A couple of weeks ago Armando posted that he would like to see more discussion about race issues here on Kos. My initial reaction was that I was not really in a position to meaningfully contribute to this discussion. After all, I am a white guy. However, I decided to seek out the white guy and white woman perspective on race in 2006 in te USA. The results of my very unscientific study are below. It sure looks like we have more work to do.
My plan was to speak to a broad spectrum of white people in a casual non-threatening setting about race topics. I attempted to speak with liberals and conservatives, males and females, and older and younger white people. My goal was to assess where white people really stood on issues of race in 2006 in the good old USA. Obviously, this is not a scientific study, but I think it gives a pretty accurate reflection of what is going on. The majority of people I spoke with I had a good relationship with prior to engaging them on these subjects which enabled them to open up about their feelings. On to the results.
I was shocked that the clear majority of people I spoke with had a number of very negative things to say about African-Americans. One 65 year old very liberal white female told me she would be hesitant to hire blacks at her business. I pressed her on it. I reminded her that her next-door neighbors were black, and she told me she didn't mean them. I asked how she would know if the people who applied for a job were good or bad black people. She basically said she would err on the side of caution and just not hire blacks unless they came personally recommended by someone she trusted. I tried to press her by mentioning that maybe there were other factors like poverty and lack of education that were really at the heart of what she was feeling. I didn't get anywhere. I mentioned that a lot of white people steal and break the law too, but it was to no avail. I was hoping this was an aboration, but it was not.
Another person I spoke to was a conservative 32 year old white male. He was much more blantant and overt in his racism. He hates the mexicans who are destrtoying our country. He showed me a very disturbing e-mail being spread among some people who I thought I respected. Basically, some professor had a theory that Mexicans were going to cause the collapse of American society. I was shocked and dismayed. This individual also expressed highly derogatory opinions about just about every other minority group I brought up in the discussion.
I spoke with approximately 20 people in total. Two of these people seemed to mirror my view on race relations. They felt that they did their best not to be racist, but it was extremely difficult for them to view things in a race-neutral way in our society. The best example I can give is that one of them said that he knows his fear in bad nighborhoods is justified, but he wishes he did not equate that fear with skin color. I agreed with them that it is extremely difficult for even the most well meaning white people to not to have some difficulties with race relations in our society.
The other 18 people all expressed what I would consider racist views in some respect or another. Frankly, this surprised me only a little bit. I have always been of the opinion that all the talk of a race-neutral America is just window dressing covering up some really bad racist underpinnings of our society. My unscientific study seemed to prove my hypothesis to be true. White people are still predominately afraid of people who are different from them. This fear seems to be as prevelant now as I can ever remember.
Armando seems to believe that if we constructively address these very real issues here on Kos that maybe we can start to reverse some of these attitudes. I am not so sure. It seems to me that, short of some massive socio-economic adjustments, these problems will only continue to get worse. The poor are getting poorer and people are looking for others to blame for this. I wish they would look to the rich white guys that are causing these problems, but instead it appears that our society is once again going for the easy out and blaming the people who are different from them. This immigration debate is stunning to me. It has just helped to show that we are nowhere near where we pretend to be in this country when it comes to race relations.
As an aside, check out James McMurtry's Childish Things CD. It is a great disc that addresses a lot of interesting issues.