There are two basic definitions of racism in the United States, one roughly associated with progressives and one roughly associated with conservatives. The former describes racism as the failure to acknowledge and seek to redress systemic discrimination against select disadvantaged minority groups. It is very broad and captures everything from unconscious bias to white supremacy. The latter views racism as making assumptions about, or taking action towards, an individual or group on the sole basis of their race. It is narrow and generally requires belief, intent, and animosity.
These definitions don’t simply differ; to a great extent they actually contradict each other. Much of the contradiction stems from the fact that the progressive definition of racism requires that an advantaged individual or group must be attacking the less privileged. The more conservative and narrow definition of racism requires no appeal to power structures, only to bias, and can be committed by anyone towards anyone...
[T]hose on the left are often shocked when polls show that majorities of white people believe that they are discriminated against in the United States. They will point to economic data, political power, and cultural representation and say, “You people are crazy.” But under the narrower definition of racism, it makes perfect sense. These white people are reacting to the fact that they can be attacked on the basis of their race in ways others can’t. In addition, whites — and increasingly Asians — look at programs like affirmative action as inherently racist...
Our society as a whole is not going to accept things like unconscious bias and cultural appropriation as disqualifying outside of places like college campuses. Unfortunately, too many conservatives have used these diluted definitions of racism to excuse even examples that violate their own more narrow one.
You might guess that I agree with the definition associated above with conservatives, and you'd be correct. We should not exalt race; in fact, doing so is exactly what Dr. King and the rest of the civil rights movement marched against:
The mob also wants to redefine what racism is. They want you to think you can sin without knowing it. They want you to think America is bad even when you know it is good. Here, the mob goes too far.
So what should civil rights mean in America in 2020?
Civil rights should mean what they always have. All liberties, all civil rights, flow from the unchangeable fact that every individual has dignity, and deserves to be treated with respect by the state, by others, and by the police. This is the premise on which America was founded, even if the mob doesn’t like it. This is the premise that solves the strife.
In the middle of the dark age of Nazi racism, Pope Pius XI issued Mit brennender Sorge, a Papal Encyclical about racism.
Whoever exalts race … whoever raises these notions above their standard value and divinizes them to an idolatrous level, distorts and perverts an order of the world planned and created by God.
Confronting South African Apartheid in 1989, Pope John Paul II defined the active choice of racism saying, “harboring racist thoughts and entertaining racist attitudes is a sin.”
Racism is active. It isn’t hidden in dormant corners of your consciousness. Racism doesn’t slumber in the architecture. It is animus, and animus is an active choice.
At the center of all of these problems – the problem of slavery, the problem of Nazism, the problem of racism, is the exaltation of race. Exalting race means elevating race beyond standard value. Defining people by race, whether a suspect stopped by the police or the wife of an NFL quarterback, is wrong.
The mob doesn’t want to hear this. They are demanding racially soaked vengeance dressed up as corporate introspection and listening sessions. They want to exalt race.
No, today's mobs certainly don't want to hear this. And somehow knocking over statues is supposed to make some difference.
5 comments:
How do you define racism?
Have you experienced it?
From the post: "You might guess that I agree with the definition associated above with conservatives, and you'd be correct."
Yes, I have had people judge me based on my race. People have told me to "check my privilege", which means they're making judgements about me based on my race.
Racism, however, is just one small part of of an overarching concept of bias. You might consider that instead of asking stupid questions.
And if you are a Southerner, and have lived out of the South, you have experienced bias. Once, I was eliminated from consideration for a job in NJ, because all my education and work experience up to that point had been in the Southeast.
Prejudice comes in many forms.
Discrimination takes many forms. My college educated Dad was excluded from consideration for a job in 1965 Chicago because he wasn't Catholic. My greatgrandmother told us stories of how the Methodist minister's wife would warn them when the Klan was riding in their small central Texas town. The Klan not only terrorized black and brown people, but immigrants, especially Catholic immigrants from Ireland and Italy. My Mom's family was Irish and came to Texas because during "The Troubles" Catholics out after curfew could be pressganged into the British Navy. Caolics during that time could not own land. So my family came to Texas to buy land they could farm. They came in the 1890's. Interesting side note, the reason so many stereotypes in Boston, Chicago, NYC is of the Irish cop or firefighter is those were the only well paying jobs someone who was Irish could get. I'm not listening to anymore BLM grievances until they show me in writing they've read "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn." "Angela's Ashes" and "Tis."
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