Russell Contreras

Definitions of race are constantly changing and structuring and revolving to keep various systems in play.

I think the path to whiteness has widened, where in the past, if you were a black conservative or Latino conservative, you could engage in conservative spaces, but you were never accepted as fully white because of barriers that were in place.

Now some of those barriers have been lifted and in spaces that path has opened up.

For example, if you are a black conservative and we have a rich black conservative tradition in the United States with a lot of diversity all over the place.

True.

I think the difference here is that you've had a lot of fringe ideas

based on white supremacy, like, say, great replacement theory.

One's idea that if you said people of color are coming here to replace white people in positions of power and politics and education, you would have been considered a Nazi, and rightfully so for many years.

Exactly.

You would not be invited to the cookout, basically, if you would.

You wouldn't be invited over for the dinner party.

No, exactly.

I don't think you'd be invited for the kids' baptism or the wedding.

And if you espouse these ideas, even in a public space online, people would say, this is outrageous, and you'd be attacked.

But now these ideas have become mainstream and have allowed people of color to say, you know what?

I agree.

I agree with this.

And before, that wasn't the case.

And that's allowed you to engage in these spaces and to be accepted, even as ludicrous as it seemed.

In the past, we didn't have this pathway where