Good Day! If you're reading this you probably already know me. In the aftermath of the November election I have so many things to say that I've decided to begin to blog. Expect postings on this cite periodically (sometimes weekly, other times monthly, or so).
Here's something I wrote last year as a sample of what you'll be getting.
BY VERNON D. JOHNSON
Courtesy to The Bellingham Herald
July 1, 2015
I sat down on Wednesday
to put in writing my own thoughts about the roiling debate over Rachel
Dolezal’s decision to “pass for black.” Now the murder of nine African
Americans in church by a white supremacist in Charleston, South Carolina, has
made incessant analysis of Dolezal’s identity seem less important. However,
there are ways that events in Charleston and Spokane can be linked. In both
instances there are two themes being debated: the social construction of race
and how whites can be allies to communities of color.
On Race
Most of what we’re
hearing from academics who’ve studied race is quick to point out that race is
not “real” biologically,” but that it’s “socially constructed.” The best
commentators will add that the consequences of conscious decisions to
categorize people along racial lines are very real in everyday life ... but
nobody ever just says “race is real!” It’s a sociological, rather than a
biological reality. To observe that it’s socially, and I would add politically,
constructed does not make it any less real. To be socially constructed merely
means to be human-made. The medium through which you’re reading this now, the
mode of transportation you use in your travels, the clothes you’re wearing,
were all constructed by humans, but they’re real, right? We should hasten to
add that race was socially and politically constructed to impose the domination
of one racial group over other groups based on how they looked. Supplemented
with the attendant racial ideology (white equals civilized, industrious,
intelligent; black equals uncivilized, lazy, dumb), racial categories work
pretty well. Ask the families of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown and the victims
of the Charleston massacre how well race works in subordinating and oppressing
people of color.
My beef here with my
fellow social scientists and cultural theorists is that we are anxious to posit
that race isn’t biologically real as a way to argue for ending racism.
Unfortunately, we tread lightly over the fact that it is a very profound social
reality, with mostly tragic human consequences. Cultural conservatives who
don’t want to talk about racial inequity, or who insist that society should be
colorblind, hold onto the “race is not (biologically) real” piece and forget
about the sociological complexities of the conversation. In the name of
“keepin’ it real” we owe it to society to hammer away at the fact that race and
racism are realities and continue to have very real consequences for
life-chances in our society.
On How to be a White Ally
Although there are
outliers, most of us who are racial justice activists and scholars encourage
whites of good will to take an active part in the work of achieving racial
equality in this country. Speaking for myself, I believe that we cannot realize
that goal without the active participation of white Americans. The tragedy of
Rachel Dolezal resides not in being a traitor to her race, but in her effort to
be something that she isn’t.
The way in which people
fit into racial groups are fluid, and some of us have a range of options, or
boxes we might check. But as unsettled as those categories may be, the vast
majority of African Americans do not have the luxury of deciding not to be
“black.”
The social and
ideological construction of race based on physical appearance works well enough
that it limits the racial options available to the Trayvon Martins and the
victims of Charleston. The disproportionate killing of black and brown people
by the police and the stunning re-emergence of white supremacist violence beg
for white America to stand up and say “no more.”
But you don’t have to
misrepresent yourself like Rachael Dolezal. The role that whites play “as
visibly white” in the racial justice movement can be a huge difference-maker
for the kind of society in which I want to live. First of all, whites can
demonstrate to communities of color that to be white is not to be irrevocably
racist. Secondly, anti-racist whites can be a powerful role model for everyday
white people who consider themselves to be good people, but don’t see
themselves as political activists. These “representations” of whiteness are
important components for societal transformation in the post-Ferguson era. My
dear white friends, now is not the time to remain silent and immobile. After
all, people of all races are just trying to be comfortable in our own skins.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Vernon D. Johnson is
director of the Ralph Munro Institute for Civic Education and professor of
political science at Western Washington University.
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