I Am a Racist
Earlier this week, the United States Supreme
Court issued a decision in a pair of controversial
affirmative action suits. Though the justices
overturned a university admissions policy using
racial quotas, they affirmed the constitutionality
of another that allows the use of race as one of a
number of factors.
I confess that I haven't taken the time to read
the text of the ruling, but I can't help but feel
it's yet another backward step. This country has a
long history of racism, but I honestly don't
believe we'll ever get beyond it until we all
ignore race completely.
Since I've previously expounded on this issue,
I'm reposting an editorial written back in 2000 to
once again proclaim that I am a "racist" (see the
very last sentence before taking that statement at
face value, please).
· · ·
I am a racist.
At least, that is the conclusion that many
readers will reach by the time they get to the end
of this article (if they even get that far). For
although I use plain common sense rather than
bigotry to make my point, I am an enfranchised,
white male professional—the antithesis of
"Diversity"—and therefore am wholly
unqualified to discuss the topic of prejudice
objectively.
Not that that will stop me.
Nearly fifty years ago, civil rights groups
gained a tremendous victory in this country when
the concept of "separate but equal" was finally
tossed out in the landmark Brown vs. The Board
of Education decision. It was a great step in
the direction of a future where people of all
colors can—to quote the famous humanitarian
Rodney King—all "get along."
But these days, it seems like we’re taking
too many steps backward. Instead of following the
inclusional spirit of Linda and Oliver Brown,
we’re becoming more and more exclusional.
We’re creating a new culture of segregation,
where we’re voluntarily emphasizing and
highlighting the colors of our skin, instead of
working to become colorblind.
In a news story discussing the University of
Southern California’s all-black dormitory
Somerville Place, student Ericka Thomas said, "I
didn't know if I could stand to room with a white
person" (Los Angeles Times, March 26).
Coming as it did from a black person discussing
racism, this quote was not deemed racist. But had
the tables been turned, and had it been a white
student that expressed equally negative feelings
about living with a black person, Kweisi Mfume and
the NAACP would have called for an instant boycott
of the newspaper and the university.
Mfume’s organization, for that matter,
serves as a perfect example. The National
Association for the Advancement of Colored People
enjoys a great deal of respect from politicians,
the media and the general public. Yet the National
Association for the Advancement of White People is
dismissed as nothing more than a fringe racist
group. While Mfume appears regularly on national
television, and often meets with high-level
politicians, few people have even heard about the
NAAWP.
I don’t believe that such an organization
as the NAAWP is necessary or even desirable, but
rather use it as an example to point out the double
standard that such groups as the NAACP, the Rainbow
Coalition and others subscribe to. In seeking to
eradicate hate and bigotry with programs and
philosophies that emphasize race, they only
reinforce the differences between the races. The
problem of racism in this country will never go
away until we all become color-blind. Black pride
can be just as exclusionary as white pride, and
thus often perpetuates, rather than lessens,
prejudice.
What we need is the NAAAP—the National
Association for the Advancement of All
People. Until we all start seeing each other as
members of the Human Race, instead of the Black,
White or Brown Race, then racism will continue to
be a sad fact of life. If this position makes me a
racist, it's because I'm preferential to the Human
Race.
©2003 Michael
Strickland ALL RIGHTS
RESERVED
|
|
