All white people are racist.
This is a statement that I've seen argued about many times. Most of the time, someone will post it on Facebook, and the comments will be filled with well-meaning white people defending themselves, angry and insulted because they consider themselves an ally fighting for racial equity - they are fighting against racism, so no, they are not racist!
However, I find it so extremely important to accept it as the truth. All white people are racist (feel free to battle it out in the comments section below, I guess). You can be fighting against racism and still have been strongly, mostly unconsciously influenced by a system rooted in racism. As a white person, as a liberal who is committed to social justice work, this has been hard for me to accept. But I've found that the way to be the most productive is to realize that I am racist. It's a scary thing to say, especially in Oak Park, of all places. And never in a million years would I be racist purposefully, consciously. I wake up every day and try so hard to be politically correct and a good ally and show solidarity and do everything "right." But through no immediate fault of my own, I am and will always be racist, and so will every other white person. I'm getting preachey here, but we have to recognize the racism in ourselves in order to combat the racism in others and in society. We have benefited from a racist system - not something we chose, but it still happened. I have to question myself frequently, call myself on my ingrained, subtle beliefs. If I tense up when there's a group of black men coming towards me on the sidewalk, I have to ask - would I be less tense if they were white? I'd still have a pit in my stomach because of the gender situation, but it would definitely be smaller if they were white. Noticing that feels disgusting. It feels awful, and I feel guilty and ashamed. But it's so much better to keep noticing it and questioning it than to let it slip by and pretend I am the perfect Oak Park liberal.
And there are so many more things I say, do, and think that are probably racist but I don't catch. I mean so well, but I could easily be one of the white people in one of the scenarios in Citizen. It's freaky, but I think all white people could be in this book, and most probably have no idea.
I agree that most everybody has done a racist thing or said something racist and at the time they did not know that is was discriminatory towards African Americans. Maybe they still don't. The thing that bothers me is when people say I have never said a racist thing or done something racist because you can very easily be against racism and fighting for equality and still be racist in a way. It is hard to tell when you are being racist because what you did or said might not have crossed your mind.
ReplyDeleteThis is very true and exactly why being "colorblind" or just simply not teaching racism is not nearly enough. Racism is something that needs to be actively unlearned. That being said, no one in this generation will be able to say that they have unlearned it. Just as racism took generations to get to its most extreme, it will take generations to unlearn.
ReplyDeleteI know that the comments on this piece will likely be just as interesting as the post itself because you're right: we've grown up in a racist system, and many people aren't willing to admit that. Whether we commit outright racist acts on our own accord or accidentally in accordance with our society, it is still racism. I agree that all whites are racist, and I can't help but feel that is some way, almost everyone is an "-ist" or "ic": Sexist, Racist, Homophobic, Xenophobic.
ReplyDeleteIt sucks but this is a very true statement. It is not just white people either. I do not want to say that everyone is racist but pretty much everyone that I know, regardless of ethnicity, is racist, even if it is unintentional.
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