Anti-Racism Is A Religion— And Nearing Cult Status

How much wrong is Ibram X. Kendi willing to do to prove he’s on the right side of history?

Linguist John McWhorter hit absolute paydirt in 2015 when he argued that 21st-century antiracism is far more religious than political. “The Antiracism religion has clergy, creed, and also even a conception of Original Sin,” McWhorter wrote. “It is what we worship, as sincerely and fervently as many worship God and Jesus and, among most Blue State Americans, more so.”

Having grown up in religious circles, I don’t find it hard to look at the modern antiracist movement and see the parallels. Racial division may not be quite as prominent a topic right now as it was in, say, 2014 and the summer of 2020, as it takes a backseat to matters such as elections, the future of our political parties, and whether Thomas Jefferson actually invented the swivel chair. But this backgrounding can help us to see what the antiracist true believers are really up to, and where the movement is currently placing its evangelistic -- yes, that is the right word -- focus.

Unsurprisingly, as with many actual religions, there’s a lot of lying and manipulation going on. Ibram X. Kendi, the high priest of the American antiracist religion, has released his newest ‘sermon’ via Netflix: Stamped From the Beginning, an adaptation of his 2016 tome by the same name. The documentary is like virtual church for antiracists, except without . . . well, there’s very few positives to virtual church, so the analogy holds. It’s exceptionally well-produced and well-told. And it’s a 92-minute tour de force in advancing the profoundly dishonest and overbroad rhetoric of the antiracist religion promising to liberate us from America’s original sin.

My latest at National Review. Read the rest here. If you hit a paywall, shoot me an email.