Time to stash "racist" in the attic?

Media Coverage and Diversity Across the Fault Lines

A Conversation between Sally Lehrman and Dori Maynard

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Hi Dori,

Recently I was sitting in the dentist's chair reading Ta-Nahisi Coates on the Henry Louis Gates Jr. affair when the hygienist pointed to the picture and said, "It's unbelievable. He was accused of racism." I couldn't quite tell who she was pointing to -- Gates, the police officer, or someone else. I asked a couple of times, and still wasn't sure.

Now you might think my confusion had more to do with the drill awaiting my right molar than any larger social issues. But I think it's just one more example of why we should do away with the word, "racist." What does it even mean anymore?

The technician, who is white, went on to remind me that the woman who made the original call to the police was accused of being a racist, too. Commentator Glenn Beck called President Obama a racist on Fox News. In fact, everyone involved in the situation and many of the people who wrote about it were branded "racists" at one point or another.

If we ever are to do away with the systems that keep racism in place in U.S. society, we have to do away with that noun -- at least put it in the attic for a while. It is an attack word, used to describe anyone who talks about race or thinks about race in a way that the user doesn't like or perhaps understand. Most worrisome to me, it has been taken up by a lot of white people who would prefer to throw accusations around than to think about race-based inequities and misunderstandings in our society.

"Bigoted," yes. We have to acknowledge that many people have explicit and implicit prejudices against one another.

"Racialized" or "racializing," yes. Let's acknowledge that race is a social process, not just skin color.

And "racist" as an adjective, as in "racist system" or "racist structure," definitely, for the same reasons.

Racist has become a term we throw against one another to avoid talking about what really matters when it comes to race. 

Ready to pack it away in the attic? 

Sally

Hi Sally,

But that it were that simple.

There's no denying that just months after some commentators declared the country post-racial, it seems as if you can't go more than a week without hearing someone accusing someone else of being racist, or strenuously objecting to the fact that someone or thing was labeled as racist.

In point of fact, just today I was reading a continuation of a post by ABC's John Stossel, condemning President Obama's supporters for confusing criticism for racism.

'Since my post below about Obama supporters who tar all of the President's critics as racists, Fidel Castro has weighed in. Reuters reports that Castro says Obama is trying to make positive changes but is being fought at every turn by right-wingers who hate him because he is black,' Stosell wrote.

But simply removing the word racist from our vocabulary isn't going to automatically mean we're having a coherent conversation on race.

The word is not the problem. Our profound lack of experience talking honestly and openly about thorny social issues is the problem. Remember, we're a country that didn't even believe in talking about money or religion.

Now we're trying to have a national dialogue on race and class.

Removing a word isn't going to help us have a more nuanced conversation. The best that can come from that is that we will spend a great deal of time talking about the word, what means to me, what it means to you and what it means to John Stossel, and very little time talking about the issue underlying the word. Remember when we realized that diversity fatigue had set in and we tried to revive it by switching from the word diversity to inclusion. Didn't really help.

Rather than eliminate some of the few words we have to use in this discussion, I propose we try to stop talking in sound bites and start talking honestly.

So, other than retiring words, how do you think we can truly engage people in a meaningful and honest discussion?

Dori

 

Time to Climb Inside the Labels

Hi Dori,

If only the shouting of "racist," so common these days, would lead to genuine dialogue about race relations and racial structures in American society. But instead it's no more than a label thrown at the opposition, whether right or left; whether brown, black or white.

Let's be clear -- I'm not talking about ignoring racism, and I don't make any claims for a "post-racial" society. And as you say, our lack of experience in talking about race is the root problem here. But throwing labels like rocks only makes matters worse. It's the very sound bite you are decrying, and does nothing to illuminate or engage. It shuts down the exchange of perspectives and discourse that can lead to change. If I'm a racist and innately so in your eyes, there's clearly no hope of redemption -- so why would I want to hear you out?

The term has become a shout on both the left and the right, at times to the point of absurdity, at times with some apparent foundation. When Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) rudely shouted at President Obama during his healthcare address to the joint session of Congress, Jill Tubman on Jack & Jill Politics called it a "racist rant." Based on some of the personal associations Adele Stan details on AlterNet, Wilson may well have sympathies with racist -- or more specifically, segregationist -- philosophy. And much of the hostile reaction to Obama on talk shows and in the blogsphere may indeed stem from the difficulty whites have with a black man in power. But I agree with Ta-Nehisi Coates that a debate over racist motivation by Wilson doesn't go anywhere. As he puts it, "I hate these arguments in which we try to go back and forth over a contention that's basically unprovable."

Unfortunately, the polarization cultivated on talk radio is seeping into our general discourse. Scholar Kathryn Ruud, who analyzed conservative talk shows, compares this type of labeling to war-time propaganda used by both sides in World War II. Labeling works very well to dehumanize and divide. It's not a good tactic for meaningful discussion.

So what's better? We need to get inside the word. Plenty of psychology studies have found that most of us carry unconscious racist attitudes that leak out, especially when we're pressed for time. We need to acknowledge those and recognize the need to build policies and behavior that make it harder for racial ideology to guide our thinking. We need to acknowledge the history of this country and the structures that were built to give some people -- starting with whites, but also straight people, physically able people, and people with money and land -- more power than others. For those of us in the media, that's our job.

Unfortunately, we seem to find it more interesting to report on the labels being thrown around, instead of the attitudes, belief systems and social structures that underlie them.

Sally