Racism: A Refresher Course

Racism: A belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one's own race is superior and has the right to rule others.

One of the best public service ads on racism that I’ve ever seen aired some time in the 1970s. It showed a man, white, well groomed and in a business suit, explaining with a plausible smile and the diction of a college graduate how really, he’s not prejudiced, but well, you know, people are just different. I can’t remember the exact script, but as I recall the smiling man said something to the effect that it’s not that he objected to them moving into the neighborhood or working in his office. But come on, let’s face it, differences in education can mean differences in behavior, and often these people just don’t understand what’s required…

The ad then faded to a boy of about ten or eleven, plainly meant to be this guy’s son. He was talking too, and smiling, but with the sly glee of a child who believes he’s been given permission to hate. “…They expect the government to take care of them, and they lay around drinking all day, throwing garbage all over the place. And then they say they want to be your friend…”

What’s striking about this old ad for a twenty-first century viewer is that it assumes its audience was sophisticated enough to shudder at the thought of their children repeating what the boy in the commercial was naively spouting.

Times have changed. More and more I’m hearing, not just the racism-wrapped-in-euphemism of the man in that ad, but the more unvarnished version offered by the boy. I’m hearing that kid’s riff not from children, but from adults who proudly cite their presumed wisdom and experience, not from semi-literate souls in trailer parks but from supposedly educated people. It’s as if that boy grew up and acquired his father’s veneer of adulthood, but not his ability to soft-pedal his racism.

A typical example that recently attracted attention online via Glenn Greenwald, is from a contributor to a blog called Instapunk.

…I am sick to death of black people as a group. The truth. That is part of the conversation Obama is asking for, isn't it?... I see young black males wearing tee shirts down to their knees -- and jeans belted just above their knees…. I want to smack them. All of them. They are egregious stereotypes. It's impossible not to think the unthinkable N-Word when they roll up beside you…

… There ARE niggers. Black people know it. White people know it. …
I'm not proposing the generalized use of the term, just trying to be clear for once, in the wake of Obama's call for us to have a dialogue about race….black people will know what I mean when I demand they concede that the following people are niggers:

- Jeremiah Wright
- O.J. Simpson
- Marion Barry
- Alan Iverson
- William Jefferson
- Louis Farrakhan
- Mike Tyson

You know what I mean. They hold you back. They're dirty, violent, and stupid…Here's the biggest thing we "racists" notice. Every single immigrant group that ever came to America -- including the Chinese who came as railroad slaves -- has risen out of poverty and want to prosperity and respect. The Irish, the Italians, the Polish, the Jews, the Koreans, the Vietnamese. Every group but you…

The man who wrote this describes himself as an “old guy,” but I can’t think of a better example of schoolyard nastiness than to take Barack Obama’s call for an honest dialogue on race as license to scream “nigger” at African Americans. I can’t think of anything more insulting and arrogant than to demand that, as some twisted gesture of goodwill, African Americans join in with you in calling fellow African Americans “niggers.”

A lot of people these days, online and off, apparently don’t have a clue about what “racism” entails. They have the vague idea that it is undesirable to be called a “racist,” but they truly don’t seem to realize that the term “racism” describes what they are embracing.

It does. What follows is a sort of refresher course aimed, not just at the “old guy” who posted the garbage on Instapunk, but various online bloggers and posters who, over the years, have offered the same arguments, over and over again, during discussions about racism;

1. First of all, you folks need to get over the notion that everybody is like you. Don’t tell us what we “know” or what we “feel.” Not all of us are constantly biting back the “N” word. When I hear the word “nigger,” I can honestly say that I don’t think of an African American. I don’t even think of a young African American man in a big t-shirt, low-belted jeans, driving a Honda and listening to rap music. When I hear or read the word “nigger,” I think of a white bigot saying it.

2. The fact that some predominantly black neighborhoods are dangerous places does not mean that white people are as victimized by racism as black people are. Everybody, white and black, is afraid of being mugged or murdered. The difference is that a law-abiding, nervous white person walking through a black neighborhood at night is likely to be relieved at the sight of a police car. A law-abiding, nervous black person walking through a white neighborhood might not be relieved at all (especially in the south.) The white menacing figure for many black Americans has all too often worn the uniform of a policeman or a sheriff.

3. The word “racism” describes a certain set of beliefs. It does not describe your diction, your clothing, or even whether or not you are civil to your black acquaintances. If you believe that people of African descent are, as a group, inherently lazier/less intelligent/ more violent than people of European descent, yes, you are a racist. It’s absurd to object to being called a “racist” after defending The Bell Curve’s premise that African Americans have a significant and unchangeable intellectual deficit when compared to white Americans. It’s like advocating that all private property be confiscated and handed over to the community and then objecting to being called a communist.

4. If you sincerely believe that people of African descent are, as a group, inherently lazier, less intelligent, and more prone to violence than people of European descent, yes, you are still a racist. You remain a racist no matter how earnestly you explain it, how much sorrow and regret you mime about being forced to utter this awful “truth,” how firmly rooted in first-hand experience you imagine your opinion to be. I’ve yet to see anything in any dictionary definition of racism that excludes sincerity from its meaning.

5. If you believe that people of African descent are, as a group, inherently lazier, less intelligent, and more prone to violence than people of European descent, and you cite all kinds of scientific charts, research, and measurements to back up your claim yes, you are still a racist, as were the many Nazis who cited all kinds of scientific charts, research, and measurements to back up Party claims about the inferiority of Jews. Claiming that there is scientific and/or statistical evidence for your racism does not make it any less racism.

6. If you have black friends, or black acquaintances whom you consider exceptions to the rule of people of African descent being inherently lazier/less intelligent/more prone to violence than people of European descent, yes, you are still a racist. You are a racist because you consider them “exceptions.”

7. If you believe that people of African descent are, as a group, inherently lazier/less intelligent/ more prone to violence than people of European descent, and you recently found out your great-great-granddad might have been a Cherokee and you are now going around describing yourself as “non-white” during online conversations about race, yes, you are still a racist. The belief that black Americans are inherently less competent than white Americans makes you a racist, whether you’re a Native American who grew up on a reservation or someone who may have some Native American ancestors several generations back.

8. And finally, here’s a tip. It has to do with punctuation, so it may seem a bit picayune, but it’s important.

If the word “nigger” keeps rising unbidden into your consciousness when you see young black men in big t-shirts and low belted jeans, or hear rap music, if your hatred for them is such that you want to hit them, if you describe black men you dislike as “dirty, violent, and stupid,” whether those adjectives apply or not, and if you strongly imply that African Americans are somehow uniquely incompetent when compared to other ethnic groups who came here, you are not a “racist.”

You are a racist.