“Prepare to be shocked by how far race hustlers will go and how much farther Matt Walsh will go to expose the grift” is how this movie is described on official platforms, including IMDb. Combine that with the labels of comedy and documentary and what could possibly go wrong?
Daily Wire author and documentary star Matt Walsh has been earning a living off pandering to Christian conservatives since 2014. Walsh’s first endeavor — the transphobic film “What is a Woman?” that attempted to expose “radical gender ideology” as a hypocritical joke — garnered millions of views and public notoriety, and now Walsh has decided to create a spiritual successor in “Am I Racist?” The movie succeeds at making the viewer uncomfortable, exposing the immense gaps in logic within Walsh’s conservative politics and little else.
Before his foray into starring in documentaries, Walsh had a long history of outrage-inspiring alt-right opinions, such as supporting the use of the N-word in a “friendly way”; the idea that 40 hours of work a week is nothing; and an unfounded insistence that Boston Children’s Hospital was performing transgender surgeries on children, which led to his fans sending bomb threats to the hospital. It is unsurprising then that Walsh doesn’t believe racism exists either. America can’t be racist. After all, as he says in “Am I Racist?”, when Walsh was a straight white male teenager in the ’90s he “never thought about race.”
To profit off a conservative fan base, you must glorify the past, and to prove that a country built on stolen land with slave labor is not at least somewhat racist, Walsh decided to try to take on the “anti-racist industry” in an over-edited documentary where he attempts to go undercover to diversity, equity and inclusion trainings, anti-racism workshops and interviews with leading anti-racist scholars to expose the flaws in their ideology. And I do mean “attempts.”
He slaps on an ill-fitting wig, a different outfit and a pair of glasses and calls it a day. He then acts smugly victorious when the people he interviews or films under false pretenses grow uncomfortable around him, as if they are disturbed by the opinions he’s expressing and not by how he’s forcing them into an intensely awkward situation while practically jumping half of them on the street. Walsh feels so validated by this that an entire part of the movie is dedicated to him walking down different streets flashing people a certificate he received for completing a DEI training and attempting to barge into their conversations.
Walsh’s caricature of a liberal asking naive, well-intentioned questions is intended to demonstrate that the “anti-racism industry” punishes good-faith inquiry and thoughtful discussion, but all he proves is his own incompetence. Most people he interacts with can tell he is not taking anything he learns seriously. After repeatedly interrupting a workshop, one group even recognizes him as Matt Walsh and then force him to leave.
Not only does Walsh take his unwilling participants’ discomfort as proof racism isn’t real, most of the quotes in the movie appear to be heavily edited to avoid any mention of the actual history of racism. The editing techniques used to make Walsh look better, like putting music over his uncomfortable moments while emphasizing his adversary’s stumbling with complete silence, are almost painful. This movie is hardly even pretending to see the other perspective, it’s just an ego stroke and a way to squeeze money out of people who feel attacked by anti-racism.
Both Walsh’s ego and wallet have been growing for a while through stunts such as this documentary. His previous endeavors such as “What is a Woman?” and selling merch of a baby with his face on it were hits with his audience, so of course the pandering continues. Walsh wants nothing more than clicks and to be seen as a countercultural icon while at the same time only properly engaging with people who agree with him; a loyal audience is a profitable audience. To keep the money printing, Walsh targets people who feel wronged and pulls them into increasingly extreme radical ideas, ensuring they feel attacked by the world and affirmed only by him. By hyper-focusing on outliers, such a one man lying about experiencing a hate crime, Walsh obscures the damage he and his fans have done since it couldn’t possibly be as bad as the lie he uncovered. Walsh profits from the outrage he generates, and his presentation and discussion of it amplifies the racist thoughts and behaviors within his fanbase. According to Walsh himself, when his show was on YouTube, it would make $100,000 in just a month with ad revenue. “Am I Racist?” has already made $11 million.
By the very end of the movie, has Walsh even answered his own question? Arguably, he has, but with confirmation bias he can’t be bothered to hide instead of through actual facts or research.