It Takes a Nation of Millions
The First in a series on my personal journey with Racism
How old where you when you realized you’re racist? I can’t answer that question, not truthfully. It was after college for sure. Probably more than a decade ago, but time frames get fuzzy, especially with the temporal disturbance that is Covid-19. One hard truth that came into focus the day I accepted that I am a racist, “The Truth really does not care about your feelings.”
Now, that statement is a rallying cry for conservative trolls everywhere. It has emboldened red pill (or worse black pills). It has allowed people to propagate misinformation under the illusion of truth. Ben Shapiro wrote a book called “Facts Don’t Care About Your Feelings,” and his stances are so far removed from reality he might as well be on the other side of the looking glass.
Honestly, it can feel that way about any truth once you come to accept it. The people who haven’t are experiencing a reality that isn’t quite real. That American Dream they are living is their reality, even if it isn’t reality itself. There’s a lot of anger and resentment toward those have accepted a truth, especially when that truth counters their belief.
Humans run on beliefs. Religion is the easy target, but politics are lockstep. We have quotes and voting records, but people believe in the truth they have woven for their value system. So when you believe you aren’t racist, you are likely denying the truth. I know that I was. I’m going to dig deeply into my own racist history, but first I want to peel back the layers that lead me to denying my own truth.
Why I Couldn’t Possibly Be A Racist
The laundry list of excuses I made for myself could fill textbooks.
I have a litany of microaggressions I didn’t even realize I was making.
One of my most infuriating traits is how literal I am. For better or for worse. In sickness and in health. Till Death do I part. I am married to the denotation. Not in the sense of figurative language, I don’t care if you “misuse” literally. Language is alive and all living things should grow.
I was having a conversation with my wife once and she told me I liked to be right. I countered with I like to be accurate. For most of my early life, I was inaccurate. I said I wasn’t a racist. What I meant was, I am not a bigot1.
I had built a cocoon around myself, a tightly knit web of lies (mixing metaphors, what an atrocity), because I was denying a truth. We live in a racist society. We are complicit in a racist society. As a white man, I benefit from a racist society. I am a racist.
The how and why racism negatively impacts people of color and benefits white people are often described as tangled webs. Sticky and difficult to navigate. Emotion laden. I think it is more like a fungal network. It’s deep rooted, in the very soil of our world. We can’t even begin to see the connections because they are so far below the surface. You have to dig in, picking one mushroom doesn’t impact the core.
Racism makes our world function. It a key component of classism.
No War But Class Warfare?
Almost every social ill in the world can be traced to classism in some measure. One of classism’s driving forces is othering. A lot of my early justifications for not being racist are smothered in othering. When you take a genetic modifier and allow it to define a person, you’re engaging in othering.
Defining my non-white friends as non-white friends is othering. I can’t even pretend to be divorced from this, it still happens. Some of this is just a function of our world. My black friends aren’t allowed to just be my friends, they must be my black friends.
It also opens the door to monolithic thinking. You often hear about the dangers of stereotyping and it’s counterpoint that stereotypes exist for a reason. A stereotype is an obstacle on the road to critical thinking. In a thesis titled “Developing Critical Thinking Skills For Overcoming Stereotypes In Intercultural Communication,” A. V. Annenkova and S. A. Domysheva write
Wearing your friends as a badge of honor isn’t a very good thing to do as a friend. Using them as permission to escape your own accountability for your place in racism is also not being a very good friend. Racism was a wedge that invisibly drove itself between some of my closest friendships because I couldn’t even acknowledge the effect it was having on my life.
When I was in elementary school, my best friend was Jeffrey. He is a man I am still fortunate to have in my life, but we’ve long since drifted from the best friend phase. Middle school wreaked havoc on our friendship, not from any one act but a series of ignorance and a lack of cultural understanding.
I couldn’t understand what being the only black family in a predominantly white, suburban neighborhood was like. I couldn’t understand what going to a more integrated, inner city (even if that city was Winston-Salem) school must have been like for one of my closest friends. How segregation was a matter of survival for a lot of people of color in integrated social settings.
What is worse, I didn’t take time to think about it or question it. I accepted the fate of our friendship and victimized myself. I was one of the good ones, in my mind at least. It’s easy to forgive, puberty is difficult for ALL children. That forgiveness comes with an invisible price, white privilege.
I mourned the loss of that friendship in childhood, but I didn’t accept my role in its demise. I hung out with someone who wrote “n*gger lover” in my sixth grade yearbook. I marked it out and told him it wasn’t cool. But we still hung out (that friendship didn’t survive into 7th grade). I felt racial divides pushing their way into our relationship, but I never stopped to ask why? How was I responsible?
If you had asked me at the time, I would say I couldn’t be racist. My best friend was black. I didn’t see color. I CALLED OUT RACIST SLURS! And yet, I wasn’t willing to stand against systemic oppression. I wasn’t even willing to sincerely question it.
I’d like to say that dating provided me an intimate opportunity for self introspection, but uh…
Not Ray Davies’ Kinks
Dating “outside your race” as a defining characteristic is problematic at best. Racial fetishism (“yellow” or “jungle fever” especially) is a consistent issue in conversations about race.
In an thesis entitled “Are Racial Preferences in Dating Morally Defensible?,” Mohammad Harith Aslam Khawaja digs into the morality of dating preferences:
There’s volumes to unpack about beauty standards, not just in racism but also sexism and a litany of other manufactured division. A song like Weezer’s “Across the Sea” was a hauntingly beautiful song that I cherished in my youth -
but in retrospect is so deeply problematic that even OceanGate would fear to tread those waters. I loved that song. That album. And while the debate over problematic art is valid (even in regard to this song in specific), I think drfapfap put it best:
I understand that artists are allowed to grow, so I’m not using this space as a screed against Rivers. Just to reflect on what spoke to me in my youth and how it impacted my world view. It reinforced my own fetishization of “ethnic” women, another brick in the foundation of my racism.
The objectification of racial features certainly merited a measure of introspection, but instead it caused me to see people as traits. I had reduced human beings to genetic markings and divorced them from their own humanity. I was being racist.
But if you had asked me in the moment? No. How could I be? I was open to dating women of ALL ethnicities! I turned my relationships into conquests. Prizes. But all of that is window dressings on my actually self-realization.
The Hardest Truths Hit the Hardest
When you realize a truth, it’s easy to feel a lot like Alice. Sitting on the other side, knowing you NEVER want to go back through the looking glass. The other side isn’t entirely unpleasant. It has benefits. It feels good. It is a mirage.
The truth is bleak. It’s uncomfortable. Once you see it, you can’t unsee it and it is pervasive. But you know it is real.
My cultural epiphany was the culmination of a lot of factors. Friends who took the time to educate me. People who challenged my misguided beliefs. Wisdom of life experience. My own research. And really, just making the decision to stop denying other people’s lived experiences.
I’d be lying if I said the internet hasn’t accelerated the process. How can you deny systemic racism when the evidence is presented to you daily, in real time? Turning that lens on myself and my own behaviors was harder. No one wants to accept they are a villain. Especially when it is something that feels out of our control.
No foundation can weather a strong enough storm. Cracks started to appear for me when I saw how much harder my friends had to work for the same results. A group of my friends started a band to poke fun at other high schoolers bringing their guitar to school and playing in the courtyard. It got out of hand. Only one person got in trouble, my friend Jamil. He happens to be black. He was accused of starting a riot by our vice principal.
That same friend came to the church camp where we had family reunions. There was a sermon about the holy ghost that apparently required white sheets and measure of rope by the camp fire. It was a funny story for me at the time, even as I acknowledged how horrific it was. We would never let something like that happen really. That was my privilege speaking.
I’ve yelled at cops, once I got out of a speeding ticket by yelling at a cop. He thought I was driving drunk. I was just exhausted from working 18 hours and having to be back at work in 5 hours. I’m sure I was swerving. Probably speeding. He let me off with a warning.
Counter that with a group of my friends terrified when they were pulled over for no reason. They wanted the one white friend to talk to the cops. Because their lives were at risk. This was before the prevalence of evidence that any minority interaction with police could be fatal.
Or at my bachelor party where I was assumed to be a celebrity because my entourage had well dressed black men. It’s a funny story, but also… I’ve said the N-word, quoting other people. I’m sorry for that, I should have never done it. It didn’t even move the needle in my social life. The Morgan Wallens of the world get rewarded for it.
I was so wrapped up in how hard life was FOR ME, I couldn’t begin to understand how I had privilege. How I’ve never really been in financial straits. How I got a college degree without really taking it seriously. How I’ve ALWAYS had job prospects. How I’ve owned a house since I was 27. I’ve been allowed to fail upward. I’ve had so many micro and macro transgressions explained away or forgiven, because I was one of the good guys.
Once I said it, “I am a racist,” a lot of pieces started to fall into place. When I stopped denying my own reality, I was able to move toward being an anti-racist. Something I still strive for today. Something I still work on.
I’ll talk about my path to being an anti-racist soon, but for now, maybe give yourself the grace to admit you might be a racist too. The truth really does set you free.
From this point forward, I’ll be using the systemic definition of racism. I understand and acknowledge that bigotry based on skin color is a viable definition of racism, but for the purpose of this article, it is important to separate those definitions.
Fantastic and very similar to my own development as a thinker (and racist).
It’s an acknowledgment that always surprises my generation and continues to enlighten my path as clarity presents itself in so many ways.
Thank you for your thoughts and sharing your journey.