Seeking An American Identity

We hear a lot about racism and race relations today.

You hear some say that it has never been worse.

Is that true? 

Many people apparently believe it.

That group obviously includes younger people who did not see what I did in the 1950's and 1960's.

For example, consider this Gallup survey on race relations.

It does suggest that both White and Black people say race relations have deteriorated over the last decade.

Is there any factual basis that racism has never been worse?

Look at what the liberal Brookings Institution has written about on this subject in an article "Black Progress: How far we've come and how far we have to go".

That article begins this way.

. 

Let's start with a few contrasting numbers.

60 and 2.2. 

In 1940, 60 percent of employed black women worked as domestic servants; today the number is down to 2.2 percent, while 60 percent hold white- collar jobs.

44 and 1.  

In 1958, 44 percent of whites said they would move if a black family became their next door neighbor; today the figure is 1 percent.

18 and 86.

In 1964, the year the great Civil Rights Act was passed, only 18 percent of whites claimed to have a friend who was black; today 86 percent say they do, while 87 percent of blacks assert they have white friends.

Progress is the largely suppressed story of race and race relations over the past half-century. And thus it’s news that more than 40 percent of African Americans now consider themselves members of the middle class. Forty-two percent own their own homes, a figure that rises to 75 percent if we look just at black married couples. Black two-parent families earn only 13 percent less than those who are white. Almost a third of the black population lives in suburbia.

It might surprise you to learn that those words were written in 1998. Since that time we have also elected an African American President of the United States twice. An African American led the U.S. Justice Department for eight years under President Obama. African Americans have increasingly been elected to leadership roles in many of the nation's urban areas and they also are in charge of a number of the police departments in major U.S. cities.

For example, an African American is Mayor in all of the four largest American cities.

New York City

Chicago

Los Angeles

Houston

Is it just a coincidence that both Whites and Blacks began to believe that race relations were poor at the same time that major media outlets repeated the message more and more?

Source: https://twitter.com/TheRabbitHole84/status/1629797419616698369/photo/1

Is it just a coincidence that shift began in 2013 during the second term of an African American President who was elected using a unifying message but who more often than not governed by highlighting divisions?

In the last decade we have heard how white privilege is responsible for so many problems in the country.

We have heard that white supremacy is the underlying principle behind almost every Republican party policy.

However, considering those narratives, I found this data interesting on how racial groups rate each other.

Credit: https://twitter.com/monitoringbias/status/1629553795242835970

This study suggests that Whites are the least racist group in America.

The study also shows that Whites rate each other lower than any other racial group rates their cohorts---BY FAR.

Whites rate other Whites higher than other racial groups but the difference is miniscule compared to what we see with other racial groups.

It is understandable that Whites would be rated lower by all other minority racial groups since it is the majority race in the United States. All minority groups have undoubtedly experienced some form of racism at some point in their lives. 

However, when you see the next data point is it not logical to wonder if some racism that is perceived by minorities is related to the fact that each minority racial group sees their race or ethnicity as much more central to their identity compared to Whites?

This is particularly true for African Americans.

When a person's identity is tied this strongly to their race or ethnicity it is going to be much more difficult to not see every slight, snub or failure as being the result of racism when that might not be the case at all.

" I didn't get the job because I am Hispanic."

" I got a poor score on the SAT because I am Black."

"That guy would not date me because I am Asian".

As an example, look no further than the comments of Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot after she was defeated in her reelection bid this week.

Source: https://www.nationalreview.com/news/im-a-black-woman-in-america-chicago-mayor-lori-lightfoot-blames-election-loss-on-racism-sexism/

Lightfoot seems incapable of accepting that she was rejected by the voters not because she was a Black woman but because crime is out of control in Chicago and she has done a poor job in managing the city.

Do not think that Whites cannot or have not been deeply committed to ethnicity identity as well.

The Italians, the Irish, the Poles, the Jews and Catholics have all been there before as well. They all were subjected to various forms of discrimination at different times as did many others.

It seems to emanate from the tribal nature that dominated much of human life for centuries and still does in many places around the world.

Our Founders set out "to form a more perfect union" when the nation was conceived. It was not perfect then. It was not perfect in the Civil War era or a hundred years after that. It is not perfect now. However, part of the American experience has been to continue to strive and work everyday to form an even more perfect union.

An objective look at our history suggests that much progress has been made toward a more perfect union over the years.

We might never get to "perfect" but if we can make it more so with each passing generation we will have accomplished more than any other nation in the world has.

When will American become the central identifier of everyone? 

The question that the American people need to answer is whether we believe that this is better achieved by tearing things down and casting blame on others or building on the positives, working cooperatively to fix the negatives and all of us spending more time looking inwards on what we can do to improve the lives of everyone.

Those things are not easily done nor is ignoring the media narratives that feed a lot of the divisions we see in our society today.

If we are to truly be "one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all" we must value those things that unite us and reject those who seek to divide us.

It is the only way forward.