The Great White Hoax: Two Centuries of Selling Racism in America

In his first book, literary scholar Kadish (English, Hunter Coll.) explores the American phenomenon he calls the “Great White Hoax.” Beginning in the 1830s through the mid-20th century, Americans feverishly consumed fake news stories and supposedly incontrovertible scientific proof of the inferiority of non-white people and conspiracies meant to promote white supremacy in the United States. These hoaxes targeted Black people, Chinese and Eastern European immigrants, Catholics, and Jews—anybody outside of the dominant white, Anglo-Saxon culture. “Viral” pre-internet newspaper articles that pushed racist lies even affected presidential elections and led to legislation based on those fake stories. To reach the widest audience possible, newspapers promoted sensationalistic narratives with little regard for the truth or facts. One early example involved the 1840 U.S. census, which purported to show that free Black people suffered from higher rates of mental illness than enslaved people. Though it was clear that faulty data led to this conclusion, many white people argued regardless that it demonstrated the inherent inferiority of Black people. The catalogue of racist hoaxes and misinformation in Kadish’s book provides a valuable template for modern readers to critically examine today’s hyper-partisan news media.