Free pass
An article headlined O'Neil, 94, walks twice as oldest pro baseball player has an interesting reminder about how young this country is, and how it's foolish to think things like racism aren't part of our daily fabric.
AP via ESPN.com: John Jordan "Buck" O'Neil never got a free pass in life.Yup, his grandfather was a slave... which means there are people running around today whose grandparents were slave owners. I'm thinking if you were raised in a family of slaveowners, you're unlikely to have a progressive view on racial issues.
The grandson of a man brought to this continent as a slave, O'Neil moved to Kansas City to avoid racial persecution in the Deep South and played baseball during
an era of segregation.
Even if you rebelled in your wild teenage years, your reasons for rejecting racist pablum would probably be adolescent contrariness, rather than any well-considered and thus genuine paradigm shift. (Besides which, your rebellion circa 1910 would be something along the lines of let's stop lynching them, instead of hey, everyone's just as good as I am).
This, of course, doesn't just apply to the 90-something white guy down at the retirement home--those baby boomers whose fight for civil rights in the 60s dovetailed with a desire to smoke dope, love freely and listen to the 'black Elvis' think carrying a few signs meant they'd dropped their father's racism, but in many cases they just lopped off the more embarrassing de jure aspects.
It might seem racism is so obviously wrong that all you need to do is stop doing wrong, and you're no longer racist. But actually the reason it's so pernicious is because there are often short-term benefits to being racist and it often falls into the category of the natural, and hence no-thought-required, aspect of life.
It's on the level of the subconscious; so people never change, unless their noses are rubbed in it.
Don't just take my word for it; take the Project Implicit test. Either the Race IAT; or the Arab-Muslim IAT; or the Skin-tone IAT; or the Asian IAT (which ironically, should be called Asian-American).
Everyone I know who's ever taken the test has proven to be racist, against every non-white group, at the subconscious level. I word it that way because I don't term that racism--which is behavior-based. It can be overcome, you just have to be aware of it.
For people who aren't always factoring race in, it's impossible to stop being racist. We all surround ourselves with and are reinforced by others who think like ourselves (it's all about feeling comfortable with our friends and world). It's also impossible because for someone who's racist, there's never a compelling personal reason (except when you fall in love with someone and/or have kids) to stand up and say--because it would have to be that deliberate and pro-active--I'm racist, and I'm wrong, and I need help.
Because I don't know how to stop being racist; because society makes it easy and at times seemingly-necessary to be racist; and because I don't know any black people (let alone have any black friends). [Insert other race at will; although, and this is another post, I don't think it matters when non-whites are racist against whites. You could argue non-whites ought to be racist].
It's funny how often I run into people (always white) who mention they were in the crowd when Martin Luther King made his "I Have a Dream" speech in 1963. An NPR story says there was that day "an unexpectedly large crowd of at least 250,000 people."
But I've never met anyone who said s/he (or their parents) was one of the 60 million Southerners in 1963--or one of the 110 million other Americans--who not only weren't at King's speech, but were openly hostile to Dr. King and his ilk, thus making his speech and life's battle necessary. Or who figured it wasn't their fight (which in political science is the same as a vote for the status quo).
What happened to all these people? Why don't we ever hear about people who atoned, did penance, for their actions in those days? We've got all these people standing up saying they're born-again Christians--who ever says they used to be racist but God spoke to them, or some other miracle occurred?
Can people really go from bombing black churches/lynching blacks/siccing police dogs on blacks/spitting in the face of blacks/watching passively on tv, to accepting blacks as their equal? What happens to people who are raised in a family like that? Or maybe all those things were done by the same elusive non-reproductive Germans who were Nazis?
Heck, it was only four decades ago that 70% of Americans ascribed one of the following qualities to blacks in response to a poll question:
What do you think are the POOREST qualities about the Negroes in the United States? (3663 answered question)So what happened to this apparently-silent majority, and their kids, and grandkids? Has anyone ever met anyone who said yes, I used to be racist, but nobody called it racism because it was the norm (even the Bible said so!)
Uneducated, illiterate, ignorant, not capable of learning (15.53%), Immoral - less moral training, low morals; inmoral, general (5.95%), Criminal - steal, kill, fight (5.16%), Lazy, don't want to work, slothful, no initiative, no ambition, shiftless (18.02%), Dirty, slovenly - live in dirt, miserable housing, carelessness (11.08%), Aggressive - chip on shoulder; smart-alecky, nasty, impolite, no manners (5.38%), Don't stick togeher; don't help their own people (1.64%), Won't stay in their place -- want equality, want to eat with you, etc. (3.41%), Dependent on others - beggars. (1.83%), Pretentious, show offs (1.04%), Common-law marriages, don't marry (0.93%), Dishonest, can't be trusted (3.22%), Drink too much, always drink (1.77%), Spend money foolishly, can't save money (1.75%), Superstitious (0.33%), Same as whites, same as anybody (4.80%), Have to be judged as individuals (2.87%), No poor qualities (0.71%), Miscellaneous, others (1.28%), Don't know, no answer (29.84%)
But I did the following things to change my views--and you know, it took years and constant work and it was hard, because it's hard to change something you never even thought you needed to think about, it was harder than learning a new way to breath.
But I decided I couldn't just trust to my good intentions, or soak up anti-racism serum via osmosis, because all my instincts were shaped by racism and since I'm as self-defensive as anyone I needed to do something extra-ordinary to start not being racist.
And now that I'm a recovering racist, I'm more open to ideas, am not so self-righteous or condescending or sarcastic, and benefit from being able to appreciate and learn from people of other races--including people from civilizations that were laying the groundwork for ours (none of which I ever heard about as a kid, aside from paper/fireworks/egg foo young) when America was still in knee-pants.
Heck, most of the poll respondents and their kin are still alive--and they're often at the top of the organizational charts. How likely is it that they've done a 180 in their views, when human nature is such that many old people still listen only to the Glenn Miller (or Nirvana) of their youth; and we all regularly say things to our peers like wow, you're the same as you were in high school?
Then again, I guess if your grandpappy was a slave owner, maybe you think it's good enough that you're no longer upholding the family tradition of whipping people to death.
AP photo of Buck O'Neil by Chris Cummins via ESPN.com; which, incidentally, should've used the headline: O'Neil, 94, gets walked by both teams
No comments:
Post a Comment