Born Racists

On several fronts, I got wind of a Newsweek article that is being touted by many as being "liberal propaganda". Well I broke down and read it. Like most other Newsweek articles, it likes to avoid going into any depth of a single scenario and instead string a bunch of situations together into one long, noncohesive article. But in spite of the campy journalism, I do not see the "big liberal conspiracy here"; just like I failed to see the giant hoopla about President Obama's speech to schoolchildren. I have no clue when or how people became so super-sensitive...and also so adverse to things outside their own comfort zone.

I found the article very interesting, and if it were a presentation, would find myself nodding my head through most of it (most...but not all). It is funny, because in spite of the title, "Even Babies Discriminate", the article mainly focuses on children...and not babies. The revelation here is that white parents by far do not explicity address the issue of race. Instead they feel it is better that their children be "colorblind"; in that skin color is irrelevant. But it is relevant; in where that lies a big part of the problem. This is what I gently (or maybe not so gently sometimes) try to tell people. You cannot sugar coat reality and present that to your children as truth. Just like you should not try to teach your children that all criminals are put in jail; you should also not try to teach your children that all _____ people are treated as equals (unless you live in some unknown utopia somewhere that is).

The article also talks about how a diverse, integrated society doesn't change jack ___ in regards to alleviating racism; in fact, it can aggrevate it. This does not mean integration is bad; but it does mean that if applied incorrectly...like affirmative action has, it can be pointless ultimately. I have seen this demonstrated...from two instances in my own life. The first is when I was in elementary school...for the early part of it, I went to a Catholic school, which was probably 90% white; then later I went on to school in Allentown, PA where the student population was probably 60% White, 20% Hispanic, 10% Black and 10% 'other'. All throughout this time, most of my very close friends were not Black. In fact, in 4th grade if you would have asked me to list my 5 best friends, 2 would have been White, 2 would have been Puerto Rican (one which was a "White" Puerto Rican, the other biracial Black & Hispanic) and the other one was biracial (1/2 Black, 1/2 Italian). When I returned to western PA for 7th grade, I did not seek out friends on the prerequisite of skin color. So I was called a "sell out" because I happened to have more White friends than Black ones. What I know now (which I did not know then) is that I never really had the social precendent set for me that I could only be close friends with another Black child because the majority of my schoolmates had not been Black up until that point. My guess is that my Black schoolmates thought I was crazy and truly believed that they had little in common with our White classmates; surely not enough to be close, close friends with them.

The second demonstration of this came when I was an adult, and I moved to Miami. In Miami the "majority" (White people) are actually the "minority" in that somewhere between 60-70% of the residents of Miami-Dade county are of Hispanic origin. When you add African-Americans to the mix, you probably have 80% "minorities" around you. So you would think it would be the most tolerant, open-minded, least racist of places, right? Wrong. Not that Miami is anything like you would find in Alabama or the like. But you do have plenty of stereotypes that are very hard to break and that create a deep divide among people....even young people. I discovered that for the first time in my life, people would meet me, and then within the first couple of sentences start asking about my ethnic background (at least in Miami...people realize that Black people are not homogenous, so they at least have that going for them). I would try to skirt around the question but they would dig, and dig. Finally I would admit, in a cursory fashion, that my father was Jamaican and my mother American. "Oh...!" they would usually say, and their face would light up with an all-knowing look. Then the comments would start, "I like how Jamaican women are...", "You looked West Indian to me" (a lie, since I look just like my American mother), "Jamaicans are so ___". It's like, didn't you hear anything I said? I was born in Pennsylvania and raised by my American family. So how do your [invalid] perceptions of Jamaicans relate to me exactly? (????). Little did I know that many people in Miami had their entire social circle determined by ethnicity. Jamaicans were leary of Haitians; Cubans looked down on Puerto Ricans; South Americans had their little quirks and quibbles amongst each other; Trinidadians would get upset if you mistook them for being from Guyana. I met several White people who wanted to play mock UN (well you can be my Jamaican friend; I already have a Cuban, a Bajan, an Indian...). It was simply mind-blowing that all of this "ethnic stuff" mattered so much as to whether or not you could be someone's friend.

I think children are born with the right instincts, and then somewhere along the line, adults mess it all up for them. We have a natural curiosity at things that are "exotic" (in that we are not used to them) and will be more comfortable around things that mirror us a bit more (maybe this is why I was always weirded out by the long-haired, blue-eyed Jesus). However a child should be taught that the surface is just that...the surface. Sometimes you walk into the library and you'll see a pile of old tattered books. Now they may have been neglected because they were not all that good to begin with, so the library is not even concerned with taking the care to organize them. However you could have a real gem in there...a true masterpiece that was always overlooked because of it's tattered ugly appearance (it may even smell funny).

The only part of the article I really disagreed with is the part about minimizing the White pride aspect for White children. This is hypocritical. But I am sure when they think of "White pride" they are thinking of the Aryan nation version. However "Black pride" as it is presented is probably of the Huey Newton version. My take on that is that there is no "Black" or "White" pride. All of us are decendents of a culture. Even as African-Americans, if we do not know our African ancestral tribe, than we have 400 years of history here in America. Again, we should be presenting reality to children, and not a fairy tale presented as reality. There is no reason whatsoever that a White child cannot be proud of the accomplishments of their ancestors. Listen to Celtic music, dance to flamenco, learn to speak French. Everyone came from a culture that had moments of glory and moments of disgrace. This is nothing to be ashamed of. It is not nearly as shameful as deceiving little children and not properly preparing them to live in the world as it really exists.