Good Morning Butler! Another day, another myth that needs to be busted. Today’s myth is reverse racism so whithout further ado let’s get started!
Before we get too deep into the conversation of reverse racism not existing, I want to define three different terms that are often mixed up: prejudice, bigotry, and racism. Prejudice is when a person makes negative preemptive judgements of another person or group before sincerly getting to know them. Any person can be prejudice of any other person. There is no power dynamic involved. Bigotry is Prejudice Plus™, it is usually accomponied by a stronger more severe mindset, as well as, discrimanatory behavior. It’s arrogant and malign, but also doesn’t require systems nor power to engage in it. Racism is a system that allows the racial group in power to retain power so in America’s case it allows white people to continue to mantain power at the downfall of other races. Since 1619, if not before, white people were using their power and other races’ lack of power to give themselves preferential access to survival resources (e.g. housing, education, jobs, etc.) while simultaneously impeding other races access to these resources. They did not do this through prejudice thoughts, or by displaying bigotry in thier actions. No, in order to truly oppress somebody you need power. The type of power that is given and perpetuated by racism. This is why “reverse racism”, as far as I can tell, will never exist in the United States’ near future.
In order to further bust this myth, I will break down the three terms I just mentioned in real life examples I encounter almost daily.
Prejudice: “ White people ain’t shit.” – Black person. This is an example of prejudice. The black individual made a negative judgement about an entire group, that was overreaching and rude. However, the statement alone, does not have the action found in bigotry, nor the power found in racism.
Bigotry: “White poeple ain’t shit, and that’s why I won’t do business with them.” – Black person. This is an example of bigotry. You can tell there is a more extreme mindset because there is action behind the words. This is in no way okay; however, there still isn’t any systematic power being used.
Racism: “Black people ain’t shit, just look at where they live.” – White person. This is an example of racism becuase the white person has systematic power over the black person. Black opinions on white people can hurt feelings, but white opinions on black people can change lives. Furthermore, oftentimes the stereotypes and prejudices used against black people are often a product of racism. In the example above, we could look at redlining as an example of how systematic power allowed that statement to be harmful, as well as, true. I could define redlining for you in my own words, but I think the Encyclopedia of Chicago, does a much better job of it.
“Redlining is the practice of arbitrarily denying or limiting financial services to specific neighborhoods, generally because its residents are people of color or are poor. While discriminatory practices existed in the banking and insurance industries well before the 1930s, the New Deal’s Home Owners’ Loan Corporation (HOLC) instituted a redlining policy by developing color-coded maps of American cities that used racial criteria to categorize lending and insurance risks. New, affluent, racially homogeneous housing areas received green lines while black and poor white neighborhoods were often circumscribed by red lines denoting their undesirability…”
By marking predominately black neighborhoods as undesireable less businesses and money went into them; therefore, making them even more poor and undesireable. Black people have never had the power to steer businesses and goverment money away from white people and their neighborhoods. This is what I mean when I say black people can’t be racist. Our thoughts, opinions, and beliefs, no matter how bigoted/prejudice, can only make minor impacts in small communities. As the United States currently stands, and has historically stood, we could never successfuly institute something such as, redlining on predominately white neighborhoods.
In the end, I guess this whole article’s relative validity relies on you agreeing with my initial definitions. If you believe bigotry and racism are synonyms, than by your definitions, yes black people can be racist. However, I urge you to think about how it could be percieved as flippiant of you to isolate the concept of power from the discussion of racism. Bigotry is to racism as disparage is to oppress. Can I insult you? Undoutebly. Can I oppress you? I don’t think so, but in the end, like always, it is up for you to decide. That being said, I would still like to claim that this myth has succesfully been busted.