Anti-racist' scholar: 'Civility' pleas come from 'those who feel...white supremacy is under threat

An "anti-racist" scholar at New York University declared that "calls for civility" — in the wake of public harassment of officials in President Donald Trump's administration — "are just a power play by those who feel that white supremacy is under threat."

Simran Jeet Singh — a Henry R. Luce Post-Doctoral Fellow for Religion in International Affairs at NYU’s Center for Religion and Media — tweeted Monday that "lecturing people of color about civility in this climate is an ultimate sign of privilege. If you don’t know what it’s like to fight for your life every single day, then it might not be your place to tell us how to fight personal and systemic racism."

Also a Senior Religion Fellow for the Sikh Coalition, Singh added that "they mobilize and run these dehumanizing racist systems — and then they ask us to be more civil?"

What's the background?

A fired-up U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) over the weekend urged public harassment of Trump officials after White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and her family were asked to leave a restaurant due to the owner’s “moral conviction” against Trump, and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen was heckled by Democratic Socialists inside a Washington, D.C., Mexican restaurant.

But Democratic leaders such as House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) spoke out against Waters and called for civility.

'Civility is racially coded, too'

Singh was apparently unmoved by Pelosi and Schumer, saying in a second Twitter thread that "civility is racially coded, too."

"Europeans described those they colonized as uncivilized people’s (barbaric, backwards, savages) in need of civilizing," he continued. "This logic was central to the colonial enterprise."

Singh said the "continued representation of people of color as being less civil" is a "stereotype continues to permeate our social imaginations." He also wrote that since "whiteness is rooted in European colonialism, it is easy to see how and why whiteness aims to make an exclusive claim to civility."

Singh then declared that "post-colonial scholarship" shows that "calls for civility are just a power play by those who feel that white supremacy is under threat."

Campus Reform said it reached out to Singh for comment but didn't receive a response.

Here's a video profile of Singh: