I WAS ONCE A WRASP

The Rev. Dana Prom Smith, S.T.D., Ph.D. (9/29/09)

I was once a WRASP until my Christian values overcame my familial loyalty. A WRASP is a White Republican, Anglo-Saxon Protestant. My family had been Republican back to Abraham Lincoln when Democrats were Copperheads, but then the ethics of grace and mercy overcame the Republican embrace of greed.

Something else happened. The nation changed from a hegemony of WRASPS into a multi-ethic society while they remained WRASPS. They aren't as important as they once were, especially after the election of a black man as president. So they became angry, peevish, and badly mannered. It's not that they're racists which they are, it's that they don't like anyone else in a kind of crazy tribalism.

There's not much to do about it, except ignore them, because there is little hope for change. Political and social fossils, they don't grow. They may gradually slough off, unless they're hardened in perpetuity into grumpy white old guys.

Appallingly, they seem to be getting worse. Not only are they
grumps, they're coarse and low class. No longer hoity-toity, they sound like riff-raff, shouting "nasties" in hallowed halls. They're enough to make a grumpy white old guy, a WASP, like me even grumpier.

Things are a little wobbly with just Democrats running things. They tend to run wild, something like the nouveau riche redecorating the castle in the bad taste. However, they're concerned about health care, education, prosperity, civility, and equality. Let's hope they chop off corporate welfare and send the corporate scoundrels to the rock pile.