Dispatches from post-racial America.

As we all know, the election of Barack Obama clearly demonstrates that the United States is a post-racial society. We might have had a few problems in the past, but they’re all behind us now. Color-blindness is the new norm, and completely justifies measures like eliminating affirmative action and invalidating key sections of the Voting Rights Acts. Americans, from Stephen Colbert to the man on the street, simply don’t see race anymore.

As clear evidence of this dramatic shift in the national culture, i give you the members of Sigma Alpha Epsilon, at the University of Oklahoma.

The fact that dozens of university students, all together on a bus, are willing to sing this song together just shows how far we’ve come.

U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!

Please feel free to add further examples of America’s post-racial harmony to this thread.

How about our uniformly written, uniformly applied drug laws and enforcement?

Apparently some people still haven’t learned that opening a statement with the phrase “I’m not a racist …” instantly clues everyone into the fact that you are indeed a racist.

I believe it when people say they don’t see race. That’s the entire point of gated communities.

I had someone start to say a racial epithet while complaining about some group, stop, say, “well, I don’t want to be racist, but you know what I mean.” Apparently saying a word is what makes you racist or not.

Who is supposed to have stated that Obama’s election meant we had achieved the goal of racial harmony, and who has been repeating that lately?

That whole thread about the DOJ’s findings on Ferguson. People in there are still saying there’s no evidence of racism! Obviously they are right, as the OP says, and racism is no more!

From what I’ve gleaned from reading the comments on online news articles (a sick habit of mine):

If …

It bothers you that black people can use the “n”-word, but you can’t

It bothers you that the media doesn’t make a big deal about black-on-black crime, only white-on-black crime

You wonder why things like the SAE chant aren’t covered by Freedom of Speech

You like to observe that black people can be racist, too…

You’re probably a bigot.

10 ways white people are more racist than they realize.

If you say/believe, “Only racists talk about race,” you are probably a racist.

If you say/believe, “Anti-racist is a code word for anti-white,” you are definitely a racist.

“I’m not a racist, but you are surely going to think so by the time I get done talking.”

I’m amazed the OP hasn’t been called a hypersensitive race-baiter for starting such a provocative thread.

:consults rolodex of black Dopers…not finding mhendo’s name anywhere in it:

Oh wait, never mind. Amazement withdrawn.

Missed edit window.

Ladies and gents, I give you…Contemplation.

The talking head I saw report that story on the Local News claimed that the report contained “shocking” results, so I expected the report to claim no signs of racism.
Shocking? Who was shocked by the report?
I think the talking head misread the word “predictable” on the teleprompter.

Fortunately, a country is not defined by the antics of a bunch of knucklehead frat boys. And just as it’s silly to argue that the election of Obama proves anything wrt eliminating AA or the other things mentioned in the OP, it is also silly to argue that these singing idiots prove anything wrt the need for AA going forward. That is an argument that stands or falls on its own merits, which lie well outside the two anecdotes in the OP.

The problem is that, while a few knucklehead frat boys might not define the nation, the sum of incidents like this suggest that racial discrimination and racial antipathy are still incredibly important components of American culture. If the incident described in the OP were even surprising, there might be less need for the thread, but i posted it precisely because it’s actually not that shocking or surprising to me. It’s of a piece with a whole variety of racial problems, from knucklehead frat boys through to the institutionalized racism of some law enforcement departments. To be honest, i’m actually far less worried about a few idiots singing “Nigger” on a bus than i am about what happens when those idiots graduate and enter the workforce. Some of them end up on police forces, or in positions of authority elsewhere in society.

And while the argument for or against affirmative action might deserve to be assessed on its own merits, the fact is that, for some debaters, those merits include an assertion about racial equality. Some of them argue that America has now essentially fixed its historical problems of racial inequity and therefore affirmative action is simply an outmoded relic based on a social order that has disappeared. I think that there are good arguments to be made for and against affirmative action, but an argument that it needs to go because it addresses a non-existent problem (an argument i’ve heard many times) constitutes either wishful thinking or willful ignorance.

Grow a fucking spine.

This thing bothers me a whole lot. I’m absolutely certain that that chanting was a routine thing. The fact that they were perfectly fine being recorded in this day and age of ubiquitous social media underscores this.

But what bothers me a lot more is the fact that people will watch that video and return to their regularly scheduled programming of downplaying and hand-waving away racism. The next time they hear someone complaining about racial discrimination, they won’t remember the glee on those boys faces as they chanted about lynching niggers. No, their reflex will be to talk about minority hypersensitivity and Al Sharpton. They see those guys and see stupid frat “bros”. I see those guys and see future managers, CEOs, jury members, teachers, principals, city councilmen, senators, and judges. I see someone who might sell me a car or a house one day–someone who’ll try to take advantage of me because all they see is a dirty nigger rather than a human being. White people can afford to believe these are a small, insignificant minority of the population. Black people already know better.

This story will be gone from mainstream America’s consciousness by the end of the week.

On the other hand, the response of the University of Oklahoma and the national chapter of SAE has been pretty great. They shut the chapter down immediately and all the members have to be moved out of the house by tomorrow night. The Greek letters came down off the building today. Instant death penalty for racist fraternities is a cool thing!

Here’s the video. Pretty sweet!

Ugh. Don’t remind me of that horrible sign. I was raised in Harrison, Arkansas, and I still have a lot of friends there. It was a huge ordeal to get that sign taken down. (And, yes, it was taken down, despite the dearth of articles mentioning that.) I’m surprised the sign didn’t make the Rational Wiki article.

Unfortunately, a few months later, the sign was actually replaced with one promoting a White Nationalist internet radio station.

And there’s my answer to this thread. You might be a racist if you make freedom of speech arguments to defend doing business with the head of the KKK to put out two racist signs.