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Home All News The Cultural Roots of the Dismissive Argument that Obama Supporters Are “Obamamaniacs” | The Cultural Roots of the Dismissive Argument that Obama Supporters Are “Obamamaniacs” |
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| Written by Foresight | |
| Tuesday, 01 April 2008 | |
 As an African American historian of mental illness in the 19th Century, I am compelled to comment on the frequent use of madness metaphors to explain the success of Senator Barack Obama’s presidential campaign. Clinton and the media at large repeatedly characterize Obama’s historic success and momentum as “Obama-Mania,” some sort of intangible phenomena in which people are “spell-bound.” Instead of rallying for support, like any other candidate, Obama supporters are portrayed as “delusional.” Psychiatric language may be common place, even ubiquitous in the 21st century, but to employ it as a way to marginalize and disenfranchise African-American political momentum certainly has historical roots. Reports of Obama’s “animal magnetism” and “frenzied crowds” re-occur in media coverage of political contests, suggesting that supporters are merely “caught up in Obama-Mania.” 1984 Vice-Presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro stepped down from Hillary Clinton's finance committee after attempts to diminish Obama’s capacities and accomplishments, asserting his supporters are simply “caught up in the concept” and that Obama is “very lucky to be who he is.” She added, "It's been a very sexist media. Some just don't like [Hillary]. The others have gotten caught up in the Obama campaign." What is most troubling here is not Senator Clinton’s metaphors or Ferarro’s bitterness and race-baiting, but how press and lay-people alike continue to characterize Barack Obama’s political momentum as something which people are getting “caught up in,” insinuating that instead of rationally choosing to be political participants, Obama supporters are operating outside of reality, trapped under some kind of “spell.” History indicates such language comes to us from 19th century American psychiatry, where black people were thought to be “morally insane,” and incapable of free, rational thought. The Cultural Roots of the Dismissive Argument that Obama Supporters Are “Obamamaniacs”Comments
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