RACIAL TARGET: James Craig Anderson, a 49-year-old auto plant worker, was standing in a parking lot when two carloads of white teenagers allegedly jumped him, yelling racial epithets, before driving over him with a pickup truck.
A little less than a year ago, I pleaded with African Americans to stop using the word “racism” as a kneejerk response to any sort of problematic situation or behavior. As a way of demonstrating how possible it is, I vowed to abstain from using “the r-word” for at least a year, as a way of doing my part to tone down the rhetorical flame wars that have come to dominate contemporary political conversation.
My point in doing so was not to deny that racism exists, but rather, by temporarily banishing it, to allow the term “racism” to be reserved only for situations that truly call for it. The truth is that while racism still exists in various forms today, trying to call it out without subscribing to a commonly held and understood definition becomes problematic as racial dynamics in the United States of America continue to evolve. In other words, what racism is and looks like to me may be different from what it is and how it looks to you … if we can’t get that ironed out, how can we solve the race problem as it currently exists?
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Today, I’ve broken my vow.
I’m sorry that I couldn’t go the whole year. I wanted to. Really, I did.
I probably would’ve been in the clear had I not read about the senseless vehicular homicide of James Craig Anderson in Jackson, Mississippi. According to eyewitness accounts and video footage, Anderson had been beaten severely by at least two young White males (whose names I will not dignify by referencing here), who had set out with the intent of bringing harm to the first Black person they ran across. And after one of them had left the scene, the other one literally ran over the victim with his truck … then bragged about it later at a local McDonald’s.
Let me say this slowly, so as not to be misunderstood.
THAT. WAS. RACIST.
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That’s not all it is, of course. It’s also the work of a sociopath, whose behavior shocked his friends enough to cause one of them to lie when asked if she knew the assailant, and who, according to a local pastor, had a history of bullying other teenagers.
But make no mistake; this crime was mostly about racism.
The most sociologically accepted definition of racism is that it consists of race prejudice plus power.
The reason why the “plus power” part is added in there is because charges of racism are usually too easily dismissed by people who claim immunity because no one can see inside the heart. People in the public eye accused of racism, according to Jay Smooth of ill doctrine, usually try to turn public attention away from what they did and tend to frame the issue around who they are (“I’m not a racist! That’s not who I am!”).
Focusing on what a person did is usually a better way to resolve minor incidents, because the alternative is combing through the racial history of everyone who ever makes a racially insensitive comment or forwards a racist email, and nobody has that kind of time.
But in this particular crime, context matters. And you don’t have to be a regular on CSI to know that these crimes were, well … racist as hell.
If it had taken place in rural Oregon or Montana, I might’ve been willing to view this crime only as a momentary lapse in judgment. But the troubled racial history of Mississippi, too numerous to even attempt to recount here, casts an ominous light on this whole affair. The rest of the details just fill in the blanks.
Fundamentally, the beating and subsequent homicide of James Craig Anderson was the result of two White males, accompanied by friends, using their locus of power to inflict pain and suffering on, quite literallythe first Black person they saw. It was about them feeling entitled to inflict such pain by virtue of their racial identity, and expecting to get away with it for the same reason.
And whether or not it should be considered a hate crime, or whether or not hate crimes are a necessary classification in our criminal justice system… all of that is beside the point.
The point is this:
If THAT isn’t racist, then just forget it … the word no longer exists.
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Now that I’ve spent hundreds of words stating the obvious, it’s worth reiterating my previous stance.
If we as Black people can tamp down on our use of the word “racism” as a catch-all equivalent to “wrongdoing by White people,” it will help to promote more effective communication from people across various ideological and racial boundaries.
But it’s also necessary for an entirely different reason.
The blight of institutional racism is a tragic stain on American history, and it is cheapened every time we apply that word to conflicts and incidents of a vastly inferior magnitude.
Especially when we do it over the Internet.
The repeated rhetorical equivalency of heinous crimes with comical misunderstandings has produced such a climate of jaded skepticism on the internet that the very phrase, “that’s racist” has morphed into a caricatured catchphrase meme, complete with its own alternative spelling (“thassraycess!”).
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If the latest horrific crime in Jackson has taught us anything, it’s that THIS is the real legacy of racism in America.
So like I said, I’m sorry I couldn’t go the full year.
But I’m sorry to say, some of us Black folks couldn’t go a whole month, or even a whole week, without complaining about racism. And if those complaints are about something trivial, like whether or not Chris Brown gets the same kind of media coverage as Charlie Sheen, we ought to keep our mouths shut.
First, I agree with you the whole way, and this is a sad example of blatant racism. But I would like to share an observation:
Talking heads which happen to be black, when talking about racism, usually are only referring to racism against them. If a black youth commits a similar crime, or let’s just say a violent crime, against a white person, rarely is racism explored as a possible motive. Often the crime is explained in terms of the socioeconomic situation of said black youth.
As a white person in a America I have been trained in numerous ways to recognize racism in myself and the white folk around me. I am trained, and rightly so, to recognize this and other offenses like it or lesser as racist within the context of “my own people”. Rarely do I see that from talking heads that happen to be black, or even from black people in general. Mind you, I am the minority in my neighborhood, so it’s not for lack of exposure.
I say all that to say the battle ground on which we fight racism is first in our own hearts, then by way of engaging others individually, then by engaging a “system.” I actually think the first two is how we engage that system primarily since a system is made up of individuals and you have to see yourself as part of it rather than it being an evil entity separate from yourself. It’s evil because of me. It’s evil because of you.
I read the article you wrote a year ago and I appreciated it for the same reasons you said you wrote it. I’m glad you challenged yourself the way you did, but I’m glad you also didn’t go the whole year since this situation deserves to be categorized the way you categorized it. It’s racist.
Great article. Thanks for posting!
Excellent insights Jelani. If Black people keep insisting that the White people’s motives in how they relate to Black people are always driven by racism, the word itself becomes a pat excuse to continue the racism. It loses it’s power to appeal to the act in question, and the power of “Don’t pull the race card” becomes the response of choice to real issues of racism; this eclipses all legitimate efforts to quell, subdue, and otherwise tame what is truly racist. We need to communicate issues more, and color less, and “come let us reason together” is a good place to start. We happen to be an emotional people, a passionate people, who look for the prejudice if even the word black is mentioned in passing and it, sometimes just plain isn’t there. After a while it won’t even be a talking point. It’ll be a point to be dismissed and ignored. So you are so right. By now everybody knows “we are black and we’re proud.” There’s nothing left to prove to ourselves, but that we can think rationally. We need to enter the market place, the school, the church, the media,, the workforce as though the ground is firm and contend like it’s level.
Racism among the white community was never fully understood by African Americans and the newest version seems entirely misunderstood. A brief bit of research reveals that the murderer in this case was previously the victim of a robbery and that this was the motivation. I am Western European (the phrase “caucasian” was made up and has no real meaning, we have vastly different cultures among us) and was forced to go to a largely African American school where I and every other white student was a daily target of racism. “Beat up a white kid day” is a well known phenomenon and the fact of the matter is we are told that we are not allowed to mention race when violence occurs to us. Because of this, despite being the majority, we are never allowed to mention some very big base issues in racism in America that are “putting the shoe on the other foot” (subjecting whites to widespread racism). These racists aren’t the children of southern families still pissed off at losing their farm hands. Those people are actually pretty likely to vehemently proclaim anti-racism as they themselves have been subjected to decades of ridicule. The new ones, the ones who are now actively engaging college campuses for the first time since the 60s, the ones who are more likely to wear a polo shirt and to smirk confidently when they see a black person with sagging pants and no degree. That guy is probably the child of a couple of hippies who, after fighting their parents, their communities and everyone they knew during the civil rights era, were spit on and robbed by blacks, then accused of racism when they tried to bring up their kid was being beaten and accused of racism on a daily basis. This is now a common situation, and it was the people who were trying to help you.
What few (none) African Americans realize is that the focal points of violent racists among whites is now coming from Southern California and the North East. Places that were previously considered bastions of liberal, anti-racist sentiment. This is where it’s coming from now, and it’s in plain sight for us. The Tea Party, while having nothing to do with it, was ironically given massive support just because it was accused of racism. While the hispanic population is actually largely to blame, by using the race card to justify illegal immigration and forcing land owners to let them move into more expensive neighborhoods than they can afford (la raza) while not having the college going rates of other immigrant groups that have to work harder to get here, I would still have to say that the majority of Caucasians today regret helping the civil rights movement because of the incredible level of almost daily harassment we have received and the fact that few African Americans today end up graduating from college. I have been called a racist for not giving someone an absurd handout more times than I can even remember. You’re “most commonly sociological” definition simply isn’t the definition and it isn’t how it’s been used. White culture has been told that it should be ashamed of it’s self and that all we have built has been built by slavery and we’re getting tired of it, from here to England. And then the civil rights courses. Not once did I see a class that talked about slavery but mentioned even a single caucasian other than Abraham Lincoln. We have no “none-racist” role models and even if we did, would we really support them entirely AFTER WATCHING YOU PEOPLE HURT OUR CHILDREN?! What do you get when you keep calling someone a racist and don’t take accountability for things like the racist flash mobs, which I do not see any mention of?
Well, I guess you get the (Tea Party, EDL, Geert Wilders, Front National, choose the option appropriate for your nation), that not even a gun toting Norwegian psycho could slow down.
Oy vey, understand that the children who beat you up and now your children more than likely were not children of the people who benefited by white aid during the civil rights movement. Those children for the most part respect human life because their parents taught them to. The children whose parents refused to be helped by the movement and thus suffered poor training and basically were at the bottom of both the White and Black strata; and the resulting bitterness at what their lack of effort netted them, taught themselves and their kids that it wasn’t them, it was the White man and uppity Blacks that kept them down. These kids grew up angry at everybody, and take their anger at their condition of poverty and lack out on each other as well as other races. As far as what you have to say about Blacks not going to college now may be true, but enough went in the sixties and seventies to forge a burgeoning Black middle class and upper middle class that encourages college for their kids. And I must beg to differ with you. New England and Southern California have always been hot beads of racism on Blacks. But outside of our meager insights, where do we begin to change the problem of racism no matter who it’s done against? I’ll tell you. In our hearts. That means we must begin to truly love each other. And where is the one place we can learn to do that outside of our families? It’s the church. If we don’t start to listen to and respond to each other in love, the love as taught in the word of God, the situation will be painstakingly slow to cure.
Amen Wanda. Very even handed. Amen.
By the way, I apologize for the numerous poor typos. I was typing this at work in a minimized screen so that no one would notice.