The Audacity of Crying “Wolf!”

The story known as “The Shepherd Boy and The Wolf” (aka The Boy Who Cried Wolf) was written back in 1673. You know the story, right? The boy cries “Wolf” and the townes people hurry to the scene to find out it was a false alarm. The boy does it yet again and the townes people came just as before. However the third time he cried “Wolf” it was no false alarm. Did the townes people come then? No. He lied to many times and lost their trust. The moral of the story: Even when liars tell the truth, they are never believed. The liar will lie once, twice, and then perish when he tells the truth. There have been many adaptations of this story ranging from “Sesame Street” to “Leave it to Beaver”. It seems that today we have a new version of this scenario. The term “racist” seems to be today’s “Wolf”. The term “racist” has been handed out to anyone who dares disagree with the presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama. Myself like many others who are Clinton supporters or are apart of Just Say No Deal have been called racists countless times as a means to discourage us from giving any criticism of Senator Obama. At first, many of us were quick to respond to these false allegations in an effort to save our civil rights amending reputations. We no longer make such an effort. This primary season has not only made the term “racist” meaningless but it has also made it a joke. I think half of the people pointing their fingers and naming people racists don’t even know what it really means. A racist is someone who discriminates against someones race. So why is it when you criticize anything about Obama except his race, you are labeled a racist? If you think he doesn’t have enough experience, you’re a racist. If you think he doesn’t have a great handle on the issues, you’re a racist. If you don’t like his radical connections, you’re a racist. If you call Obama a flip-flopper, you guessed it, you’re a racist. This which brings me back to the boy who cried wolf. Calling people “racist” doesn’t have the same effect on people now as it did months ago. We have just plainly gotten use to people throwing that word around. We have come to realize that for some people, it’s the only comeback they have. They know their candidate isn’t prepared to be president. They just use the term to make themselves feel better. As if making ourselves believe there’s something wrong with us and not their candidate. We no longer feel the need to defend ourselves after given the racist label. I have found myself simply replying “Whatever.” to the claim. Frankly, the Obama campaign and his supporters have cried wolf just too many times. So go ahead, call us racists. Just like in the story we are ignoring your cries and no one believes you.