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Maybe Everyone's A Tad Racist by Pam Marlett Aug 2, 2008 In todays world of culture wars and culture shock, is anyone really color blind? |
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I'm not color blind. There, I said it. And let me tell you the feeling that follows that admission is more than a little, well, enlightening.
Indeed, one of the perks about being and African American raised by a Caucasian woman is that I continue to see that bigotry is never exclusively white. There's a reason I have yet to join the National Association of Real Black Folks: I've been told I'm too white. Apparently I need to ghetto myself up; wear a wife beater, start talking slang and become a lot more confrontational. And if that sounds racist to you, well it is. But isn't the idea behind the sentence racist as well? Is the notion that in order to be black you have to have the same personality, level of ability, and speech as other black people every bit as racist as the idea that all black people live a thug life in the hood and will bust a cap in yo ass if you dare cross them? Does one attitude aide and support the other? Even I have on occasion espoused viewpoints that some have construed as racist. I suppose my explanation for not dating Hispanics, that they tend to be hot heads, could be considered racist. Does that mean I'm going to go out and commit a hate crime? No. But it doesn't excuse the remark either. If stripped to its bare minimum racism is fueled by an individual's ignorance and misunderstanding of a group of people. The racial bend behind my own explanation for not dating Hispanics is fueled by my ignorance in the fact that I've never dated anyone Hispanic. I've just been friends with some, and not even close enough to call the majority of them friends. It is that level of ignorance, of the unwillingness to even attempt to understand Hispanic culture and life before forming an opinion that drives a form of racism that I've squirmed to face. And this is perhaps not a very new dilemma. History has chronicled time and time again that we as a species and individual societies are most comfortable with consistency. It is the attitude we tell new parents to adopt when raising children, the nature of the advice we give young adults moving towards a future in school. It is why tribal societies have continued to thrive up to modern age. But we weren't all born in the same village, on the same country, in the same part of the world. As human societies began to interact racism became a partial response to a critical inconsistency: having to deal with people whose norms, customs, and race often differed radically from what we were used to seeing. If viewed in this format the human response to cultural inconsistency may be a powerful way to help understand racism and its origins. Culture shock is sometimes a response to such circumstances, so one could look at racism as a more extreme response. Think of anytime to different countries or even religions met for the first time. With some exceptions the long term response is usually not very positive. When one is raised within a culture that believes only it exists the person is less likely to be open minded when confronting another culture or religion and reluctant to hold it on par with their own. It is the same with religion and plays an important part in almost every religious oppression and war. That is why racism has not died after all these years, with every new culture we encounter it surfaces again. It is why I feel everyone has a bit of racism ingrained in them. We still posses a degree of cultural and racial misunderstanding and whether one can overcome it is a question of the individual. As for me, it may take more time for me to overcome my misunderstandings since my own race is often a source that misunderstanding. But if there is an official, "Manners and Customs of Real Black Folks" manual I've got to get my hands on it. I'll have to re apply my application before college starts. |
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