Throughout the second chapter of Darkwater by W.E.B. Du Bois, The Souls of White Folk, Du Bois highlights the dichotomy of White vs. Black that he argues has been established by European colonialism. According to Du Bois, the dichotomy exists under the premise that whiteness is synonymous to goodness and purity, whereas blackness is its opposite, being synonymous to evil and taintedness. Furthermore, he asserts, it is this racist dichotomy that upholds whiteness as “the ownership of the earth, forever and ever,” through the guise of European colonialism, to the extent of becoming the nation’s “religion,” especially by way of “white Christianity.” Du Bois argues that whiteness is seen as “Everything great, good, efficient, fair, and honorable,” …show more content…
Say to men, earnestly and repeatedly: “Honesty is best, knowledge is power; do unto others as you would be done by.” Say this and act it and the nation must move toward it, if not to it. But say to people: “The one virtue is to be white,” and the people rush to the inevitable conclusion, “Kill the ‘n-----’?”” Thus, the cultural solution that Du Bois presents is “A true and worthy ideal,” which will “free and uplift [the] people,” and which operates under a premise of honesty and equal chance to obtain power, unlike the current cultural doctrine that Du Bois speaks of as dictating that “the one virtue is to be white,” which does not allow for an equal chance to obtain power, rather solely favoring whiteness and perpetually persecuting and killing blackness. By using the n-word, Du Bois reinforces the cruelty and inhumanity which the culture of White power shapes around blackness. When Du Bois …show more content…
Black dichotomy that these Europeans have shapes has become an essential aspect of White Christianity, as the White vs. Black dichotomy is the most widely-ruling cultural-norm of the United States, and, as was aforementioned, has been inflicted by the European White Christianity which colonized America. The argument that follows is that “A nation religion is its life,” and later, Du Bois writes, “living is earning a living.” By this logic, Du Bois is arguing that the White Christianity which dominates the nation’s culture influences the life of the nation, a life which can be observed in the last paragraph as being founded upon racism, and which then means that the “earning a living” that he speaks of is also imbued with racism. Du Bois provides examples of the way that living and earning a living are imbued with the racism fueled by White European Christianity when he