Every time there is another “current event”–a shooting, a bombing, an immigration crisis, or a development with ISIS–I start reading. And I start thinking…
What is the real problem?
Right now, there is a great focus on how much racism we still have in America. And it is true.
It is only partially true if it is about White and Black.
You see, the real problem is that we don’t like what is different from ourselves. That is what causes white supremacy, eugenics, and all things we would like to pretend never happened: the Crusades, the Holocaust, etc. We don’t like what is not like us, and so we want to either force it to change, or get rid of it.
And, if we can’t get rid of it, then let it serve us because we are better and its existence can make us thrive.
What a great history we have made for ourselves by supposedly stamping out that awful S word and overcoming racism.
Except we never learned how to live differently as a whole society, to include Black people as our equals… And we never learned the lesson of how to stop disliking those who were not like us and placing them under us so that we could thrive. Our housekeepers (aka servants) are Hispanic. Our food pickers are Hispanic. Our lowest-wage workers (servants) are Black and Hispanic.
But we don’t have slaves anymore.
Those lazy welfare bums just need to stop having kids and get jobs.
Our White CEOs prophet from the work that those “lazy welfare bums” perform for $8 per hour.
But we don’t have slaves.
And we don’t have racism.
We can ignore the problem, because some of those low-wage workers are also White.
But if there is a terrorist attack, what are the first words to come out of our mouths?
“Muslim”.
We have a race problem in America.
It is about more than just Black and White.
It is about all of us, and how we live together. It stops with you and me, and the way we live, whether we are willing to stand on the corner together outside special community events, whether we stop congregating in our special interest group-only meetings (because, after all, only people with 15 eyelashes will understand why we need to wax our eyebrows this many times a year), and get together and develop the art of empathy. If we continue to become more and more insular, things will continue to get worse, not better.
- Learning From My Younger Self - February 10, 2024
- more reflections on ITD - June 30, 2023
- On travel while at ITD: reflections after day 1 - June 27, 2023
- ITD day 1 - June 27, 2023
- ITD day 1 - June 27, 2023
- Job Descriptions, Inclusivity, and Equity for People with Disabilities - October 15, 2022
- Traveling without a Guide Dog: Experience with Cane and Walker - October 14, 2022
- Disability and Church, Intersection - June 11, 2022
- Review: When Chronic Pain and Illness Take Everything Away - June 11, 2022
- Grammar and Style Resources for Writers - June 9, 2022
