This is how the entire history of racism worked in the United States. You may be a poor white person, living in a crappy neighborhood, with a crappy job, but atleast you're not black with things like Jim Crow, police, and redlining making sure legally your life is even worse. Plus your boss looks just like you and said you're a cultural fit so you may even be rich like him one day!

You reminded me of the Lyndon B Johnson quote which seems more relevant that ever. "If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you."

The trouble with this quote is that it's too easy to misinterpret it exactly in favor of the people it's criticizing.

Racism is a system for pitting poor white people and poor black people against each other. But the perpetrators are not the people in the other tribe, they're the people telling you that there should be separate tribes.

Racists were just temporarily embarrassed by the civil war.

Were they? If so, embarrassed about what? Losing it?

I think they and right wingers are only embarrassed by losing, it explain their behaviour.

Bacon's Rebellion [1] in colonial Virginia, 1676-7, was a a multi-race and cross-class uprising against the colonial government and the aritocratic planter class. The rebellion's failure was followed by measures that served to alienate the poor white population from the enslaved black population.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacon%27s_Rebellion