A CNN story published Thursday says some black people are “almost relieved to see Obama go” because of how the president’s time in the White House has heightened racial tensions in the country.
“Black America: We didn’t know how racist America was until it elected its first black president,” reads a description of author John Blake’s compilation of other’s opinions focusing on what African-Americans “won’t miss about Obama.” The author interviewed seven people for the story, primarily drawing his conclusions about what blacks think about Obama from those interviews.
“There’s been a lot of talk about angry white Americans and the rise of Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. But what about the anger that many blacks and others have felt over the treatment of Obama? What might that anger give rise to, and how is it changing them?” wrote Blake.
He claimed after conducting the interviews for this report that “a psychological shift is taking place among many blacks” in reaction to racially tinged political rhetoric that has led many to report “they’ve never felt so much pessimism about white America, such hopelessness.”
Blake wrote that many see “racial venom” in the way the president has been treated during his time in office, and said as a result that “some black people unfriended white America… They would hear a stray remark from a white coworker, argue over something that Obama was facing, and suddenly a close relationship would turn chilly.”
After quoting political blogger Mashaun D. Simon’s continued concerns about Obama’s physical safety because there are “people who are still very angry that he was in the White House,” Blake concluded the story with questions about whether the promised hope and change will ever be realized.
“Obama will soon be gone from office. Will his successor inspire black Americans to recover some of the optimism they lost during the Obama years? Or will the promise of a compassionate, multiracial democracy that Obama embodies seem like a lie?”
