WHITE PEOPLE ARE SCARY AF

White folk done got me shook. They're downright frigtening, out of control, dangerous, irresponsible, and rageous. They're scary AF.

Or, at least some of them are.

And there have been several recent polls that provide a peek into just who these scary people are--provide a glimpse into the demographic groups who, in the midst of a pandemic, appear more than willing to put their bodies, and the bodies of others, at risk of sickeness and possibly death.

Take, for instance, the state of Texas--the place where I currently reside. Just a few months ago, the University of Texas and the Texas Tribune jointly conducted and published the results of a poll that highlighted how different groups were responding to getting that poke in the arm. Their findings were stark. It's not Black folk who are the problem when it comes to rolling up their sleeve and getting jab in the arm. Despite the constant focus on us, despite the axiomatic assumption that the putative dysfunctional behvaior of Black people put them at risk, despite the common wisdom that themedical profession's of history of devaluing the Black body would result in us being hostile toward the idea of getting vaccinated against COVID--despite all of this, the results of the poll showed that the percentage of Blacks saying that they had no intention of taking that shot plummeted from 53% to 29% between October 2020 and February 2021. Anyway you cut it, that's a garganutan drop in a relatively short period of time, and we ought to be getting something that we rarely get: Publicly commended for doing our part in protecting not only our own lives but also safeguarding the common good.

Contrast that with the percentage of White Republicans who are flipping the bird to rolling up their sleeves: During that same time period--October 2020 to February 2021-- the percentage of White Republicans "resistors" hardly budged, remaining stuck around the low 40's. All of which leads the pollsters to point out that "White republicans have emerged as the demographic group that's proven most consistently hesistant about COVID-19 vaccines."

To date, more than three million Texans have caught a case of COVID, and of that number, 54,000 have been ushered into their graves. And as if that ain't enough, researchers are predicting that within the next couple of weeks the hospitalization rate could very well be back up where it was in January 2021-- the height of the pandemic. What's more, Gamma and Lamda could be suiting up to follow Delta. That's a real possibility if current trends continue. More sickness. More death. More heartache. And yet, we've got a sizeable swath of White Republicans who are still flipping the bird at vaccination. Disastrous. Downright dystopian. Rabidly reckless. Walking and talking petri dishes.

White people are scary as AF.

But it's not just Texas. A poll by Civiqs found that between December 2020 and August 2021, the percentage of Black folk saying they had no intention of getting the vaccine took a serious nosedive, plunging from 27% to 9%. What about Whites? You guessed it: The percentage saying "no" to the vax remained stuck at around 30%. The story for White Republicans is even worse: That percentage has hoovered around 43%; in contrast, the percentage of White Democrats resistant to the vaccine dropped from 5% to 1%. Finally, a NPR/PBS/Marist Poll found that almost 50% of people who voted for Trump said they refuse a vaccination if it was made available to them.

Just think about the insanity of this. At a time when well over 36,000,000 people have contracted cases. At a time when over 600,000 U.S. residents--and counting-- have already perished from the pandemic. At a time when the seven day average of new reported cases is racing toward 100,000. At a time when COVID related hospitalizations are surging across the United States. At a time when we're being constantly reminded that it's the unvaccinated who're catching most of the smoke. At a time like this, we've still got large numbers of people outrightly refusing to roll up their sleeves. We've still got a cluster of predominantly White and Republican folk defiantly resisting getting jabbed in the arm. We've still got people who've decided that this is the hill that they're willing to die on.

White people are scary AF.

THEY NOT INTO WEED LIKE THAT!

So, yeah, we're in jam. I suspect that the die-hard vax resisters are beyond moral suasion and, therefore, not capable--or even interested-- in being pulled out of the depths of their depraved behavior. I don't believe that graphs, dialogues, and numbers are capable of moving sufficient numbers of the "refuseniks"to consent to getting that much needed poke in the arm. As far as this hard-core is concerned, pleading for them to get vaccinated is akin to asking them to give up on their vision of what it means to be White, free, and "great again." Asking them to roll up their sleeve is akin to requesting them to renounce their membership in the Church of White Rage-- a mega church that, in their minds, projects and strives for an earthly Kindgom where they are the victorious rather than the victimized. Their adamant resistance to getting vaxxed--and what that means for the rest of us-- cannot be fully grasped and understood outside of their political and religious beliefs that's fueling all of this dangerous reticience.

Dangling the possibility of winning the lottery doesn't work. Teasing them with free beer and hot dogs is a gargantuan waste of time and resources. And in states where it's legal, sliding them a joint for a jab is to deeply mis-read the nature and depth of these White Republicans that're providing the energy propelling the "resistance movement."

They just not into weed like that.

What to do, then? I don't have a full answer. But of this, I'm convinced: We need to openly acknowledge who's driving this resistance. We need to drop all narratives that deflect from the fact that the fuel behind this heat is being heavily provided by a hard core of White folk. We need to admit--as difficult as it for some of us to do so-- that there are some situations where moral suasion is inexpedient. We must admit that we cannot tolerate a White minority putting the common good at risk. We need to admit that these hard-core "resisters" are the same people who believe that the election was stolen from Trump, that some imaginary large scale voter fraud demands the disenfranchisment, that the vax is the mark of the beast, and that there's some pizza joint in DC where kids were getting abused by the liberal elite. We need to double down on our own resistance to the broader political project that these folks are a part of and, further, we need to increase the political and economic costs for these hard core resisters who insist on their putative right to disregard the common good. These folks need to catch a glimpse of the stick, and we need to discuss what that might look like. We need to consider this, and more, because some of these White folk out here are crazy AF.

Catch you on the flip side,

Doc Greene