When Lincoln freed the slaves (in Confederate territory only, of course), some of the most voracious opposition came not from slave owners, but from poor whites. To be sure, there was an economic aspect–freed blacks would now be competing for jobs–but there was a more important and deeper social logic behind their opposition. If you were a dirt poor Caucasian in the South, the only thing you had was the knowledge that at least you weren't a slave, that you were better than these demi-humans the Lord had seen fit to place in bondage, <b>below you on the American social totem pole</b>.

Wallerstein, in his world-systems writings, talked about the world not in terms of a First, Second, or Third World, but in terms of <b>core</b> and <b>periphery</b>. As capitalism constantly demands cheap labor for production, while at the same time demanding workers with enough buying power to consume these cheaply made goods, what happened was that the core (what some refer to as 'the First World') exported the terrible labor conditions of the Industrial age to poorer countries where there was a steady supply of rural migrants fresh from the farms to the factories.

In other words, in order for us to be relatively happy, someone else must be relatively unhappy. When one country exhausts its supply of newcomers to industrialization, its cheap labor needs do not cease to exist–we just find a new bunch of people to push around.

I was thinking about this while I was watching the new show, "Mind of Mencia," on Comedy Central. Echoing a sentiment you often hear from comedians (the only people who are allowed to be racists on television), some blacks and Hispanics are overwhelmed with relief that they are no longer on the bottom of our national ladder. As Mencia said, "Achmed–tag! You're it!" Elsewhere on Comedy Central, I've seen several black stand-up comedians extolling the virtues of racial profiling… but only when it applies only to Arabs and Muslims.

Why would people who, by their own admission, have suffered unjustly under racial profiling, so willingly endorse it? Because there is a hidden truth about racial profiling which I have hinted at previously:

Racial profiling is not necessarily intended to be a punitive measure against the target group, even though it ends up being one. Rather, racial profiling is a way to make racial elites feel safer. Remember who's proposing the policy–it isn't that we should be hassling Arabs, necessarily; it's that they <b>aren't</b> hassling the profilers' group(s). That's why Mencia calls 9/11 " a great day for blacks and Latinos;" they're tired of this bullshit, but the pro-profiling minority crowd's objection is neither moral nor utilitarian, it's just plain selfish.

My previous writings on racial profiling can be found here, here and here.