I read the chapter Denial, in the book "White Like Me" by Tim Wise. In this chapter he discusses how people say all the time that racism is gone, it doesn't exist anymore, but in reality that is just denial about the racism that does exist in our country. It all starts from being white and not wanting to admit there is a problem, because, "If you're white and willing to concede that the system is stacked against people of color, that means it must be stacked in your favor, and to admit that is to open oneself up to all kinds of unproductive guilt and self-recrimination." It is easier to be in denial and say there is no problem when white people are getting all the privileges and having no problems. Once they start to speak out and admit there is an issue, the issue then becomes bold and out there. It immediately becomes an open issue and if someone triess to ignore it or stray away from it they will, to start, feel guilty, and two, be in the public eye and be seen as a racist, "once a crime is acknowledged, it can't be minimized, smoothed over, essentially made to be no big deal." That is the core idea of denial. Racism is clear all over the place, but if people don't talk about it and act like its not there, they start to believe it actually doesn't exist especially because they don't experience it.
Another part of white denial that is mentioned, is the "Oprah effect". Oprah is an obvious successful black woman. She is a person who extreme left wing David Horowitz uses to try and prove that racism and inequality doesn't exist because she is black and so successful. Yes it is possible to be successful with the right resources and hard work, but just because there are a few exceptions to inequalities again does not mean they don't exist to a huge degree. Wise also makes the point that no matter if you are Oprah Winfrey, or just a black person, their will always be insecurities that somebody is judging you just because of your skin color, "No white person turned away after a store had closed, or given bad customer service, would ever have to consider that perhaps we had been treated that way because of out race". White people never worry about racism because it has never been a problem for them. That's what makes denial so much easier. They have not experienced it, they don't know what it feels like so they just say that it doesn't exist.
I never really thought about the issue of the oprah effect. And now that I finally know what that is I really can see how awful it is for people to jump to that conclusion. Denial is the easiest way that people in the majority can ignore the injustice that isn't directly affecting them. As soon as white people can come to terms with all the awful things we have done over the ages to minorities, this is the point where we can rebuild the broken relationship betweeen the races in America.
ReplyDeletelike a said in your post, how easy will it be to rebuild the relationship between the races? Has the problem gotten too deep tobe able to fix. Will black people always, in the back of their head be worried that something is happening just because of the color of their skin? I do think that if a change were to happen it would have to be from both sides, the white people would have to stop being in denial of whats going on and face the issue head on, and blacks would have to try and stray from always thinking racism exist, but I think taht is way easier said then done.
Delete