Burke's Analysis of National Hate and The Civil Rights Movement

 Burke open's his discussion of Hitler's hate discourse in Mien Kampf, by presenting this analysis as a necessary process in order to prevent a "sinister and unifying" disease of anger against a particular people from taking root in America, as it did in anti-Semitic germany during WWII. Burke says in his opening statements that America is somewhat protected of this occurrence because of our deep rooted democracy, "Our vices cannot get together in a grand united front of prejudices; and the result of this frustration, if or until they succeed in surmounting it, speaks, as the bible might say, ' in the name of' democracy" (Burke 192). Oh sweet Burke, I wish you weren't naive enough to say that. Or perhaps you are just inextricably brilliant and understand that nothing gets across to Americans unless you stroke their ego a little first, because evident in the racial discourse that opposed the Civil Rights Movement and upheld segregation politics, America is plainly capable or unified prejudice.

In fact I think that perhaps we can internalize much of Burke's analysis of Hitler's hateful discourse by contrasting Hitler's anti-semitic discourse with the racial discourse of the segregation movement.

Burke discusses Hitler's powerful hate-filled rhetoric in terms of how it served as a social elixir for the ailments present around the time of his rise politically. First he provided a unity for western europeans against a common enemy, "men who can unite against nothing else can unite on the basis of a foe shared by all" (Burke 193). Although I think we can agree that not every white person living in America between 1950-1968 fell victim to racists discourse, those who spoke in opposition to the Civil Rights Movement, like Hitler, focused on building unity in the white community in terms of Us vs. Them discourses. They, like Hitler were able to gain support by instilling fear in the economic market of the time period (Burke 195-6). Whites feared an economic market where their jobs would be challenged, maybe even controlled by, the increasingly more powerful black community. But perhaps the strongest connection between these Hateful discourses is their reliance on what Burke calls "Inborn Dignity." Which is a theory born from religious and Humanistic discourse and focuses on self-righteous
living, but was twisted by Hitler and the racial discourse of the 1950's in America. Hitler discussed his racial theory in terms of pure blood, elevating Aryans above Jews (Burke 202). This same argument was the force behind racial discourse that sought to rationalize segregation. The whites were seen as inherently born with aa a more pure race, and therefore it was the moral duty of politicians to separate them from their "less pure" counterparts.

Because of the ease with which we can draw lines between these hateful discourses we are demanded by Burke to reflect on the powerful unification these discourses provide. Does hateful discourse always follow this schema? If we understand how this argument is structured, can we provent it from ever happening again?