For the first time in recorded history everyone has an equal chance of success.
Or that’s what we like to tell ourselves.
We gape at the powerful, unwaxed women that are directors and CEOs. We smile fondly at the emasculated house-husband that stays home to tend to the children.
Sure, Spics and Polacks still man the mops and paint our walls, but everyone knows of at least one rich and successful Mexican or American Indian! They might not all be doing well but at least now they have the chance to be successful.
And the Blacks… well… we like to claim that they’re on an equal footing with the rest of ‘us’ (listen to me, I’m perpetuating racism right here…), but who are we kidding? I look at how tribalistic and wild England was before the Romans arrived… and wonder if Africans merely missed the Imperialistic Gravy Train. What would’ve happened if Caesar went South instead of North? (I don’t know enough history here — is there a reason there were no large communities south of Alexandria and Carthage?) Today there is a little Arabian/North African racism, but nothing compared to the scale of black-attack and White supremacy that rules contemporary society (the Arabians have only been attacked in recent years, and we all know why that is — again, like modern-day ‘black racism’, Middle East racism is Americentric too…)
So how do we fix it? A lot of people point to these ‘ethnicities’ that hold high-powered positions or win awards. A lot of people say that we’re already on the path to eliminating racism. But… are we?
Do we not reinforce racism every time we congratulate an ethnic minority on achieving a high-status position? Our entire mindset has to change. We still look at those of differing cultures and colours as fundamentally different. Every time someone writes an article celebrating the chutzpah and tenacity of a female CEO, we are reaffirming these differences between us — differences that don’t exist.
* * *
Try this little thought experiment for a moment. If you’re white, get a really detailed image in your mind of a black person. Dark, thicker skin. Flatter nose. Fuller lips. Curly hair perhaps. If you’re black, picture a white person and all that ‘white’ entails. If you’re yellow… picture something else, I don’t know. Now… imagine yourself in their skin. Imagine being identical to how you are now, only a different colour, a different shape. The same fluid personality but filling a different vassal. It’s really damn hard, eh? It’s also a little revolting, isn’t it…? Did you shudder? Did you simply shrug and give up? It’s pretty hard to do, actually. Sadly.
* * *
Once upon a time, we were all brothers. It was a very damn long time ago now. But we fought each other’s battles and hunted for the tribe — the extended family — instead of ourselves. I suppose, back then, our entire world was much smaller. Populations were smaller. There was less contention for resources.
Did racism purely arise from a burgeoning ‘need’ to gather resources? Did we subjugate our fellow man merely so that we could compete with others? Migrant Indians keep Black slaves too, in their African colonies. It’s not just a ‘white thing’. We treat men and women — our friends, our family? — as commodities with values, rather than sentient beings.
Do we have this all to blame on capitalism…? I wonder if there’s less racism in ‘less developed’ parts of the world where more important things than money are sought for.
AGD
Oct 13, 2009
Well, part-right. It is extraordinary when [member of disadvantaged group] does very well at something or other. That’s not to do with any intrinsic to [that group] but a recognition that they’ve generally had to deal with a variety of extrinsic barriers they otherwise wouldn’t have.
sebastian
Oct 13, 2009
And by observance of those extraneous barriers/limitations, do we not reinforce them?
“Aw, he’s done so well… and with a face like that! Chrikee.”
AGD
Oct 13, 2009
No. Recognising the existence of difficulties as externalities rather than intrinsic qualities of the group in question implicitly acknowledges that the group itself isn’t problematic but equal.
sebastian
Oct 13, 2009
So…
Originally we slaved blacks because we figured they had intrinsic qualities that made them slavable (insert long diatribe here)…
But now, we acknowledge that we all have the same intrinsic qualities, and only extraneous difficulties prevent the world from being racism-free?
Where do the extraneous bits come from?
(Sorry, hard to think with this when I’ve been brought up in the same society…)
AGD
Oct 13, 2009
I think the truth is that everyone is ‘slavable’; the revelation about radically different others is that one has ‘permission’ to, making it the loss of moral protections rather than the discovery of some inherent qualities.
The extraneous bits are from the entrenched socio-economic imbalance even after the end of overt discrimination.
Ed Adams
Oct 13, 2009
I am prejugdice against Sea Monkeys.
Does that make me a racist?
Angie
Oct 13, 2009
I don’t know if you planned it like this or if you already knew, but with President Obama’s recent Nobel Prize win, people are questioning if whether he really deserved it this early in his presidency or if its because he’s the first American president with blood in him that isn’t all white. I’d really hate it if that was the case. It would show that we’re really not as far along as we thought we were with being blind to race.
Granted I have seen small positive changes recently, just in everyday life, with the economy but a Nobel Peace prize? Jumping the gun a little I think.
Mr. Apron
Oct 13, 2009
Angie, I think the United States (at least) has always been farther away than it thinks it is.
Society always marginalizes and is condescending whenever it celebrates the achievements of one of its downtrodden. The newsmedia is sopping wet saturated with patronizing “good boy” stories about paraplegics running marathons on titanium legs or armless golfers or whatever. It’s horseshit designed and packaged as progress in a can.
I don’t know, Sebastian… I would love to go back to being 3 years old, where you don’t acknowledge differences of race/color simply because you don’t notice them. Friends are friends. But the moment we realize that he has darker skin and she has a big nose and they have kinky hair, it’s pretty much all over. All over indeed.
Melissa
Oct 13, 2009
My thoughts exactly, Angie. It’s like petting a twelve-year-old on the head and giving him a candy bar for knowing how to tie his shoes. Even if the shoes on his feet are velcro-fastened. If I were Obama, I would be offended at the decision!
Mae
Oct 13, 2009
I’m hopelessly tech-challenged and I don’t know what RSS feed is, so I wouldn’t want to subscribe to that, not being aware of the consequences. I even googled it, and it seemed simple, but then the real world was different.
I do like this post though. Racism is ugly
Mae
Oct 13, 2009
Euw why’s my brain sticking out in this picture? >>>>>>
sebastian
Oct 13, 2009
Because your brain is SO damn huge, it’s burst through your skull. It’s a good thing!
I even have a ‘help page’ that tells you what RSS is
http://blog.mrseb.co.uk/about/rss-feed-list/
Will respond to the rest soon, just need to finish writing tomorrow’s post — where I expose my soooul.
sebastian
Oct 14, 2009
Ed — probably not, unless you pin them to notice boards with damning words scrawled in their own blood underneath. Even then, we humans tend not to care about non-humans — which is how racism begun in the first place…
AngieBOOOOOM — certainly an odd one, that peace prize. You can kind of see the point, if it encourages him to not declare wars like his predecessor Mr Bush. Maybe it’s a preventative measure? ‘Please, Mr Obama, don’t bomb us!’
Definitely a new and interesting use of the Nobel, that’s for sure.
Ah, to be a child again, Apron… Funny that, eh? Maybe that just proves that we’re not innately racist. Even back in tribalistic days, I bet two kids from differing tribes would get along. I suppose the survival-instinct thing kicks in later on. Or what we have been programmed to consider ‘survival’.
Now I really must go and finish SIlence of the Lambs already. I like books. Sometimes you don’t even get told a character is black or white, until the end, or if some other character mentions it. Interesting!
Bryan
Oct 14, 2009
Racism is just like any other divisive concept based on discrimination – ageism, sexism, xenophobia, religious and political intolerance, homophobia. They all stem from the same human characteristics. Perhaps “racism” will one day disappear, but something will undoubtedly take its place. Earth dwellers versus denizens of other planets? Man and Machine?? Twelve Colonies of Kobol and Cylons???? Cylons who want to find Earth and Cylons who want to be rid of humans????? but wait, that was all in the past.
sebastian
Oct 14, 2009
Hm, but we don’t all have those characteristics, or they are not dominant in certain people/cultures.
There are plenty of examples of societies where old people were revered, or reviled; where slavery was despised, or seen as the best solution — it seems to vary a lot, from epoch to epoch, civilisation to civilisation.
I want to know what causes us to pick on our fellow man