, she will be resented for her magnanimity. The anti-white racism will continue unabated. Way to go Caitlin!

In Clark’s defense, she is 22-years old. The schools she has attended have been indoctrinating her (and everyone else) into antiwhiteism (decentering whiteness) for decades. The language of critical social justice and anti-racism is deeply ingrained. Her unwarranted apology for being white is entirely consistent with the state of Western education. Her self-loathing and instinct to de-center her whiteness should come as no surprise.

Why it is not cool to problematize whiteness

Black people, not all, perhaps most, have long experienced solidarity and meaning around the word “blackness.” Blackness is the macro essence of black people that transcends specific national or ethnic groups (such as Jamaicans). I remember hearing Miles Davis, when asked by an interviewer about the white musicians in his band (like the brilliant Bill Evans), make a distinction between white and black by describing black people as naturally rhythmic people, claiming rhythm was in their bones. This would be a small example of the countless ways I have heard black people speak about blackness. I have also heard indigenous people speak about a certain at home feeling they get when around other indigenous people, even those they have just met.

It is considered appropriate and good for all people of colour to speak in glowing terms of either their macro-ethnic group, or of their specific ethno-national groups, and to describe these collectives as united around sets of ethno-cultural traditions. When people of colour engage in cultural promotion, practice, and preservation of their ethno-traditions, it is seen as a beautiful addition to the overall global tapestry of diversity. It is celebrated and embraced by all. Not so when whites do it.

Before focusing on the difficulties of promotion, practice, and preservation of Anglo-Canadian ethno-traditions in Justin Trudeau’s “post-national” Canada which, according to him, has “no core ethnic identity,” allow me to first comment on the impossibility of advocating in any way, for the interests or good name of the macro white people group. Anyone who attempts such a thing is instantly branded a white supremacist Nazi.

Demographics are Destiny!

Don’t get me wrong, I am not necessarily interested in the promotion of any macro people groups. However, I do feel that terms referring to macro-people groups are important. And not just for the reasons outlined in the above discussion about blackness. I also feel that the demography around macro-people groups is important. It is important, to pick an uncomfortable and contentious example, that we understand black and indigenous people commit more crime than white people. And further, they commit more crimes against white people, than white people do against them. It is not racist to point this out. It is racist to ignore it deliberately. For one, to lead white people to believe that white strangers are just as likely to be violent criminals as black, brown or indigenous strangers, is irresponsible and unfair. The safety of white people is not less important than the appearance of them not being racist. All people in a liberal society should have access to detailed information regarding the demographic dynamics of that society. If some people use that information to discriminate, it matters little since they are the same people who would discriminate whether given ethnic demographic data or not. The rest of us want to know who is committing the rapes and murders.

Why after dropping my kids to school the other day, did I hear on the conservative AM Sauga 960, that a man about 6’1” who was seen wearing a black sweater, was wanted by police for a violent incident? Nothing else provided. The most important identifying information, the information that is absolutely key if making the public safe and aware is the point of the news bulletin, is what colour the man is. Who are we supposed to be looking for? A tall man in a black sweater is all the public has to go on!? If the guy takes the sweater off, or switches it to a green one, then all we know is that a dangerous criminal on the loose is a tall man. The boundless ridiculous awful stupidity of this haunts my nightmares.

I could go on all day about the dynamics and demographics of macro-people groups, but I’ll close with a final thought. It seems clear that the current demographic trajectory of Canada and the majority of Western nations, is not at all in the interest of white people. Tough pill to swallow; hard thing to admit. Doesn’t make it less true.

In a future essay I will give more reasons why this stuff matters, and offer a more in depth discussion on the pattern of progress and prosperity found in the modern history of the white macro-people group.

I’ve reached the limit for today. Until next time!

Here is Part Four of Deprogramming From Leftism For Anglo Canadians.

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Thanks for reading. For more from this author, read Dumb People and the Dreaded "N-word"

And here is Part One and Part Two of Deprogramming from Leftism for Anglo Canadians.

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