No, they thought they were protecting America. I grew up racist in the MS Delta, the very deepest of the Deep South, and ground zero for racism in America. I know how they think. If you were to interview them, almost to a man they’d very seriously tell you that they are good people, that they only want the best for everyone, and that they just want to protect America.

The key is in a quote by the Soviet dissident Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: “To do evil, one must first believe he is doing good.”

What I’m getting at is that most racists in America don’t even realize that they are racists at all. My family — and every white I knew in the Delta — was deeply racist…but they would all have been deeply offended to be called racist. Remember Jesus quote: “Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do.”

Yes, there are exceptions, but what you see above is the rule. Most of them really do think of themselves as good, honest, hardworking Americans…and have precisely zero clue about the reality, the actual harm they are committing. I know that because I never knew of the harm that I did until my travels in the Navy showed me just how racist I really was.