Recently, a friend of mine launched a scathing attack on Bernie Sanders on Facebook. Among other things, he instructed people not to vote for Sanders because he was “just a white man.” At first, I was taken aback. Like Sanders, my friend is a white guy whose politics blur towards the left. Hence, I found his casual bashing of whiteness weird and awkward. To him, being white was enough to dismiss the credibility of a candidate. It was enough to make him ridicule something he held in common with Sanders.

Given the climate of our culture, my friend’s white-bashing is not surprising. Not too long ago, Stephen Marche of The Guardian warned us of the “white man pathology” responsible for Sanders’ popularity. In Quartz, Sady Doyle wrote of the “angry white male public intellectual” whose offences included being white, male and an intellectual in public. According to these authors, whiteness was a stain on the moral fabric of society. Despite being part of this demographic, they bashed their identities to score progressive points with their liberal readers.

However, singling out a group for the purpose of ridicule is not new. In the past, we reserved these jabs to people who were as hated as they were embarrassing: Valley Girls, Frat Boys and more recently, Hipsters. As of late, society’s irritation has turned to white people and the things they do. Like your coffee hot, artisan and cruelty-free? Oh you must be white. Ever butchered a hip hop dance? Hi, white person. Worn something lumberjack-y, like, ever? White, white, white.

And with the accessibility of social media, we can discuss subjects once reserved for Sociology syllabuses. The thrills of patriarchy and racism are now the fodder of slacktivists who tweet and reblog them in the form of patronizing listicles. While that can create some awareness, it reinforces the idea that being less white affords your politics more integrity.

There’s no doubt there are inequalities in our society which should be eradicated. To do so, we need to have dialogue that doesn’t descend into cheap insults over our identities. Moaning about stale pale males when that’s a summary of your dating history is duplicitous. Throwing a forest’s worth of shade at white male politicians like Bernie Sanders when you subscribe to the teachings of Karl Marx is blatantly hypocritical.

Regardless of your sincerity, white bashing is a lazy attempt to give your politics an urban facelift. Self-deprecation is useful when it goes after the hysterical obsessions of self. But when it’s used as a form of racial politicking, it’s empty and self-serving. It does nothing but reinforce divisions in a society in desperate need of unity.

Opinions expressed on the editorial pages are not necessarily those of WSN, and our publication of opinions is not an endorsement of them.

Email Khanya Mtshali at [email protected].