Former South Bend, Indiana mayor and current Democratic Party presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg wants to be seen as the reasonable and tolerant adult in the room. But this branding effort is constantly thwarted by Pete Buttigieg himself. Time and again he reveals that, under the smiling, baby-faced surface, he is a man brimming with rage and resentment towards those who don’t think like him. He is also a moral coward and a simpering poser who wants nothing more than to be accepted by the wokest fringes of the Democratic base. All of these various competing aspects of Buttigieg’s personality were put on display in a bizarre survey he recently sent to his staff.
The “Microaggressions in the workplace” survey is explicitly intended only for those in his staff who “identify as a person of color.” Or, as the mayor said elsewhere, his “staff of color” (which sounds like something wielded by a flamboyant wizard). The answers provided will be used “to inform our white colleagues about privilege and microaggression.” This is why they are excluded from filling it out. Buttigieg realizes that white people are too pampered to have ever experienced microaggressions, whatever those are, and too stupid to know what privilege is.
The document then reads: “In the workplace, have you ever experienced the following from a white colleague?” The possible traumatic experiences include being talked over, left off of email chains, not invited to meetings, or called the wrong name accidentally. The survey taker is next provided the opportunity to give longer, written answers to questions like “What does good allyship feel like?” and “What does bad allyship feel like?” Weirdly, they are asked to describe the “physical environment” they were in when they experienced these microaggressions. Buttigieg also wants to know if there were any “witnesses” to these crimes. Suddenly a person not getting cc’ed on an email has turned into an episode of CSI.
Now, a few things must be noted upfront. First, all of the listed “microaggressions” are nothing more than very normal, very insignificant (indeed, micro) social miscues. Literally every adult in the country has been microaggressed in some or all of these ways. Adults who stew over these kinds of things, and who find themselves so impacted by it that they can provide numerous specific examples complete with physical descriptions of the surrounding environment where it occurred, are emotionally immature to a clinical degree and unfit for any sort of employment. When a white man is talked over or called the wrong name, nobody considers it a racist affront. Nobody considers it anything. It’s just a part of life. Well, the same goes for non-white people, as well. I’m sure this will be its own microaggression, but my response to anyone of any race crying about mild rudeness and minor annoyances in the workplace is: Get over it, you humungous baby.
More to the point, this little questionnaire is one of the most blatantly racist things we’ve seen from any American politician in many years. One wonders whether it is even legal for an employer to send around a survey to subordinates of one race inquiring about the conduct of another race. Certainly, it would be unthinkable with the roles reversed. Just imagine a survey to be filled out only by those who “identify as white,” asking if they’ve ever been the victim of rude behavior from their “black colleagues.” The outrage would be nuclear in proportion. The politician or candidate responsible would be tarred and feathered, then tied to a donkey and banished into the wilderness.
But this is different, somehow. Singling out and scolding white workers is not racist, somehow. Different rules apply, somehow. Nobody can explain how. Or why. It’s a double standard we are simply meant to accept without question or complaint.