Who’s the Bigot?
This chapter uses two advice columns, fifty years apart, to introduce the argument that the increasing turn to the language of bigotry poses puzzles that demand attention. Despite evident agreement that bigotry in all its forms is wrong and contrary to national ideals, political battles in the United States over “calling out” bigotry are fraught and polarizing; people disagree over bigotry’s forms. Conflicts during the 2016 presidential election and the Trump presidency provide examples. The chapter introduces several puzzles about bigotry that later chapters will address by analyzing controversies over interfaith, interracial, and same-sex marriage; racial desegregation; and civil rights laws. That study reveals recurring patterns of argument. The chapter also contends that past examples of bigotry on which there is now consensus—such as anti-Semitism and racism—inform judgments about newer forms, as in the constitutional conflicts over same-sex marriage and conscience-based objections to civil rights laws.