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An answer to a question that I was asked on my last blog. On my post last week about the NFL and the Flag........a blogger asked what could he do in this country that I as a black woman could not. I hope he reads this it is a pretty long read. I am sharing this in hopes that we can all talk about the problems in this country with civility and respect for each other and make healthy changes that will benefit us all. This is a copy and paste......written by Tim Wise. This essay was written originally for CNN.com and can be found here. ______ There’s an old saying that it’s hard to know what you don’t know, the premise being that when you’re ignorant about something, you aren’t likely to realize your blind spots. But I’m not so sure. Sometimes, knowing what you don’t know just requires a certain degree of humility. For instance, I don’t know calculus, because I never took it in school. But here’s the thing: I know that I don’t know calculus; and as such, I would never presume to know it, let alone to tell others for whom it had actually been their major that I knew it better than they did. How nice it would be if white Americans would exercise a similar restraint when it comes to the topic of racism and discrimination in America. For although we have rarely had to know much about it — and though most of us, by our own admission, socialize in nearly all-white environments where we won’t benefit from the insights of persons of color who have, indeed, had to major in the subject — we continue to insist that we know more about it than they do. To wit, a just-released poll from CNN and the Kaiser Family Foundation, which finds that white Americans are far less likely than persons of color to believe that racism remains a serious problem in the U.S. While roughly two-thirds of blacks and Latinos believe racism is a big problem in America today, only about four in ten whites agree. Even a simple recognition of ongoing racial inequities in life chances differs markedly across racial lines, with clear majorities of African Americans perceiving that the typical black person is worse off than the typical white person in terms of income, education and housing, but most whites being evenly divided on the question, with about half of us failing to perceive such well-documented inequalities of condition. So despite the fact that African Americans are worse off than whites in every single category of well-being, and despite the research indicating that these disparities owe significantly to discrimination both past and present, most whites believe there are few if any ongoing inequities in need of being addressed. For instance, even though young blacks with college degrees are twice as likely as similar whites to be unemployed, regardless of their field of study, most white Americans don’t see much of a problem (or actually continue to insist that it is we who are discriminated against in employment). Despite the fact that white male high school dropouts between 18-34 are more likely to find work than black men that age with two years of college, most white Americans don’t see much of a problem, or again, insist that “reverse discrimination” is the real issue when it comes to racism. Despite the fact that the typical white family has about sixteen times as much wealth as the typical black family — and that even white households headed up by a high school dropout have, on average, twice the wealth of black and Latino households headed by a college graduate — most white Americans don’t see much of a problem. Despite the fact that black are about three times as likely as white to be suspended or expelled from school, even though the rates of serious school rule infractions are largely the same (contrary to popular belief), and despite the fact that black are about twice as likely as white to be taught by the least experienced teachers, most white Americans don’t see much of a problem. According to the survey, whites are also far less likely than blacks to believe the Voting Rights Act is still needed, even as several states have moved to create impediments to voting that will disproportionately affect voters of color. And while overwhelming majorities of African Americans (and a clear majority of Latinos) see biases in the justice system, only about half of whites agree; this, despite the racial disproportionality of police-involved shootings, and the blatant disparities within the so-called war on drugs, whereby blacks, for instance, are four times as likely as whites to be arrested for marijuana, even as rates of usage and dealing are virtually identical. It apparently doesn’t register as a “big problem” in the eyes of most whites that there are roughly 160,000 black folks arrested for drug possession annually who wouldn’t be were it not for the racially-disproportionate way in which African Americans are targeted in the drug war. Likewise, it fails to give us much pause that there are also about 160,000 whites who would be arrested for possession each year if arrest rates actually mirrored rates of drug law violations. It’s apparently no big deal that in recent years, persons of color have been subjected to massively disparate treatment by police stop-and-frisk policies, even though such policies almost exclusively target innocent people and are unconstitutional. That white Americans don’t by and large see what people of color see doesn’t mean that white folks are horrible people of course; nor does it suggest that whites are all inveterate racists who don’t care about the impediments to opportunity still facing our black and brown brothers and sisters. But what it does suggest is a degree of isolation and provincialism that should lead us to think twice before pontificating about a subject that we simply don’t have to know nearly as well as those who are the targets of it. When more than half of Blacks (two-thirds between 18-34) and a third of Hispanics report that they have experienced unfair treatment in public places at some point just in the last month because of their race, for whites to deny the seriousness of racism in America is to say, in effect, that folks of color are hallucinating, irrational, or ignorant about their own lived experience. It is to say that we white folks know black and brown reality better than those who live it—perhaps because we are more intelligent or level-headed (which arguments would be inherently racist of course). Sadly, white denial of this sort has a long and ignoble pedigree. Even in the early 1960s, prior to the passage of the monumental civil rights legislation of that decade, most white Americans didn’t really see the problem. Though civil rights icons like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. are venerated as heroes today by most, including by large numbers of whites, when King was alive, most white folks saw very little need for the movement of which he was such an integral part. In 1963, for instance, more than six in ten whites told Gallup pollsters that blacks were treated equally with whites in their communities, a number that grew to seventy-five percent the year before Dr. King was killed (but at which point the Fair Housing Act still hadn’t been passed). Even more tellingly, in 1962, fully eighty-five percent of whites told Gallup that black had the same chance as white to obtain a high quality education. Such beliefs might strike us as delusional in retrospect, of course, but that’s the point: Unless we believe that white Americans have somehow become amazingly attuned to the experiences of persons of color in the last half-century (and more so than those people of color are, with regard to their own experiences) — even as our parents and grandparents clearly failed to discern truth from fiction — it seems that we should probably think twice before trusting white perceptions when it comes to the state of racial discrimination in this country. If we were so oblivious even when racism was formally embedded in every fiber of the nation’s being — when the U.S. was an official apartheid country — what in the world would lead us to believe that we had suddenly become keen interpreters of black and brown folks’ lives? But although white denial has been a constant throughout American history, one thing about today’s version of it seems potentially more dangerous than that of past generations, and it is this fact more than any other which should give us pause. In the past, white obliviousness was of a more genuinely naive sort — in other words, most white folks really did think, absurd though it sounds, that everything was just fine, not only for ourselves but for black folks too — but today’s denial comes wrapped in a patina of resentment and anxiety. Today, it is not just that whites fail to see the obstacles still faced by persons of color; rather, too many of us apparently believe the tables have turned and now it is we who face those obstacles. Denial mixed with perceived victimhood and an unhealthy dose of nostalgia is far worse than denial of a purely ignorant type. For whites to not know black and brown reality is bad enough; but for us to literally invert black and brown reality with our own, and to believe that we are the ones who are being victimized, is a recipe for increased tension and acrimony. It is certainly no way to build multiracial democracy. Only by challenging white denial — and that means we white folks challenging our own — can we turn back the rising tide of white anxiety, which has manifested most recently in the campaign of Donald Trump, the backlash against Syrian refugees, and the growing hostility to Black Lives Matter protesters, the latter of which culminated recently in the shooting of five BLM activists by whites in Minneapolis. We must proclaim not only that black and brown lives matter, despite a society that has rarely acted as such, but that facts matter too; and as always, the facts suggest that white America still has some waking up to do. |
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10/2/2017 7:46 am |
Brightsmile, I had already read the Tom Wise article and am familiar with HIS position on racial equality and bias in America. But, as I stated in your original post, he didn't write your blog - YOU did. I wanted to know if YOU are currently the subject of some sort of racial bias because of your race. Basically, if you recall, I asked what things can I do that you cannot. You still haven't listed any. Fossil
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10/2/2017 7:58 am |
Hello Maisie...thanks for your input.....................I think your comment just proved Mr Wise right.
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10/2/2017 9:43 am |
Hello Bigblock........Thanks for your input...........However if you would like to address the topic I would be glad to respond.
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10/2/2017 10:07 am |
Hi Bright: Racism seems to be such a touchy subject and since no-one wants to be called a racist people are afraid to even mention the subject. My parents and grandparents were Italian, but I was born in Canada and lived in the U.S. but still think of myself as Italian. My whole family are so white we look anemic and most of us have blonde hair and green eyes, but I remember looking at my father's immigration papers when he moved to Canada from Italy. Under the heading "Race" it listed my father as "Non-White". I was very young at the time I read those papers but I remember feeling such a shock when I saw that. OMG if I was 'non-white' does that mean I am black? What I'm trying to say Bright is that racism in any form is so hateful and wrong. Recently I watched a documentary about the Rodney King beating and race riots that followed the policemen's trial when they were all found to be not guilty. I can't imagine how afraid a Black mother or a Muslim mother must feel every day just having to send their sons out the door to go to school This is not something a white person could ever truly understand.
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What really I know about racial discrimination can be written on the head of a pin. But I do know we need civility and respect for each other not matter the race, color or creed. I was blind to discrimination until 1964, as children my family were brought up to respect others. In 1964 I was in New York, a couple of friends and I went into a restaurant for coffee. We sat down at a counter where a Black waitress came up to us and said we would have to move to the White area as this was for Blacks only. I was surprised and truly thought this form of discrimination was over. Even today I realize we are all along way from equality. We still have a lot of work to do.
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10/2/2017 10:57 am |
Hi Bright: Racism seems to be such a touchy subject and since no-one wants to be called a racist people are afraid to even mention the subject. My parents and grandparents were Italian, but I was born in Canada and lived in the U.S. but still think of myself as Italian. My whole family are so white we look anemic and most of us have blonde hair and green eyes, but I remember looking at my father's immigration papers when he moved to Canada from Italy. Under the heading "Race" it listed my father as "Non-White". I was very young at the time I read those papers but I remember feeling such a shock when I saw that. OMG if I was 'non-white' does that mean I am black? What I'm trying to say Bright is that racism in any form is so hateful and wrong. Recently I watched a documentary about the Rodney King beating and race riots that followed the policemen's trial when they were all found to be not guilty. I can't imagine how afraid a Black mother or a Muslim mother must feel every day just having to send their sons out the door to go to school This is not something a white person could ever truly understand.
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10/2/2017 2:33 pm |
What really I know about racial discrimination can be written on the head of a pin. But I do know we need civility and respect for each other not matter the race, color or creed. I was blind to discrimination until 1964, as children my family were brought up to respect others. In 1964 I was in New York, a couple of friends and I went into a restaurant for coffee. We sat down at a counter where a Black waitress came up to us and said we would have to move to the White area as this was for Blacks only. I was surprised and truly thought this form of discrimination was over. Even today I realize we are all along way from equality. We still have a lot of work to do. I agree we do need to be civil to each other. I try to be at all times.
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10/2/2017 2:47 pm |
Hi Maggie.....Thanks for your input. I have heard stories like that too and some even worse. Yes it is sad that man can be very unkind to his fellowman. If I have given the impression that this type of behavior happens only in my country I am sorry because this type of behavior is almost all over maybe not as prevalent........Canada,Australia,India etc........Man seems to have a need to feel he is better than someone else.Which is sad because we are all children of God is the way I feel.
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10/2/2017 2:59 pm |
Hello Skariff............Thanks for your response......I was really hoping that some team would give Mr Kapernick a job also. It seems the owners got together and decided not to hire him. I have learned that to have wealth,prestige and clout does not automatically mean a person is kind or wants to do what is right.
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For instance, I don’t know calculus, because I never took it in school. But here’s the thing: I know that I don’t know calculus; and as such, I would never presume to know it, let alone to tell others for whom it had actually been their major that I knew it better than they did.d quote Like I tried to explain to Fossil - Racism is a topic that my Quaker community has been dealing with for the past three years. If the colored Quakers tell me there is a problem, I have no reason to disbelieve them. These people are law-abiding, active in Quaker meetings and pro-active. They are not Ghetto Flakes full of myriad excuses. The White Baptist Preacher that Fossil is talking about is probably clueless. I have been to Washington DC several times and one of my trips included a luncheon at the "Southeast White House" where the local clergy (predominantly black) gather to strengthened the poor (predominately black) community with food programs and mentoring the youth. I am also a representative of the William Penn House in Washington D.C. which holds workshops where privileged youth will go into the inner cities to build community gardens working together with the inner cities youths. While there are many things that people of color are already doing to improve their communities - they still need the support of backing of those of us who are in the majority. The Southeast White House, located one mile east of the Anacostia River in Southeast Washington, D.C., is affectionately known in the community as the Little White House due to its distinctive architecture and its location four miles east of the “real” White House. The Southeast White House is situated in an area that is often referred to as the forgotten quadrant of the city because of the limited number of social services and assistance available to the community quote Abracadabra 
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10/2/2017 3:28 pm |
Brightsmile, the Rush Limbaugh SFF crowd has been led to believe that racism is something that was "taken care of back in the 60s" Racism was simply legislated away ..it's gone, it's illegal. Regarding the NFL, the head in the sand Limbaugh crowd isn't even able to say the words 'police shootings'. All they want to talk about is money. Good luck, and by the way they thrive on confrontation. You've thrown them completely off with kindness!. Good job
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No, he has a PhD and trains real activists in and around Washington D.C. Need an introduction?  Fossil  Abracadabra
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Only by challenging white denial — and that means we white folks challenging our own — can we turn back the rising tide of white anxiety, which has manifested most recently in the campaign of Donald Trump, the backlash against Syrian refugees, and the growing hostility to Black Lives Matter protesters, the latter of which culminated recently in the shooting of five BLM activists by whites in Minneapolis. We must proclaim not only that black and brown lives matter, despite a society that has rarely acted as such, but that facts matter too; and as always, the facts suggest that white America still has some waking up to do. The Fact that White People become so unglued about Black Athletes peacefully and respectfully protesting Racial Injustices indicates there is some waking up to do. . Trump is a blowhard but he might have done us a favor by unifying us to stand up for what is right. Thank God, the NFL is backing the athletes and doing the right thing instead prioritize money. LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL!!! Abracadabra
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10/3/2017 5:04 am |
Brightsmile, the Rush Limbaugh SFF crowd has been led to believe that racism is something that was "taken care of back in the 60s" Racism was simply legislated away ..it's gone, it's illegal. Regarding the NFL, the head in the sand Limbaugh crowd isn't even able to say the words 'police shootings'. All they want to talk about is money. Good luck, and by the way they thrive on confrontation. You've thrown them completely off with kindness!. Good job
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10/3/2017 5:16 am |
Hello Pattiebaby.........I am so glad to hear from you...huggggsss friend. I have not seen you for a while. I was going to ask Mott if she had seen you but I have not seen her for a while either. Thanks for your thoughts and ideas .I agree with you we do have a lot to be thankful for and I do. I hope that you will come to chat more I miss you.
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10/3/2017 5:32 am |
Only by challenging white denial — and that means we white folks challenging our own — can we turn back the rising tide of white anxiety, which has manifested most recently in the campaign of Donald Trump, the backlash against Syrian refugees, and the growing hostility to Black Lives Matter protesters, the latter of which culminated recently in the shooting of five BLM activists by whites in Minneapolis. We must proclaim not only that black and brown lives matter, despite a society that has rarely acted as such, but that facts matter too; and as always, the facts suggest that white America still has some waking up to do. The Fact that White People become so unglued about Black Athletes peacefully and respectfully protesting Racial Injustices indicates there is some waking up to do. . Trump is a blowhard but he might have done us a favor by unifying us to stand up for what is right. Thank God, the NFL is backing the athletes and doing the right thing instead prioritize money. LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL!!!
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10/3/2017 5:43 am |
Hello Boogie......I have always loved and respected you.....You are sooooo right it has gone from covert to overt which is why I thought it was time to write this blog and the one last week. I will not be writing anymore like them because normally I speak through my artwork. I feel they were productive as I wanted them to be. Everyone has been civil and shared their point of view. I had only 1 person that I had to delete their comments and ban........ So all in all i am very happy with the response that I got. I hope that a lot of the folk here will take the time to talk to others about Liberty and justice for all.
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10/3/2017 5:45 am |
I was born just a few years after WW2 ended. During the war many Italians in Canada had our property seized and were herded into internment camps. When I was growing up I think people forgot about the war and Mussolini, but Italians were at the bottom of the social register and we were ridiculed and insulted. I remember in grade school one teacher called my brother a 'greasy black wop' and one teacher made me stand on top of my desk and show everyone my 'wop shoes'. Maybe a person needs to experience racism first hand before they can appreciate what it is and how degrading and stupid it is.
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10/3/2017 6:03 am |
I was born just a few years after WW2 ended. During the war many Italians in Canada had our property seized and were herded into internment camps. When I was growing up I think people forgot about the war and Mussolini, but Italians were at the bottom of the social register and we were ridiculed and insulted. I remember in grade school one teacher called my brother a 'greasy black wop' and one teacher made me stand on top of my desk and show everyone my 'wop shoes'. Maybe a person needs to experience racism first hand before they can appreciate what it is and how degrading and stupid it is. The sad part is some folk who have been through things like that can be the meanest to others that have..............I remember how my family talked about Jews. I saw a Mexican woman say some very ugly things about black people.
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