Following Donald Trump’s victory in the general election, the entire nation experienced a spike of racially-charged attacks from emboldened racists and bigots who found their own concealed beliefs represented in mainstream politics.
Living in the Bay Area, however, this phenomenon felt completely alien to me. A solid blue state since 1992, it's no secret that California, especially the Bay Area, is very socially liberal; after Trump's victory, California state legislators vowed to preserve the rights of all Californians, regardless of who was in the White House. It makes it easy to presume that we are in our own little bubble, safe from the hostility towards minorities that's bound to come with the next four years.
But the morning after the election, a friend of mine-- let’s call her J-- was confronted by a woman at Safeway while she was using the self-checkout to buy food. The woman commanded J to show her bag. Confused, J complied; this was the first time she had ever been stopped.
“I’m so glad Trump won," J later heard the woman say to a coworker.
J is Indian. Hers is just one unreported case of post-election, racially-charged harassment in California.
The alt-right movement in California seems to be one that has only recently been gaining traction. Three months ago, flyers by white nationalist organization Identity Evropa were found glued at various locations on and around Amador Valley high school's campus in Pleasanton, California.
A small, affluent city, Pleasanton lies south of Oakland and San Francisco, which are two of the most liberal cities in the United States. Though it certainly is less liberal than the rest of California, it’s in no way a hub for conservatism, with the high schools being much less so.
“I think this is problematic for a school [in] Pleasanton especially because we have such a racially diverse campus. We have a lot of Asian people, a lot of Indian people, for example - it’s not just white people. So for someone to put up a flyer like that, to say ‘white people are the best, white people are supreme, we need to take back our country,’ especially in a school like this, is essentially saying that most of us do not belong here in the United States, or here in Pleasanton specifically,” said Kelly Chen, a Chinese-American senior at Amador Valley.
Amador's “racially diverse campus" as it turns out, rounds to an approximately 49% minority student body.
Founded in March 2016 by Nathan Damigo, Identity Evropa is a white nationalist group, so to speak, that hopes to secure a “better future for People of European Heritage” by spreading messages of white pride and speaking out against multiculturalism and immigration in America.
The organization is based on the notion that Europeans are being marginalized by current society and that America was meant to be an ethnically homogeneous (white) nation. According to Identity Evropa, all races are biologically unequal, and the equality of races is an “un-American” ideal.
"“The term "White Supremacist” is a word that means “I don’t like you.” It is language used to undermine European interests and promote the replacement of European people through mass immigration. It is, at its core, anti-white hate speech.”
It works to build white pride and identity, and inform the public on so-called "Cultural Marxism," which is, essentially, the spread of political correctness and multiculturalism.
“Multiculturalism means our [European] displacement. When someone says a school, institution, business, etc. needs more diversity, what they are saying is that it needs less European people. This is not something that is only happening in America, but something that is also happening in our homelands,” wrote a representative of Identity Evropa in an interview I conducted over Facebook.
Young, educated, and well-groomed, these white supremacists have traded their hoods for Bermuda shorts and button ups. They function under the guise of citizens who are concerned for the well-being of the nation and the safety of Americans, and they rely on civilized discussions with fellow college students to gain more following.
These are the types of racists California has to fear. And with Trump’s inauguration less than a month away, we can only expect that this trend will proliferate. As a young Korean female, I fear for my friends, for my family, for the future. Because the way things are looking now, under a Trump presidency, no state--no person--can truly be protected.
