by Jen Chau, originally published at The Time Is Always Right
This is – I think – our favorite game to play when it comes to race. Locate the racist, focus on the racist, blog and tweet the crap out of that racist, and shame that racist as much as possible. The racist shouldn’t be able to carry on life as he knew it. I too hope for change in the person who took a misstep, but I think we are missing the bigger picture. We use magnifying glasses to focus on individual events rather than seeing the connections and the patterns that point to larger societal problems.
Just last night, the story broke about a Justice of the Peace in Louisiana refusing to marry interracial couples. What ensues is shock, lots of WTFing, and general disbelief. Well, mostly. There are some people who I have seen virtually sigh and then look away with tired eyes. Me included. The shock of some can feel disempowering to others who know full well that this is reality. While everyone was jumping to speak to this, all I felt like doing was going to sleep. And this story absolutely points to the work that I do with Swirl. Heck, this guy doesn’t want to marry interracial couples because he’s afraid of what the kids will be -
“There is a problem with both groups accepting a child from such a marriage,” Bardwell said. “I think those children suffer and I won’t help put them through it.”
So I definitely have a gut reaction to all of this. But instead of wanting to write to this guy and drag him kicking and screaming out of his racism, I want to ask questions. I think it’s great that so many people were posting this story and bringing it to light, but it’s what we do NEXT that is the most important. Do we perform some kind of witchhunt on this guy to prove to him that mixed race people are in fact deranged? 
I mean, it might sound fun, but what is it going to get us? What can we do to really make this a worthwhile conversation?
These are the things I wish we would think and talk about:
- Why is there so much shock about this? Yes we are in 2009. Yes we have a multiracial African American man as our President. AND? Racism and bias is alive and well. If we are shocked, we have to look at that and ask ourselves why we are shocked. Maybe we feel safe in our small little worlds because we surround ourselves with like-minded people. I am sure a lot of us do this to a certain extent. However, there are examples and examples that there are still people in this country who discriminate and treat people unfairly (and then worse, and more violent). And even more than make it into the press. What about all of the other IR couples this guy turned away before we found out about this one?
Perhaps we need such a defense mechanism to continue. If we are surprised, then that probably means that we have coaxed ourselves into believing that this stuff doesn’t really happen and it allows us to life more carefree lives. And then we get abruptly rushed into reality, but only for a moment - to read about it, talk about it, and retweet it. Then, once we feel we have said enough demeaning things about this racist, we go back to our lives and feel better for it. Until it happens again. It’s this cycle that we need to break. Because you know what? The aim should not be to FIND the racists and sufficiently shame them. It should be to understand WHY these behaviors still exist, and to think about the big picture actions we can take to get our society to a better place. If we as a country decide to take on each individual that happens to enter the spotlight for a minute, we are not going to have the impact we want to have. We are too focused on the individual and not thinking about the structural racism that has helped to create, encourage, and sustain this individual and so many others. I know it’s easier not to think about this – and largely, we haven’t. I am always curious about how we react as a society to these moments, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen us get to the bigger picture and the solutions. These moments resolve themselves when the offender finally issues an apology. Ohhhhh, he’s sorry. Ok. Back to business!
- Why do people still believe that mixed race kids are going to suffer? We will miss a huge opportunity if we don’t look at the content of this issue. Many times we miss this too, because we are so intent on labeling someone as racist (it’s racist or not racist – VERY black and white and too simplistic, but that’s how we do). Let’s talk about what he thinks about mixed race kids. Most of the emails and reactions I have seen about this story have been by mixed race people who think it’s ridiculous, so this probably means there’s a fair amount of education that probably needs to be done. Obama has done a lot to raise national consciousness around what it means to be mixed (not so much that he himself has talked about it incessently, but his mere presence has caused the media to ask others to speak on it, Swirl included). However, we still have a way to go. It wasn’t until 2000 that the US Census allowed mixed race people to identify as more than one race, so there is still a lot of room for understanding around multiracial identity. Perhaps that becomes the work – not putting our effort into speaking against this Justice of the Peace, but promoting what’s out there and putting more out there about what it means to be mixed and how it can be challenging and wonderful all at once – but who doesn’t have both challenge and beauty in their lives? We need to humanize the experience, and I am going to be working with Swirl to do this. Please email me if you are interested in working with me on a project that is brewing in my head as we speak.
- When this dies down, what are we going to do? I guess this is the biggest question for me. While there are definitely tireless activists out there who think about and plan the demise of racism every single day, there are more of us in this country who only get riled up for just this kind of event and then go back into dormancy. Again, this is your perogative. I’m not judging – everyone should live the life they want. BUT I would like it (if this stuff really pisses you off) if you would join others who are trying to do something. We need more people to fight ignorance and hatred in this country.
I saw this comment at the bottom of the SFGate article about the Justice of the Peace (I posted the link above):
bagogranola
10/15/2009 2:10:13 PM
You have got to be kidding, I’m going back into my own little world where this could never happen.
Well, I suppose we will hear from him next time something offensive happens to bring him out of his own little world.
My hope is that everyone comes out of their “own little worlds” to see that we are all in this world together. Once we are willing to see things as they really are, we can work together for change.
[...] Let’s find the racist! And then let’s shame the racist! – A very considered, thoughtful response to the news regarding the Louisana judge who refused to marry a mixed-race couple because, well, he didn’t think it right. Jen Chau pushes us to think beyond the knee jerk “that’s so racist” response, and look at things a bit deeper. [...]
The real issue here is aversive racism. Of course obtrusive, obvious forms of racism still exist, but they are not longer defining racism; they aren’t new, fresh, idealistic forms of racism like King Leopold’s version of fair trade. When these old-fashioned versions of ourselves are viewed, the closed-minded bigot of a preacher, the school bus driver, the old woman that mumbles “spic” as she buys groceries, these are examples that break the status quo of racial silence.
The hip way to be is colorblind. You can still grab your purse when you walk in Queens or North Portland, you can still not hire a black man that is as qualified as a white candidate, you can really do anything you want, AS LONG as you blame your action on something that isn’t racism.
Well, it’s dark out and I would have been afraid of anyone,
but it wasn’t anyone, it was a black man,
Well, he was just not what we were looking for as a student,
but the skin tone of the white candidate was?
The lines are arbitrary but the racism is clear and present. There is still white privilege and there is still ignorance. It’s just as deeply rooted as it was, but now it is quiet and subtle.
I don’t think change will come from accepting that there is a world that surrounds the smaller world in which we congregate, change will come from acknowledgment that there are problems today by Every Person, and trying to rectify those together.
Yeah?
This is an interesting piece on how we view and criticize racists in the 21st Century. It seems that it is much easier for mainstream media and the public alike to grasp onto stories, such as the one involving this Justice of the Peace, than to deal with the subtle racism that shapes all of our decisions and actions today. To turn on the news, and every night shine a light on and discuss instances of subtle racism that we permit in our daily lives would frankly become depressing and perhaps cause many to resent the issue completely. So, it is easier for us to make an example of and shame members of our collective community that act out racial prejudices that “cross the line” of acceptability. Does this public task of teaching-a-lesson help convert this man and others to be more aware of their racial prejudices? I’m not sure, but I agree that it does draw away from the important issues of how such prejudices are bred and carried on throughout our Country. While I admire the efforts of blogs such as this to shine a light on the more important and more difficult to answer questions regarding race, how do we get the mainstream culture to care and bother to think about these issues? Is it only the sensationalizing (and then unfortunate dormancy afterwards) of such individual characters that causes the average American to care at all about that status of race today? Surveys show that most Whites wildly underestimate the threat, disadvantages, prejudices and inequality caused by racism today; how else are we to open their eyes to the fact that in 2009, despite electing Barack Obama, racism is still a serious issue?
I remember when this event broke out in the news and Bobby Jindal made a big fuss about this. At first I thought this was all fake. The reason for this is that right around this time Foxnews recently called Obama racist and compared him to Hitler. When this happen I thought Bobby Jindal was trying to assure people that the republican party wasn’t racist, and who better to stand up for the interracial couple than Bobby Jindal who is of Indian decent. After a day or so I realized this wasn’t just a set up by the Republican party, but stuff like this continues on in the south. What struck me as even more odd was the fact that whatever church the couple wanted to get married in denied them their rights. How can a religion do that?
It is easy today for anything to get in the news. I feel the news in America is a joke, but I do think this was one of the few stories that deserves to be in the news and earn all the attention. But it will not last long in the news and most have already forgotten about it. But the point is that blaming someone of being a racist is almost a very harsh remark this day and age. This event supports the claim made against Bardwell. But racism doesn’t make the news anymore like it used to, and I think if it did it would show people how messed up our country is. In the 1960s when the civil rights act were going on, race issues made the news all the time, and now I think a lot of people assume nothing is wrong. But look at everything that has happened recently. As soon as Obama became president, he is accused of being a racist by foxnews, we’re any of the other recent presidents ever called a racist by any news network? No, and why would race come up? Oh, because he is the first black president. The only time race seems to make the news is when Al Sharpton speaks out against race and most people I know don’t take him serious. I don’t take him serious most of the time and I think the news puts him on as a joke. If the news would show more events like this I think more people would realize the actual problems of this country.
It’s interesting the Judges reasoning on the matter. It seems he is honestly attempting to spare a child from emotional damage for whatever reason he thinks it will be so. And as far as i have been taught thus far, muti-racial people do have certain extra stresses in their lives in regards to race, however, that doesn’t mean their stress in any grander than any other human being in the world, it’s just different. It’s something I will never understand as a white American, but I hardly believe that the stress it causes is not worth the life lead. And who’s to say this couple wants kids at all? The judge’s job is to marry two people in love who wish to legally bond their lives together…who said anything about kids? Even still, their kid is their choice, and they should know what’s to come in dealing with their child in the world regardless of race, let alone in addition to race.
So now what? Everyone is pissed off about this idiot in the south..were we really all that shocked? I’m amazed he could speak fast enough to deny them, before we all grew old and died. It’s true that it doesn’t seem that the world quite knows the amount of racism that still exists, and I agree that it would be a helpful thing for this kind of information to become more mainstream. But it seems hardly possible at this point to have the media present things like this. When we can’t even see truth of what’s going on in in our own war from our own News station, what makes anyone think we can make a change via our media? I’m not sure the solution…it’s a frustrating topic. But we have to keep at it and find a way to make a change. Be active. Spread the word.
Trying to “find the racist” is something I have to admit I’ve been guilty of. I’ve found myself all too eager to chat with friends about teriable people who said or did racist things. I think this blog is right, that part of the reason we do this is so we can section off racism, deal with it, and then go back to our daily unracist lives. I would like to take the sentament further and say that “finding the racist” is as much about denying a system of racism, as it is about denying the privilege we (white people) gain from this system, and further denying the racism within ourselves.
I first began thinking about this while in a class of mine called Culture Ethnicity and Mental Health. Race is a fairly regular topic among the discussions in this class, and because of that, people have on occasion let some less than PC statements slip. During these times I found it extra important to raise my hand in disagreement, or to at least offer a very obvious eye roll. One day I stopped to wonder why I feel such a strong urge and derive such pleasure from pointing out and shooting down other peoples racist comments. Is it because I want to end racism? That may be part of it. But ultimately it was because if I call something else racist, I can’t be. It was interesting to read this blog and think about this as a social phenomena that applies to the way society looks at media as well.
In pointing out someone else’s racist ways it not only allows us to deny any possibility of racism within ourselves, but it allows us to blame those individuals for something that is not case to case, but in fact a system of oppression in which we all play a roll. It is imperative for this system to be ignored because the white majority benefits greatly. America, like me, is too eager to turn to individual situations to end racism, like having a black president or condemning a preacher. While these are important strides, to think they will end racism is a dangerous misconception. When something is ignored, how can it be changed?