If there is one thing the United States has learned over the past few months, it’s that the progressive left never lets heightened racial tensions go to waste.

Americans should go by a particular rule of thumb when the far left champions the cause of black Americans. Whenever progressives launch a campaign ostensibly designed to benefit minorities, it is reasonable to assume that they have an alternate agenda, one that has nothing to do with those they say they are helping.

Over the past few months, progressives politicians, leaders, pundits, and personalities have made a show of expressing solidarity with the black community in the wake of the killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers. These individuals are doing their best to persuade the nation, and especially black Americans, to believe they are working to effect real change in race relations. However, it seems that their efforts are lacking an essential component: solutions.

Progressive Machine Favors Gestures Over Substance

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio recently posted a defiant tweet against an individual who dumped a can of red paint on a Black Lives Matter mural sprawled across Fifth Avenue. The person, who ran off shortly after defacing the mural, has not yet been apprehended.

“Nice try,” the mayor tweeted in a post that also included a picture of the Department of Transportation personnel repainting the logo. In true virtue-signaling fashion, he added that the movement is “more than words and it can’t be undone.”

A significant number of cities run by Democratic leaders have painted Black Lives Matter murals in the wake of Floyd’s death to show support for the movement. It is one of several gestures leftists have made to establish unity with the black community.

In the music industry, artists have changed their names to be more racially sensitive. Country bands Lady Antebellum and the Dixie Chicks have removed “problematic” parts of their names to pre-empt any potential backlash from the left.

White actors have pledged to stop voicing animated characters of different race or ethnicity. Recently, Mike Henry, who does multiple characters on Fox’s Family Guy, announced that he would no longer voice the black Cleveland Brown character after 20 years in the role.

Of course, we can’t forget the recent spat over the Washington Redskins. The progressive left recently scored a victory after applying enough pressure to team ownership to drop the name in favor of one more acceptable to the woke Sanhedrin.

Virtue Signaling, Not Results

So, we have white voice actors giving up roles, country musicians getting woke, the Redskins changing names, and Black Lives Matter appearing on major city boulevards across the country. What do all of these noble declarations of support for black America mean?

Quite frankly, they don’t mean a damn thing.

In the end, all of the murals, name changes, and career choices are a Mount Everest of empty gestures, false promises, and blatant exploitation. These feckless displays of false concern will enrich not a single black life, and this is by design.

Instead of pursuing viable solutions to the issues plaguing black communities, the progressive crowd is content to virtue-signal and push for nonsensical solutions like defunding the police. These actions do not benefit black Americans; they are simple distractions intended to make everyone involved feel good.

It has become apparent that the Church of Wokeism is following one of its long-cherished commandments: Never let the killing of a black man go to waste. Over the past few months, the progressive left has eagerly leveraged the death of Floyd and the riots and protests that followed to launch a full-out woke offensive to influence in the national conversation.

The Redskins will change their name, not to honor the wishes of Native Americans who are offended, but to avoid being bullied any further. Lady Antebellum, now going by Lady A, is filing a lawsuit against a black singer, who used the name first, to avoid earning the wrath of the progressive priesthood.

But it seems that the objective is not to resolve racial inequality or police brutality. The aim is to stand on the corpses of black men and women to coerce even stricter obedience to the Church of Wokeism. In the end, only the progressives win and – once again — black Americans lose.

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Read more from Jeff Charles.