The racist words of LA Clippers owner Donald Sterling that resulted in him getting a lifetime ban from the NBA and the racist judgments of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy are
already in our culture's rear view mirror. The fact that our nation
has basically already moved on says a lot about our fickle media culture
and even more about our inability to recognize racism in our midst.
The thing about Sterling that let's us move on so quickly is how blatant
his racism was on the tape made by his bi-racial mistress, similarly
Bundy's declarations that the "negroes" were "better off as slaves" are
so straightforwardly bigoted that they are astounding. Rarely does it
happen that the majority of our culture can recognize and summarily
reject racism, because rarely is it so obvious. Bundy's and Sterling's
words seem to belong to another era when rich white men could get away
with saying such things. Today their racism must be masked in howls of
outrage over "political correctness" or a Supreme Court ruling that
naively declares we are in a post-racial America. Racism still is
intertwined in our culture in ways that are institutional and
systemic--forms of racism that are far more difficult to recognize than
are the racist words of Sterling and Bundy.
Nehiti Coates, writing in The Atlantic,said
it well, "The problem with Cliven Bundy isn't that he is a racist but
that he is an oafish racist. He invokes the crudest stereotypes, like
cotton picking. This makes white people feel bad. The elegant racist knows how to injure non-white people while never summoning the specter of white guilt."
The
NBA knew about Sterling's racism for years and years, but it did
nothing. It's current abhorrence of Sterling's words seems more to do
with the fact that he was stupid enough to get caught saying them.
Again, Coates from The Atlantic:
"Like
Cliven Bundy, Donald Sterling confirms our comfortable view of
racists. Donald Sterling is a "bad person." He's mean to women. He
carouses with prostitutes.He uses the word "nigger." He fits our idea
of what an actual racist must look like: snarling, villainous, immoral,
ignorant, gauche. The actual racism that Sterling long practiced,
that this society has long practiced (and is still practicing) must
attract significantly less note. That is because to see racism in all
its elegance is to implicate not just its active practitioners, but to
implicate ourselves."
Similarly,
the TV and radio talk show hosts along with the bloggers on the
internet were quick to anoint Bundy as a hero fighting against the
tyranny of the federal government, yet even more quickly they fled from
him and changed the subject when he was stupid enough to hold a press
conference and declare his racist ideology. Really? None of these
media people knew he was a racist beforehand? Really?
The more "elegant" form of racism that is institutional, systemic and seemingly omnipresent is better illustrated by the essay published by Princeton freshman Tal Fortgang.
Fortgang became a viral sensation after he wrote his piece defending
himself from fellow students who ask him to "check your privilege" just
because he is white and male. He feels that his own hard work and that
of his family--including his own Holocaust survivor grandparents--is
dismissed on account of his gender and ethnicity.
What
the college freshman's essay reveals is his lack of understanding of
the pervasiveness of racism and sexism in our culture. Women continue
to earn significantly less than men for the same positions, and they make up small minorities of leadership positions
in most major professions. There are certainly exceptions, but they
remain exceptions. Similarly, African Americans have worse options for
employment and housing and are incarcerated at greater numbers than
whites--even if they are in the same economic class!
One of Fortgang's classmates at Princeton, Briana Payton, who is African American and female, wrote an excellent response to Fortgang. She
notes, "Fortgang's privilege is, in essence, the inability to not see
[racism and sexism] as problematic because it doesn't affect him." She
goes on to address Fortgang's false claim that we live in a meritocracy
where everyone starts from the same place and social conditions: "No one
is saying Fortgang did not sow seeds, but checking his privilege is
just acknowledging that the ground he tilled was more fertile than the
ground others tilled. They could have spent the same amount of time in
the hot sun, watering these seeds, but Fortgang might still reap better
results because of certain advantages. For example, he says his value
of education is a privilege, and it might be. However, his African
American counterpart in an underfunded, under-sourced school with the
same value of education and work ethic may not be afforded the same
opportunities at the end of his high school career. Ultimately, success
is when hard work meets opportunity."
What
makes Payton's argument more credible is that she acknowledges her own
privileges--coming from an intact family and the upper middle class. If
only Fortgang--and so, so many other whites could acknowledge their
privileges. What Fortgang and those who share his beliefs refuse to
understand is that he does not face the same suspicion based solely upon
his skin color from police, store clerks, teachers and jurors that an
African American faces. The list is long of African Americans who have
overcome systemic and institutionalized racism, but that is a credit to
their hard work and determination rather than because they started from
the same place as their White counterparts. In a similar manner,
gender, class and sexual orientation among others each bring with them
subtle yet powerful daily discriminations and "micro-aggressions."
A
Christian response to the "elegant" institutionalized and systemic
racism of our culture begins with White Christians coming clean about
their own racism and repenting from it. The next steps involve
Christians working with people of all faiths and those of none to
dismantle the unrecognized ways racism and sexism (and classism, and
heterosexism and. . . ) continue to hold sway. The few fools like Bundy
and Sterling who wear their true views on their sleeves for all the
world to see are shrinking in number each day. We really don't have the
luxury anymore of people being blatant about their discrimination. Our
culture's system of oppression is much more difficult to acknowledge
and reject. The Church should be the place where people can achieve the
humility necessary to repent and work for change; it's too bad it often
is the last bastion of discrimination.
Grace and Peace,
Chase
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