Hello there,
We need to get minorities to all attend NASCAR from now on, and be as
culturally flamboyant as possible, showing off your non-white culture
at the event to ***** off all the Aryans. And all the gay Whites
should show up in thongs:
http://theoccidentalquarterly.com/archives/vol6no4/MacDonald.pdf
Another implicit white community is NASCAR racing, which strongly
overlaps with evangelical Christianity, country music, and small town
American
culture, particularly the culture of the South. A famous Mike
Luckovich cartoon
that appeared in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution shows a black man
and a white
man talking with a Confederate fl ag fl ying in the background. "We
need a
fl ag that isn't racist...but preserves white southern culture..." The
next panel
shows a NASCAR checkered fl ag. The implicit/explicit distinction
could not
be more obvious.
A large part of the attraction of NASCAR is a desire for traditional
American
culture. NASCAR events are permeated with sentimental patriotism,
prayers,
military fl yovers, and postrace fi reworks. As sociologist Jim Wright
notes, "just
about everything ... you encounter in a day at the track drips with
traditional
Americana."43 However, "race is the skeleton in the NASCAR Family
closet.
On the tracks and in the stands, stock-car racing remains a white-
person's
sport."44 The whiteness of NASCAR races can be seen from a comment
that,
after surveying the crowd at the 1999 Daytona 500, "there were
probably about
as many Confederate fl ags here as black people"-i.e., fewer than
forty out of a
crowd of approximately 200,000.45 Because the Confederate fl ag is the
ultimate
in political incorrectness, their presence at NASCAR events is quite
possibly
an act of rebellion. "The near-universal discrediting of the Stars and
Bars as a
politically incorrect, if not racist, symbol has obviously not yet
reached every
Winston Cup fan. Either that, or they just don't care. And, as you
might imagine,
there was no pussyfooting or self-fl agellation about the point among
fans at
the Southern 500, which was adorned by a profusion of Confederate fl
ags the
likes of which I had not witnessed at any other track."46
Wright stresses the link of NASCAR to traditional small town and rural
American culture and its links to outdoor pursuits like hunting, fi
shing,
camping, and guns.47 There is a large overlap between NASCAR fans and
gun
Winter 2006-2007 / MacDonald 21
ownership. There is also a strong Christian religious atmosphere:
Races begin
with a benediction and a prayer. There is "a visible Christian
fellowship" in
NASCAR, including entire teams that identify themselves publicly as
Christian
teams; many of the drivers actively participate in Christian ministry.
48 Other
values in evidence are courage in the face of danger-another throwback
to
traditional American culture, deriving ultimately from the Scots-Irish
culture
of the English borderlands: "As we enter the third decade of women's
liberation
and the second decade of the post communist era, we've come to expect,
even demand more sensitivity and empathy in our men than bravado or
grit,
and the traditional manly virtues of courage, bravery, and 'guts'
strike many
as anachronistic at best, even dangerous and moronic."49
The only recent scientifi c survey on NASCAR fans is the Southern
Focus Poll
of 1998, conducted by the Center for the Study of the South at the
University
of North Carolina.50 26.1 percent of white Southerners had been to a
NASCAR
race, compared to 4.4 percent of blacks. In the national sample using
the same
questions, the percentages were 24.1 and 12.5 percent respectively.
These
results undercount the total number of fans of non-NASCAR stock car
racing
and other forms of auto racing. 18.1 percent of respondents with a
high school
education had been to a NASCAR race, compared to 22.5 percent of high
school
graduates, 27 percent with some college, and 18 percent of college
graduates.
NASCAR also claims 75 million fans in America, 25 percent of the
population.51
NASCAR racing is the fastest growing sport in America, second only to
the NFL
in sports viewership.52 This is a very large implicit white community.
Being a NASCAR fan overlaps with other implicit white identities. A
1993
survey carried out by the National Opinion Research Center found a 3:1
ratio
in NASCAR attendance between small-town and large-city residents;
almost
2:1 for gun owners vs. non-gun owners, 3:1 for hunters vs. nonhunters,
and
almost 3:1 between people who like country music "very much" and those
who
hate it (21.3 percent to 7.6 percent).53 Indeed, one survey found that
49 percent
of people who "listen to country music a lot" are fans of NASCAR,
compared
to 31 percent of all respondents. The biggest disparity is in the
other direction:
Only 24 percent of people who listen to country music a lot identify
themselves
as fans of the NBA compared to 47 percent of all respondents.54
There is little doubt that country music is an implicit white
community:
Over 90 percent of country music listeners are white.55 Although
country music
remains the most common radio format, it is disappearing from major
urban
areas where whites are becoming a minority.
While NASCAR is a white sport, the NBA is widely perceived to be a
black
sport. Whites, especially nonurban whites, are a decreasing audience
for the
NBA. Since the Michael Jordan era, television ratings for the NBA have
been
on the decline. In 2005, ratings were down 7 percent on ESPN and TNT,
4
percent on ESPN, and more than 30 percent for the NBA fi nals.56 The
audience
22 Vol. 6, No. 4 THE OCCIDENTAL QUARTERLY
for NASCAR and the NBA are nonoverlapping, with the NBA appealing to
"a young, multicultural, urban market audience"57-the polar opposite
of
the married, white, Republicans who have adopted implicit white
identities.
NASCAR has enjoyed an increasingly dominant television audience
position
during the portion of the year formerly controlled by the NBA.58
The NBA culture is seen as African-American, and the response of the
NBA
has been to attempt to make the NBA look more like white America in
order
to restore its fan base. Sports writer Gary Peterson notes that "for
decades
there has been a racial divide between NBA players (mostly black) and
the
paying customers (largely white). That divide has become a fl ashpoint
over
the past 15 years...Never before have the players seemed so unlike the
fans.
This divide is the top concern at the league offi ce-even ahead of
declining
free throw shooting and baggy shorts. For proof you need look no
further
than the league-wide dress code NBA commissioner David Stern imposed
last
season. It was an extraordinary step-he might as well have told the
players,
'Quit dressing like typical young, urban African-Americans. You're
scaring
the fans.'"59 Besides banning ostentatious gold chains and mandating
business
casual attire, the NBA has also handed out draconian penalties for fi
ghting
among players, because fi ghting fi ts into the image of urban,
African-American
culture.60 Another sportswriter, MSNBC's Michael Ventre, opined that
"the
terms 'NBA' and 'thuggery' have become inextricably linked in the
minds of
basketball fans the world over."61
The point is not that the NBA is more violent than, say, professional
hockey;
it's just that the NBA is conscious of racial stereotyping processes
among
whites. Part of NASCAR's attraction for whites is that it is an
implicit white
community. By regulating dress and conduct, the NBA seems to be trying
to
make the NBA an implicit white community despite the racial
composition
of its players.
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