Why Everyone — Whether Conservative, Liberal or Otherwise — Needs to Unite In Defeating Racism In America
The truth about defeating racism
By Sadhana Mandala
The Progressive Teen Staff Writer
IT WAS JUST A FEW YEARS AGO when people thought the country was ridden of its racist past and its citizens could finally move on to a racism-free America after President Barack Obama, an African-American man, became the President of the United States. People were talking about a post-racial world with the election of Obama in 2008 and again in 2012. The election itself was a show of strength and unity within the country; we can all agree that a black president is a remarkable step in the right direction.
But it’s just that — a step in the right direction.
There is still a far way to go after electing the first black president. While Obama’s presidency was a profound and meaningful moment in the progress of the country, racism, of course, never really went away. The election itself could not reverse centuries of ingrained racism. In fact, racism is built right into every level of our society in ways that are hard to wrap your head around. Racism is a social construct created by society in order to put the majority group superior to the minority group in the United States. In America, there are two kinds of racism: the systemic racism that’s built into our society, namely the policies and practices intended to harm certain racial groups, and individual unconscious racism, which is the actions of everyday people without acknowledgment of their racist actions. I believe that the solution to racism in our country is through practicing bipartisanship, changing perceptions, heightening diversity, addressing implicit and unconscious biases, acknowledging our racist past, and engaging in a common effort to change the narrative.
When America was conceived, the Declaration of Independence stated that “all men are created equal.” And yet the country’s other foundational document — The Constitution — protected that most unequal of institutions, slavery. Many people argue that this country, however built on the ideals of freedom and equality, was hypocritically also built on slavery. The south’s entire economy boomed from the agricultural use of slaves for the cotton industry. From this horrid past, it’s hard to imagine that the society we have today has eradicated all remnants of slavery in such a short time span.
I believe that the two-party system is one of the most destructive and toxic forces in America. It’s hard to believe that in a country where you have options in literally every aspect of your life, there are truly only two options in voting in our political system. I think Democrats take it for granted that they have the minority vote because a lot of people vote Democratic because they have no other choice. But if you introduce more choices in between the Democrats and Republicans, you would be surprised how much the voting would change.
The two-party system inherently creates a divide among Americans: either you are Democratic or Republican. There’s no in-between and because both parties have radically differing opinions, it’s hard to have a productive conversation because they both are just trying to one-up each other and argue to win. Politicians from both sides of the aisle should show that they are friends. Nancy Pelosi said, “We fight tooth and nail, but we don’t forget that we are people. We fight but don’t forget at the core, we are Americans” and I think they should do a better job of saying that to the American people.
The issue of racism shouldn’t be a partisan issue because people on both sides of the aisle should agree that black children and children of color shouldn’t face discrimination solely because of the color of their skin. There needs to be a unilateral effort to fighting racism from both sides of the aisle in order to make progress in equality for all Americans. Racism shouldn’t be a liberal or conservative issue but rather an American issue because it affects 20% of the county’s population.
Ever since the election of President Donald Trump, hate crimes have been at an all-time high. White supremacists have been empowered and hateful, anti-immigrant rhetoric has intensified. These incidents of hate and bias have been condemned by the majority of the country but systemic racism is something different and harder to detect. It’s less about violence and burning crosses then it is about everyday decisions made by people who may not even think of themselves as racist. It’s the unconscious bias and white privilege that everyday people must realize in playing a major role in the way Americans see race.
As sociologist Eduardo Bonilla-Silva has said, “The main problem nowadays is not the folks with the hoods, but the folks dressed in suits.” The term “Racism without racists” have been written about in articles and talked about in the news around the idea that the kind of racism we experience in American is majority unconscious biases and not intentional racists.
I think a big reason racism is still thriving is because people are uncomfortable and unable to talk about race like an everyday topic. Having the ability to avoid talking about race is a form of white privilege. As a person of color, there is not one day where I go about my life and forget that I am a person of color walking in the street of America, a country notorious for its racist bigotry. Every time I walk into a classroom, I am made aware of my race by people around me, and that I have to act in a specific way because of the color of my skin. I am immediately aware that I am the only student of color in the majority of my classes at Wellesley High School. Many people get defensive when the topic of white privilege is brought up because they assume it implies that you haven’t struggled or worked hard. White privilege isn’t “your life is easy because you are white.” White privilege means that “your skin color isn’t one of the things making it harder” No one is saying that your life is easy and you don’t have troubles, but unlike people of color, those troubles aren’t because of the color of your skin.
An academic paper described it as “White privilege of passing the invisible knapsack.” It described that white privilege is a set of unearned and noticed assets that white people of America have. They may not be aware of them but they can assume that they are able to cash in these assets anytime they need. The logic behind this is that the color of your skin plays a direct impact on how you are treated by your peers, employers, and society. Especially in Wellesley, being a majority white neighborhood, it’s very clear as a person of color to see the white privilege of individuals who go here. In order to address the issue of racism and the unleveled playing field, the white majority of this country need to accept their inherent privilege and how to make it fairer for people of color to participate in this system innately rigged against them.
In America, people are more offended at being called racist than actually being racist. Someone could say the most racist thing but the term “racist” is used as a derogatory term, like your accusing someone of a crime. When you label someone as a racist or call someone out for being racist, you are ostracising them from the conversation. When you accuse someone of being racist, it’s as if you are accusing them of a crime that they aren’t intentionally committing.
People also often say “Why are you being a victim? Racism doesn’t affect you that much!” There is a difference between claiming victimhood and standing up and saying that there is not a leveled playing field. Black people and people of color live in a world that is systematically meant to oppress them and keep them at the bottom of the social ladder. African Americans had a net worth that is ⅛ that of their white counterparts in the 1900s during gentrification and redlining. Redlining is when banks refused a loan to someone because they live in an area deemed to be a poor financial risk. These loans were typically not given to African Americans, and this causes the generations later not to have wealth in their families. The next generation of African Americans faces the same struggle their parents and grandparents faced, unlike white Americans who usually had families’ houses which they could base their net worth off.
In our city of Boston, one of the faster growing metropolitan cities, the income inequality disparities between whites and blacks are shocking. Newsweek report,
“African Americans have a median net worth of $8 new report shows. White households in Boston, on the other hand, have an average net worth of $247,500, or nearly 31,000 times more than African-American Bostonians.”
Of course, it’s just an average of a set of people and isn’t representative of all African American families or White families but these stats are indisputable. It’s unfathomable that in such a liberal and modern city like Boston, the income inequality between white people and black people is so high. The systemic wealth gap is started here in cities like Boston that linger on from generation to generation, widening the income inequality gap. The system set in place in America is built in such a way that only a select group of people have the opportunity for success.
For example, a country similar to the United States with a racist history is South Africa. Apartheid is a policy that governed relations between South Africa’s white minority and nonwhite majority and sanctioned racial segregation and political and economic discrimination against nonwhites. However in South Africa, at the end of Apartheid, there was an acknowledgment of racism. A Truth and Reconciliation Commission that as a nation everyone agrees that apartheid happened. There was a universal acknowledgment in South Africa that there was racism, segregation, and people even said “Yes, I came after you because you were black”, all happened because of the racism in South Africa at that time. The TRC acknowledged that as a person of color, you are not mental or crazy — you’re not crazy for thinking that there is a system in place oppressing and holding you back because there was.
In America, I think this kind of acknowledgment is hard to come by because the fear of retribution is too high. However, if the citizens of the country come together to acknowledge the fact that slavery happened and racism is still ingrained in the states. If everyone in the state can come to that kind of acknowledgment, then I think it is possible for our country as a whole to move forward from the horrific deeds we’ve committed in the past.
Fundamentally, I think we treat racism the wrong way in America. I think we should treat racism as a disease, and not as a choice. Racism is for all intents and purposes, a disease which is passed down from generation to generation. Being racist is not a conscious choice by individuals but rather taught to them over time. If your not in a world where racism exists, you don’t become a racist. The environment and surroundings which you surround yourself by dictate how you are to act in terms of accepting and rejecting people of different races.
Fortunately, racism does not stand up well to contact. Racism doesn’t hold up when people are in contact with people of another race because racism is based on race, and race is a construct that has been created to oppress people. For example, It’s hard to hate black people when you have black friends. Not that racist people aren’t friends with people from other races but it’s simply harder to harness feeling of hate and superiority when the colleagues you work with every day are of that very race, when the neighbors who you go to the grocery store are of that race, when your friends you spend your weekends with are of that race. You most commonly see racism in areas where there is very little diversity of races. A way to prevent people from harnessing those racist and prejudice tendencies is simply to diversify living places through immigration policies and increase tolerance towards people who are different to us. Surrounding yourself with people of different races chips away at the racist tendencies and biases taught to you by society because you start to see a black person as just a person.
I believe that the way to solving racism isn’t solely based on political pressure and governmental change but a social movement of change. The students of Young Ethnic Scholars (YES) club organized a school walkout against racial inequality faced by students of color at Wellesley High school. My friends and I organized a silent-sit and walkout to demand the school administration to change their ways and make new changes to the school in order to make our school experience more inclusive. The walkout in Wellesley was started on a local level from the formation of a student led group walking out of class for racial justice, and it created a huge impact for the people in the community. It not only empowered us to speak out against what we believe is the most crucial issue at Wellesley, but it affected our white peers as well. Hearing personal stories from their fellow classmates about microaggressions students of color face really struck a chord with everyone in the audience. It changed my friend’s perspective on how privilege impacts them and how they can act in order to assure that students of color feel more welcomed and comfortable in our school environment.
What we need as a country to get through the racism and bigotry is a similar walkout and protest in Washington and around the country to demand social change and interventions for anti-racism practices. The walkout that Wellesley had on a small scale should be a model for the kind of leadership and activism we need on a large scale. Only then will we see fundamental change tackling the root cause of racism. I am hopeful for the future of America because of our young generation that stands up and fights for what is morally right. We don’t listen to the logistics and feasibility by our school board or governmental agencies but we organize and fight for what we believe to be right. It is activism like this we need in order to systematically chip away at the decades of ingrained racism in our society.
