White Supremacy’s Implosion Is Both Beautiful and Dangerous

The boogeyman was really nothing more than their own shadow

Shane Paul Neil
LEVEL
Published in
4 min readJan 7, 2021

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Photo: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

We were supposed to celebrate Stacey Abrams saving the country. We should have enjoyed at least a day’s worth of (tempered) joy at the prospect of the country beginning to right itself.

That didn’t happen.

What we got instead was an act of domestic terrorism. Worse still, we watched as those terrorists received coddling under the cloak of White privilege.

In my lifetime, I don’t think I have witnessed this kind of White panic. We have all watched as White supremacy and fragility converged on themselves and created a wave of paranoia. That paranoia resulted in an attempt to cripple the federal government.

With the power of whiteness, it almost worked.

We saw gates miraculously opened, allowing “protesters” to storm the Capitol with Congress in session. We were amazed that there was little to no attempt to hide identities. Participants gave their full names in interviews and offered explanations for participating in group treason. We watched as those who were strong enough to break into the Capitol were suddenly too feeble to walk down the stairs without assistance. Rioters were offended and heartbroken when they were met…

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Shane Paul Neil
LEVEL
Writer for

Writer (duh) and photographer. Bylines @levelmag @complex @ebony @huffpo shanepaulneil.com