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Do We Dare Face Facts? About Race in America?
By lindamuralidharan on 2014-12-13 00:13:19
Many different media venues have provided seemingly endless comment about police brutality, specifically the
disproportionate effect on black communities. And no matter whether or not there was any culpable legal case to be made
against the police officers who killed Eric Garner and Michael Brown, we know that the grand jury process in these
instances was highly irregular and unsatisfactory. I have heard it said repeatedly that we need to have a conversation about
race in this country. In a comment I made recently on this blog I indicated we...black and white communities....have such
different living situations we pretty much don't have a clue about where the opposite community is coming from. I think we
have to start first with two huge but slightly different issues before we can settle in to the every day exchanges of "what is
your experience like and what would you like to see happen in society taking your own values into account?". Do we have
the courage to meet the following two taboo subjects head on? First there is the issue of defining who is black and who is
not in the parlance of this American society. We currently use a false and dishonest mechanism for "labeling" ourselves. I
think we have to get rid of the labels. I am going to only indirectly acknowledge here that issues can arise when native
white people have children with folks from other parts of the world...Asia, for example. I am emphasizing that I think we
ought to forget completely the temptation to define anybody as white or black. I don't mean we never discuss our ethnic
heritages...nothing wrong with somebody saying, "Yeah, my grandma was Italian so I have a real thing about how my
spaghetti sauce is cooked." We could presumably also say, "My mom grew up in rural Georgia so I have a lot of nostalgia
for collard greens and skillet corn bread. " I am talking about the fiction that Barack Obama is "black". In reality, he is
white. Or he is black. Or he is both. See what I mean? It is totally dysfunctional to say only that he is black. How many
times have you heard somebody say, "I am part Japanese, on my mother's side, and part German, on my Dad's side." Or, "I
am half Greek and half Italian." People with Afro American ancestry are not allowed to do that. If they have even a single
Afro American ancestor.... that is detectable...they are identified as black. Now, I know that there is a very small trend
within the younger generation to identify as "mixed race", but that movement is pretty insignificant at the moment.
Sometimes it is peer pressure from within the black community that results in a very light skinned young person identifying
primarily with being "black". Sometimes others just define the person, no questions asked. I do not really see how we
escape these dilemmas unless we stop using the categories altogether except, as I indicated above, to refer to one's "cultural"
but not "biological" heritage. h ‘ Lets be sure we remind ourselves regularly
why this nonsense even exists. Yes, it is founded in racism. Iti is founded in racism of the most fundamental yet convoluted
kind. For too many centuries of American history, the white power structure had such a fear of needing to treat black people
as equals and perhaps pay them for their labor at white rates (which were not always very good for the poor white folks),
chose to consider anybody with clearly visible signs of having a black (or Negro as then stated) forbear was considered
black (Negro) no matter how light skinned the person was. According to Wikipedia, the male legislators at the time in the
South did not actually pass any laws about it because it was so common to find a Negro or Native American ancestor among
even the relative elite that they didn't want anybody examining the family tree too closely. There were exceptions for people
who no visible signs of the black ancestor especially if they were contributing members of the local community.
However, from that period until this day, in our cultural and often
unconscious racism, folks from mixed race families are designated as "black" if they show any signs of their black
ancestors. Some people, of course, are light enough skinned with Caucasian like hair that they choose to "pass", and they
and their offspring are considered white. I have learned that the habit of calling anyone whose ancestors are known to be
black, black, no matter how "white" they appear has an official name. It is called "hypodescent", and it specifically is
defined as the automatic assignment of children of a mixed union between different socioeconomic or ethnic groups to the
group with the lower status. In the first quarter of the twentieth century, the worst of this kind of thinking...also sometimes
referred to as "invisible blackness" was codified in actual laws. The laws in certain states, predominantly Southern, stated
that you were considered to be black if you had "one drop" of "African South of the Sahara" blood in your ancestry...it didn't
matter what you looked like...you would be legally classified as black (modern terminology, of course) and thus subject to
any discriminatory laws based on race. We have not really veered from that to this day although we persist more as a result
of racist custom and attitude more than of law. There are no laws on the books that I know of defining who you are. We just
define people out of this old habit of one drop. How can we continue to live with this fiction if we are to accept each
other...of any and all ethnicity.... as fellow humans deserving of whatever treatment we would like ourselves and our own
offspring to receive [caption i
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Wied Cale Mak? Jeane tows Werrens ‘
he Tan aperers ReeeteT fae Pore beer Dron domes Dererse,
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slave era[/caption] The second unresolved issue is the immoral, unscientific, unjust, ineffective "War on Drugs". All
Americans are severely impacted by this misguided governmental effort. We spend immense amounts of local and national
tax dollars trying to stop people from using their right to put stuff in their own bodies. We also spend money giving them
false information about what this means. We support tremendous numbers of drug trade interdicters and their lucrative
support system industries in futile attempts to keep illegal drugs from entering the country from outside. And we jail all
kinds of people...with the biggest impact on the black community...for taking drugs that don't have the support of the
powerful liquor lobby, the interdiction lobby, and incomplete science behind them. All of us pay in tax dollars and in wasted
efforts lecturing kids about the wrong approach and contributing to views that stereotype certain people, usually specific
ethnic groups or the economic underclass..which may consist of white, brown or black individuals.. I strongly suggest that
people who want to be responsible voters spend just a little time studying the history of drug laws. Middle class people,
especially women for example, took a lot of narcotics in patent medicines during the nineteenth century until opium became
associated with Chinese laborers. Then we had to make narcotics illegal. Later the obsessive ignorance about drugs and the
people who use them led US officials to make a lot of recreational drugs illegal..such as cocaine...and called these drugs
narcotics also. Cocaine may get you high, but it is not a narcotic if you are talking honestly about the classification of the
chemicals we refer to as drugs. Only drugs derived from the opium poppy or artificially designed chemical equivalents are
"narcotics". Cocaine was vilified partly because it was at one time the main choice of people in the black community and of
black musicians. We cannot talk about legalizing street drugs without recognizing how racist most anti-drug laws are in the
present or in their historical derivation. We, the general public, thus have false notions of what a drug addict is...is it the long
haired white guy, skinny and unkempt or the menacing black guy with slick hip hop walks and clothing or is it the middle
class white lass or lad...maybe clean cut and balding like Rush Limbaugh? If they fit the first two descriptions in our minds,
we look at these people as "other" and not quite human and it is worse if the person is black because too many Americans
already look at black people as "other", as maybe not quite equal or deserving or even...human. The fact of the matter is...far
beyond the fact that cutting off the supply does not work nearly so well as prevention and treatment for actual drug
abuse...there is nothing wrong with the average recreational street drug that is not also wrong with alcohol. That is, if these
others, marijuana, cocaine, heroin and the like were legalized and regulated for quality and quantity and taxation revenue. I
always add the caveat that designer drugs and PCP may need special consideration before automatically legalizing them, but
ultimately nearly all can be used safely if we know their purity, their strength, and if we are educated about safe use. Just
like we educate people about the safe use of an automobile. Only a small percentage of people who experiment with these
drugs becomes addicted. Usually the eventual addiction results from some combination of environmental influence,
personal emotional or mental health issues, and personal biological/brain chemistry issues. No, you do not want your 17
year old experimenting with these things or drinking any more alcohol than some wine at her cousin's wedding. Any of
these substances may have a more extreme effect on the younger developing brain than on mature adult brains. You don't
want your son or daughter risking arrest. However, when a person is 20, or older perhaps, then it is up to that person to asses
the risks of short term harm or of addiction. Occasional use of these substances on a recreational basis (not if you are using
it to self-medicate or avoid mental health issues) is only a bad idea to the extent you may not trust the source or may put
yourself on the wrong side of the law. Thankfully we are beginning to recognize these facts about marijuana and we have
already Colorado and Washington as models of states where sales, regulation, usage and taxation are being worked out
without many bad social consequences. We need to speed up the process of legalizing and regulating the other recreational
drugs. You may not want to take my word for all this. I learned all this...with the addition of occasional statistical support
for this position...from working with addicts from all walks of life and with all kinds of personal challenges. And, of course,
I include people who were mainly addicted to alcohol because as much as society tries to deny it, alcohol is a drug. A mood
altering drug that creates much more social damage when abused than does the mood altering drug caffeine or even
marijuana. [caption id="attachment_6482" align="alignleft" width="600"]
5 Legal Drug Sales[/caption]
Since there is so much false information out there, I think it important for the lay person to begin by reading Carl Hart's
book, High Price: A Neuroscientist's Journey of Self-Discovery that Challenges Everything You Know about Drugs and
Society. You may not agree with every point he chooses to make...I don't...but his main theses are based on proven research.
And you will also add to your understanding of the issues faced by a bright black boy child raised entirely in a poor,
working class, segregated black community in Florida who actually has the talent to earn a PHD in neuroscience...he also
had the pluck but desperately needed a whole bunch of mentors to help him change his childhood mind set. In any case, this
needed "conversation about race" that is recommended to help a nation deal with its racism problem, cannot be more than
half- hearted if we do not face the issue of defining ethnic identity and the issue of counter productive drug and related
criminal justice policies. Only rigorous honesty will move us toward a more just and understanding and less violent society.
So...do we dare?
