This question seems to assume that the only kind of racism that exists is conscious bigotry, which is precisely the assumption that is wrong and is the subject of the ongoing debate in this thread.
Plus, I do naturally sink in water…does that make me a witch or not?
That may be but what harm is there in unconscious bigotry that doesn’t manifest itself in word or deed?
None by itself, but unconscious bigotry can manifest itself in action, and it can also lead to a lesser likelihood of being open to the existence of other forms of bigotry that one doesn’t personally experience.
There were some white people in the South during Jim Crow who might have had no personal animus towards any black people, but also did nothing to oppose the racist system of Jim Crow. Jim Crow is gone, but if some significant remnants remain that make life more difficult for black people in many ways, and one isn’t helping in some way to demolish these remnants, then I think it’s reasonable to point this out and encourage them to hop on the train and help out.
It does manifest. But not in a way that’s necessarily obvious at an individual level.
If a single cop shoots a black teen out of fear, there’s only so much that can be inferred. But when studies show that cops (and Americans generally) overestimate the age and size of black teens, and are more likely to view black teens as aggressive or threatening, then you start to see how implicit bias matters. The same goes for names on resumes. A single rejection of a stereotypically black name might mean nothing. It’s only in the statistical aggregation that the unintentional discrimination becomes apparent.
The same basic thing is true of structural racism (as distinct from implicit bias). As a consequence of conscious bigotry from 1870-1970, black people live in segregated neighborhoods in many parts of the US. Lots of policies affect those neighborhoods differently and worse, such as how much money is spent on repairing roads there or where to place wastewater treatment plants. The people making those decisions may harbor no conscious bias, but the decisions nevertheless further racism. And you wouldn’t be able to tell at the level of an individual decision without zooming out to examine the history.
Implicit bias and structural racism account for big parts of the problems we still see today. And they are problems inherent in how white people act. But they are not things you always observe in individual instances of behavior. We know they are present because of the wider context. And with implicit bias, we know it is present because everyone who takes the tests shows some level of bias.
I agree. Which is why I said don’t assume racism until they say or DO something racist.
I whole-heartedly agree with this. But I don’t think the best way to “encourage them to hop on the train and help out” is to start off by saying “You’re racist. You might not think you are, and you don’t do or say anything remotely racist, but unconsciously, you are racist. Also, you should help others stop being racist”
To me the converse is just as true: we will never make any progress on the very real and very significant issues of implicit and of structural racism as long it requires first that all Whites call themselves racists and requires that any statement that a person’s actions are motivated by racism be accepted as the truth without question and that the accuser knows the mind of the White person and what (s)he was thinking better than the White person does.
It’s an absurd demand and a conversation stopper.
Insisting that racism only exists when there is subjective intent to be racist in the mind of the actor guarantees that racism will never be excised from our society.
To effectively fight racism you have to surrender your pride and let objective observers tell you when you are acting questionably with respect to race, especially, specifically, and particularly when you don’t know there’s a problem with what you are doing.
Insisting on being absolved and considered pure based on what you think is in your heart is self-serving and selfish and will do nothing except help White folks satisfy their self images while preserving their race-based advantages.
What you think is in your heart or mind is irrelevant. Your intent is irrelevant. The fact that you aren’t aware or conscious is the point. You are an unreliable judge of yourself.
Insisting that all racism requires racists and racist intent ignores much that is structural racism and facilitates the ignoring of the structural features.
The “objective observer” is a mythical creature in this matter although I am sure that you would claim to be such. Does W. Kamau Bell get to unilaterally claim that his observations are the objective ones? Is he exempt from having implicit biases and from having his expectations prime his perceptions? Is actual conversation and thus improvement not better accomplished by all appreciating that none of us possess a complete objective truth and starting from there?
And really no one here except you is speaking about “absolution” nor seeking it; to many of us the concept is a strange one and it is certainly a useless one. The issue here more is on your apparent obsession with blame (of everyone who is White) to the exclusion of actually fixing problems.
This may seem a strange analogy to make but I am reminded of the evolution of understanding in how to approach quality improvement. I know it in the medical world but I suspect it is similar in other industries. The kneejerk approach is to want to find someone to blame for the occurrence of an adverse outcome. Point the finger at the person or persons who did the wrong thing and hold them responsible for the consequences. And one can sometimes find someone who made an error. Thing is that identifying who made an error does very little to improve quality in the future. It does nothing to determine and to address the actual root cause of the adverse outcome, to determine how the structure of the system increased the risk of the adverse outcome. What has been well established is that a “culture of blame” only results in less self-reporting of errors and less possibility of reducing them in the future; becoming self-aware of good faith errors, admitting to them and being part of a process to not only reduce your own chance of making them in the future but of modifying the system’s structure to help prevent others from committing them in the future, requires some mutual trust. It’s not an absolution from personal accountability; it’s a recognition that the focus on “blame and shame” if anything diminishes actual quality improvement.
Race based advantages? Good luck disentangling those objectively.
I quizzed you in intent before but you didn’t respond, I’ll ask again
Any thoughts now on whether intent matters at all?
Intent doesn’t matter much when you are talking about racism. It matters a lot when you are talking about murder. See the difference?
What is an “objective observer”? who gets to define “acting questionably”.
It has already been stated on this thread by you that everyone is racist
If that is the case then why would I trust the judgement of someone who may be prejudging me on the colour of my skin and seeing racism where none exists? By your standards no “objective observer” exists. You have something of a paradox.
Of course that is a problem of your own making.
For me, I think it is perfectly possible to find someone to be so essentially free of racist thought and deed that I could not saddle them with the label of “racist”. (the same is true of homophobia, sexism etc…)
So in my world a potentially objective observer does exist and I’d be happy for a judgement of what is and isn’t racist to be filtered through them. Unfortunately for you, in my world that also means you accepting that some people are simply not “racist” to any meaningful extent.
no…you’ll have to explain. Harm is done in both cases, a dead person results in both cases, the method of harm is the same in both cases. The only difference is the intent.
Now of course it so happens that we are not talking about “murder” in both cases are we? And would you care to guess one of the distinguishing factors between “murder” and “manslaughter”? (at least in the UK system)
OK, if you aren’t comfortable with that example. try this.
As a stranger at a party I begin an anecdote that ends up mentioning spiders. The person I’m speaking to has a panic attack when I finish the anecdote because I did not know they have arachnophobia.
Run that scenario again but this time I* do *know they are arachnophobic and tell the story with intention of causing that panic attack.
So in that case…does intent matter?
This is actually an excellent analogy. This area forms a large part of the professional work I carry out and the one thing we do is view things from the point of the process.
The people are assumed to be blameless and it is the imperfect design of the process that allows errors to occur.
I start with the explicit assumption that people are good and competent and want things to work out well. Starting with an assumption that they are inherently incompetent is a guarantee that I’ll make no progress.
How this has anything to do with racism is beyond me. Racism is not the same as those examples you have given. They are not examples of racism.
So screw this I’m going hang-gliding. Cheers.
They specifically and purposefully have nothing to do with racism. I’m pushing back on the idea that intent is irrelevant when considering racism. I deliberately gave examples that are “bad” things with negative outcomes to first test whether that idea only applies to racism.
OK I see where you are coming from. I think you will find that most people who have experience being a victim of racism will tell you that intention has precious little to do with racism - as in, it’s not a defense to a racist act or othering act (such as hair touching the afro) to say - “I wasn’t thinking any racist thoughts when I did that”. When it happens every day to you and never to the other kids - you start to feel like shit regardless of people’s intentions.
Let’s return to “All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten.”
The problem: Black girls with big hair wearing it natural get unwanted attention (inclusive of touching) disproportionate to other children and may consequently try to hide their hair and internalize negative thoughts about what may be better thought as part of their intrinsic beauty. They may end up wanting to wear their hair in ways that look more like the White girls’ hair as a result. To look less Black.
Possible approaches to that problem:
Bell’s first thought that he thought better on - Daughter of mine, someone making you feel bad about your Black features is racism. Assume racist intent of the other children and possibly of the teacher. The blame approach. Accomplishes? Not much.
Bell’s actual approach - reinforcement of her hair’s beauty by her parents and empowering her to decide to wear it how she decides to wear it when she wants to. Succeeded in preventing racist impacts on the child. Might be the best choice in this particular case.
Assuming no ill intent and no realization by others involved of the racial impact of the behaviors. Speak to the teacher assuming the teacher s of good intent and explain the impact that other children’s excessive attention is having. Encourage the teacher to expand her efforts to teach acceptance and respect of each others differences and to enforce personal space social norms as part of that mutual respect. Perhaps there are books to be read that do not specifically discuss hair but are instead about feathers or fur being different and how other animals’ curiosity expressed too much resulted in the different one becoming ashamed of what was beautiful? Maybe there is another system level approach? Or maybe the problem is minor enough that a systems solution is not required. That decision requires input from those experiencing how being so treated feels. That is a subjective, not an objective thing.
Is someone who to the best of their own self-awareness abhor racism and certainly have no explicit beliefs that White is in anyway better but who when tested can be shown to have implicit beliefs that they are unaware of that bias them ever so slightly but still measurably to prefer Whites to Blacks and to fear Black males more than White males, a racist?
And I’d agree that implicit bias is the result of racism and more it is a means by which racism occurs. But the author is not “a racist” by virtue of having implicit biases. He needs no “absolution”. And he, like the rest of us, so we, still needs to take responsibility for how we act upon those biases by virtue of our best efforts to become aware of them and to control for them, be they implicit biases regarding Black, Blue, White, or any other color or group.
I would really like to emphasise that I don’t think these kids are racists. Even with adults who I see do racist things, I will not automatically label them racists, because it’s not helpful and it’s often untrue. This is a difficult point for a lot of people to understand. But the world is subtle. We can have differing views on racism and I will still not label you a racist. I hope we are all onboard so far.
I don’t think he assumes racist intent. And I don’t think he blames any individuals. Regardless of what he actually said, I think it is possible to be angry at society for condoning a race-based behavior (and this is what this hair touching is) that is annoying, disrespectful and “othering”.
Maybe you aren’t aware of this (I wasn’t aware of it myself until about a decade ago because I have never lived around black people) but this black hair touching thing is a widespread phenomenon among black women. It happens so much that they can share their own stories among peers with complete understanding.
You recommend speaking to the teacher and encouraging the teacher to expand [their] teaching of acceptance…" OK, So they should do this also with her primary school teacher when she moves on from kindergarden too right? Then, as she progresses through classes, with all her teachers in different subjects in each school she attends and then at university, the deans of each school, the dorm-room counsellors (yes, it happens at university). And also, because it doesn’t just happen at school, it also happens at the local park or playground, so they should speak to all the parents down there too. And at the supermarket they might want to have a word with the manager. At the wedding we will attend on the weekend - best have a word with the bride and groom to ask them to hand out a leaflet explaining the situation to all the parents of kids at the kids table.
Gee, I’m starting to feel like this places a lot of onus on the parents.
I am not black so I can’t speak for them. However, I am a white guy who has been living in Japan for over 20 years. My Japanese language ability is pretty good - I can read and write, speak on virtually any topic and do any daily necessity required to function as a normal adult. However, almost every time I have a meal with someone who is asian, the waitstaff will ask the asian person that I’m with if it is OK to take my plate (when I’ve finished eating). Even if that asian person doesn’t speak Japanese. Because of the way I look. It’s not a big deal as a single event, and I am certain that there is no bad-natured intent involved because I don’t think that automatically assuming I’m deficient in language ability because of my race can be classified as ill intent.
But it is still race-based behaviour that happens so often (almost daily) that it does have a negative effect on my well-being (I’m thinking is this going to happen forever until I die - when I take my daughter out for dinner will I be belittled in front of her like this? Yes). I don’t expect or want sympathy. I have long since realised I can’t change Japan and I am not trying to. But if I can help convince someone in a very multicultural society that some kinds of race-based behaviours range from annoying to insulting, then I will consider it a positive thing I have done.