According to a March 10, 2010 article by the Associated Press, the United States will reach the “tipping point” of minority births in 2010 and there will be more non-white births than white births. It is the belief of this blogger that this is a momentous and historical milestone for the United States. After hundreds of years of white dominance in the United States the pendulum is swinging the other direction. I say “It’s about time”. Between the change in the percentage of white people in the country and the results of the last presidential election the writing is on the wall. Either white culture learns how to see past skin pigmentation and become part of creating an enriched multicultural society or watch itself disappear into culturally impoverished oblivion. This blog is not going to address the issue of defining who is white versus who is not white. This blog is going to comment on becoming aware of how white culture can take its head out of the sand and become part of this exciting and enriching cultural change.
I have always viewed myself as a non-racist person but within the last few years I have learned a few things – things that non-whites I talk to say they have known their entire lives. The first is that until recently, I haven’t thought about race and that is a privilege unique to whites in the US. Another is that race is a social construct not a biological one. It is obvious when looked at scientifically but our culture often treats race as a biological reality. Most white people (including myself until recently) have not been aware of the privileges being white provides to the members of the white culture. And the most difficult realization for me to own is how I have unconsciously contributed to racism and supported white dominance on a daily basis.
I believe whites and non-whites have a great deal to offer each other. I know I am not the only one who is taken aback when we realize just how much energy and how many of our resources go into maintaining a race based power structure in our culture? The more I look the more I am appalled at the waste of human time and potential going into this maintenance. If we are going to deconstruct racism the first thing I need to look at is what are my contributions to the maintenance of white dominance? Racism is illegal in many of our social structures these days. Overt racism is illegal, so at one level it seems we have made a lot of progress in the last hundred years. The problem is that at other levels racism has simply changed its form.
In 1994, Lee Mun Wah made a film called “The Color of Fear” that took a stark look at the racism different cultures bring to the table of our culture. I highly recommend anyone who is interested in this topic to take a look at the film. This was a groundbreaking film and since 1994 there have been many films, seminars, and conferences dealing with this same topic. One that I found particularly interesting was a talk give by Dr. Gary Bailey PhD, associate professor at Simmons College School of Social Work in December of 2008. The talk was titled “The Color of Fear: Paradox of Fear and Oppression in the New Millennium”. There is a great deal of information concerning racism in the 70 minutes talk but the part I found particularly fascinating was his comments on subtle racism. The racism we all participate in on a daily basis whose cumulative effect undermines the very anti-racial goals many of us profess to hold.
Dr. Bailey mentioned a few example of subtle racism and I will mention three. The first of these is symbolic racism which is defined as people acting in ways they don’t believe. “It isn’t that I don’t like you, it is that you act in ways that I cannot condone”. If a person sees another person acting contrary to the rules of the dominate culture it is not racism to demand that they follow the rules even if the person’s culture uses a different set of rules. This is not seen as forced assimilation but simply needing to follow the rules if a person wants to succeed. If one doesn’t follow the rules then the person can’t be trusted therefore cannot work well on the team or in the system. The second is adversive racism which is defined as avoiding contact with or interaction with people from another culture. A person feels most “comfortable” working or socializing with people from her or his own culture therefore only goes to stores or joins organizations from his or her own culture. The third is micro-inequities. Without realizing it a person makes comments, uses a tone of voice or gives assignments that express aggression without being openly aggressive. An example would be a supervisor giving more menial tasks within a job description to a person from a different culture than his own.
I don’t think there are any surprises on the above list. I can look back and see places where I have participated in subtle forms of racism. Non are legally actionable or violations of policy or law. But the day to day subtle racist acts slowly ebb at a person’s feeling about themselves often resulting in the person contributing to self-racism – saying or doing things that validate the racism that is coming from the outside.
I experience the above information with appreciation – another opportunity to shed some light on how I contribute to the very behavior I am committed to fight against. The most surprising thing about the information was that it was not surprising. By shifting my attitude and looking for the hidden behavior in the larger cultural picture it increases my ability to self-reflect and expands my opportunities to be more mindful.
As I said in the first paragraph I believe people who find themselves in the current dominate culture are soon going to find themselves bewildered, confused, and angry about the raising dominance of non-white peoples if they don’t look at how they oppress others and change their consciousness and behavior. I believe taking more steps to be mindful and noticing the subtleties of our thinking and behavior is where we start. When we notice that what we are doing to contributes to the very things we are committed to destroying it gives an opportunity to change. These changes add up and the “tipping point” becomes not whether we are white or non-white but whether we share life with other human beings in a joyful and creative manner.
References:
Associated Press. (2010, March 10). Minority Birth Rates Following Long Track for a New Majority. New article posted to: http://www.wenatcheeworld.com/news/2010/mar/10/minority-birth-rates-following-long-track-for-a/
Bailey, B. (2008, Dec. 18). The Color of Fear: The Paradox of Race and Oppression in the New Millennium. Video posted to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7U9lOtxwDTk
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