Pakistan

Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Trump tapped ‘reservoir of inherent racism’

Former US President, Jimmy Carter said that Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump tapped “reservoir of inherent racism’. “I don’t feel good, except for one thing: I think the country has been reawakened the last two or three years to the fact that we haven’t resolved the race issue adequately” Carter said.

The reason behind Republicans’ animosity toward Barack Obama had “a heavy racial overtone” according to Carter. He also said that “I think there’s a heavy reaction among some of the racially conscious Republicans against an African-American being president.”

He said that USA had “reawakened” due to the fact that racism was not tackled in the 1960s and ’70s. “White police attacks on innocent blacks” along with high unemployment and high rates of incarceration was the trigger behind this reawakening according to Carter.

He said Mr. Trump violated “basic human rights” when he labelled Mexican immigrants as criminals and signaled out a ban on Muslims entering USA. “When you single out any particular group of people for secondary citizenship status, that’s a violation of basic human rights,” Carter said.

This commentary by a former US President is a clear inditement of the West and its attitude towards minorities. The West always jumps on USA’s bandwagon to criticize rest of the world for violation of human rights. However, it should look into its own backyard and stop promoting xenophobia.