After The Virtue Signal: White People Have Cooled Toward Black Lives Matter

The wind of reaction is blowing at gale force now.

Mother Jones:

“In an opinion piece published by the New York Times, two political scientists, Jennifer Chudy of Wellesley College and Hakeem Jefferson of Stanford University, measured voters’ attitudes on key racial justice issues over the course of 2020. They specifically wanted to know, as they put it: “Did George Floyd’s death catalyze support for Black Lives Matter? If so, for how long and for whom?”

The answers, in a nutshell, are: yes, briefly, and for white Americans and Republicans. The fleeting support for Black Lives Matter among the latter groups didn’t merely fade in time. It fell to new lows. White Americans actually became less supportive of Black Lives Matter than they were before Floyd’s death. This trend, the researchers note, “seems unlikely to reverse anytime soon.”

New York Times:

“The moment was called “a racial reckoning.” Multiracial crowds of protesters took to the streets to call for racial justice. Books about racism soared to the top of best-seller lists. And surveys suggested that white Americans, many of whom had long opposed efforts to advance the goals of racial equality, were having a change of heart.

This time felt different. If previous instances of violence against Black people were quickly forgotten, the sense among many Americans was that George Floyd’s death would usher in a durable shift in attitudes regarding race and justice.

A year later, we needn’t engage in mere speculation. Time and data allow us to examine the stability of Americans’ racial attitudes. One key question: Did George Floyd’s death catalyze support for Black Lives Matter? If so, for how long and for whom? …

Here and elsewhere scholars have considered the parallels between the summer of 2020 and the tumultuous summers of the 1960s. The 1960s represented a watershed moment for race, in part because of the important shifts in American public opinion. But the lasting legacy of the era is found in its landmark legislation — the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Civil Rights Act of 1968 — rather than the changing of hearts and minds.

Some have wondered whether support for B.L.M., especially among white people, is genuine or merely virtue-signaling. As the volatility of the polling suggests, there is reason to be skeptical. This conversation, however, misrepresents racism as a social problem rooted in individual values rather than as a system forcefully sustained by our institutions. In our opinion, a more fruitful conversation would consider how to transform support for B.L.M., wherever and how tenuous it exists, into more enduring political change. Whether or not this effort will involve substantial numbers of white Americans remains to be seen. …”