We Have a Black President, But That Doesn't Resolve the Deep Racism Built into the American Psyche

[marmar]

AlterNet / By Tim Wise

We Have a Black President, But That Doesn't Resolve the Deep Racism Built into the American Psyche
President Obama hails a post-racial future for America. But being colorblind to our society is not a smart move.

June 17, 2010 |


It was summer 2004 when most of us first became familiar with Barack Obama. Then an Illinois state senator, the U.S. senate candidate delivered the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in Boston: the first of his many now-famous orations on a national stage. Therein he delivered several applause lines, but none were as big as when he proclaimed:

"There's not a black America and a white America and Latino America and Asian America; there's the United States of America."

Though one might welcome such a statement were it offered in the future and aspirational tense -- as a heartfelt plea for true equality -- Obama proclaimed it in the descriptive and present tense. In so doing he traded intellectual honesty for easy and predictable ovation. After all, 2004 was the same year that research from MIT and the University of Chicago found that job applicants with "white" names were 50 percent more likely to be called back for an interview than those with "black" names, even when all their qualifications were indistinguishable. And with black and brown unemployment standing at double the white rate, even as the new upstart from Chicago poured forth rhetoric professing national unity (and with the median white family possessing 8-10 times the net worth of the median black or Latino family), it should have been apparent that Obama was engaged in political science fiction rather than the description of sociological truth.

Post-Racial Liberalism: Its Origins and Trajectory

To be fair, of course, the rhetoric of post-racial liberalism wasn't something invented by the current President. Rather, it has its roots in the period immediately following the passage of civil rights laws in the 1960s. It was Daniel Patrick Moynihan, for instance -- an advisor to President Johnson before becoming a United States Senator -- who first suggested that the nation would do well to engage in "benign neglect" when it came to the issue of race.

According to Moynihan, persistent inequities between whites and blacks could best be addressed by the passage of race-neutral, universal programs to help all in need; that, in addition to focusing on presumed cultural defects in the black community, from single parent families to crime to an inadequate attachment to education and the labor market. While conservatives made some of the same arguments about so-called black cultural pathology during this period, what distinguished post-racial liberalism from the new cultural racism of the right was its stated commitment to reducing racial disparities, albeit by non-racial means. ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/vision/147204/we_have_a_black_president%2C_but_that_doesn%27t_resolve_the_deep_racism_built_into_the_american_psyche/

[Skinner]

1. I think this is a misreading of Obama's 2004 keynote.

He was not saying that racial inequality was a thing of the past. He was criticising those who would cynically drive wedges between people for political gain (read: George W. Bush).

Building bridges and trying to bring people together has been Obama's schtick from the beginning. Some people weren't paying attention. "Change we can believe in" was not about a progressive policy revolution -- it was a new kind of politics that tried to heal the divisions of the Bush era.

[Rebubula]

2. LOLZ

Racism in the American Psyche

I am NOT denying that there is racism in America....far from it. I come from the mountains of North Georgia - so I have seen racism in action and thought.

However, I have traveled extensively for business and pleasure and find that ALL countries\cultures\people display racism of some group or another. To act as though this country has a corner on racism is myopic at best.

As spoken in a Drive By Truckers Song - 'Racism is a worldwide problem and has been since the beginning of recorded history and it ain't just white and black neither. But, thanks to folks like George Wallace, it is always easier to play it with a Southern Accent.'

The world is not the US and the US is not the cause of all the world's ills.

[marmar]

3. "US is not the cause of all the world's ills"

Who said it is? Did you read the piece or just react to the headline?

[Rebubula]

7. Reacting...

...to posted pieces that like to paint America as being some Ginormous racist country in the middle of a Benetton-like world.

This, like may others, posit that idea....at least in my reactionary mind.

[teknomanzer]

8. What is your point?

No one ever said racism is a problem exclusive to the United States or even the South for that matter. Just because racism exists in other nations - and it clearly does - does not mean we should not make every effort in this country to address it as a problem. Further it is a matter of extreme importance in a country that makes claim to exceptionalism. We claim our country is based on rule of law and equality rather than ethnic heritage. Racism has no place in such a country.

[Myrina]

4. He's not "Black", he's bi-racial. Racists have an even bigger problem with THAT.

n/t

[rury]

5. He's black...

of course his mother was white, but the one-drop rule applies!!

[Myrina]

6. ... and that's what I mean ...

... that the 'one drop (of anything non-white) rule' still even applies in this country is fucked up and shows how insane the anti-everyone folks are.

:hi: