Who are You Calling a Racist?

Race has become the big issue here in the MetroWest area with the Gates case getting so much play. Indeed it became a national issue when President Obama remarked on the case during his press conference. Today, everyone is breathlessly awaiting the outcome of the beer summit.

As an aging, technically overweight white guy, I have to say that I am getting weary of all the very successful thin black men continuing to blather about racial discrimination. It is unseemly. Some of them got their shot at success because a majority of white guys believe that justice demanded a level playing field. Affirmative action, EEO, and many other acronyms were devised to the end of giving a brother a chance. I never complained that my tax money was being used to give kids breakfast, or to support the METCO. Many people in our community hosted inner city kids and helped them financially and spiritually during their high school and college years.

So I am getting a little tired of being assumed to be a racist. It seems to me that there are a lot of successful black men and women out there. The majority of us voted for a black governor here in Massachusetts, and for a black president of the USA. Where is the racism in that? Yes, I know it is still out there. People still dislike Jews and Irish and Indians and Arabs... Prejudice exists in every culture. In the US, we have done just about everything governmentally that can be done to assure a level playing field. What is left to do now is for people to stop using discrimination as an excuse for not trying. No one liked Pakistanis or Koreans when they moved in, and because the stuck together and worked hard, many have done very well.

Folks, the fact is that in 2009, most of the white people I know do not judge others by the color of a person's skin; they judge them by the way they talk, the way they are dressed and the way they behave. These may be superficial characteristics, but this is reality. People of color are being judged today the same way we judge other white people.

Discrimination is real; but I do not believe it is based upon skin color these days for the majority of educated Americans. People like to quote MLK and focus on character. But, you can't judge character until you get to know someone. No one will bother to learn the content of another's character if they never get to meet them.

The point is that in the USA today, discrimination is a class thing, an education and an economic thing - as it always has been true for and among white folks. The real insidious aspect of perceived discrimination is when you believe that your failure is because of bias against you, there is a tendancy to use that as an excuse to give up. In my experience, talent trumps bias, nine out of ten times.
Time for a beer. Then a nap.