Race relations should still be fresh in the minds of those for whom the assault on Daisy Lundy first awakened the issue. However, it seems that the momentum of the talks, teach-ins, forums and discussions was great enough that people were overwhelmed. The awareness and unity brought by the assault needs to become constant, especially in the form of a general concern for minority rights, and this requires that those who are not part of a minority feel like they have a role in this concern.
We must look at the past as well as the future when debating the merits of possible bureaucratic solutions. We must strike a balance between correcting past wrongs and breaking down the divisions that lead to them. For this to happen, two fundamental things need to be realized.
First, we all need to recognize that institutionalized racism and prejudice are still relevant. Much more recently than slavery, official policies and unofficial conventions have oppressed blacks as well as other minorities.
Everyone has heard of the phenomenon of "white flight," but less well-known is the role that the government played in it. Until 1950, clauses prohibiting black occupants could legally be written into property deeds of new developments. Through the 1960s, Federal Housing Administration policies discouraged loans in racially-mixed areas. Washington sent tax dollars to build up the suburbs so that middle-class families could achieve the American dream of owning their own home; meanwhile, minorities and poor whites were trapped in rapidly deteriorating inner cities. Because public school funding comes primarily from property taxes (which are local), failing schools became a part of the downward spiral despite integration efforts.
Of course, eliminating discrimination in government policies is not enough. A person's employment opportunities should not be determined by factors unrelated to the job in question, and things like race or sexual orientation do not affect a person's ability to work. Because prejudice still exists, non-discrimination policies are necessary to help those who are discriminated against.
These may seem like things that do not happen anymore. Then again, five weeks ago, most of us would have said the same thing about hate crimes. Also, the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors has evidently forgotten the continuing importance of non-discrimination policies. Even if racism and discriminatory practices no longer existed at all, discrimination that occurred a generation ago has effects today that are more than lingering. If it was our society and government that held someone in an oppressed situation, then isn't it our society and government's responsibility to help that person's child out of the same situation?
This is the impact that our country's history of institutional racism has had, but here we switch tracks as we look to the future. The second thing we need to realize is that we are all individuals. To define ourselves or each other in terms of one characteristic is belittling, and it is exactly what created the problem at hand.
Stereotypes are based on faulty inferences: Take a set of attributes and assume that everyone who has the first attribute has all the rest. So someone who is black must also talk in a certain way, listen to hip-hop, be disposed to violence, vote Democratic, etc. Gay men have good fashion sense, women are irrational, Jews love money. This sort of prejudice led and often still leads to the marginalization of many minorities.
Most of the marginalized groups have found strength in their uniqueness, and have stopped being an "other" for the majority by taking pride in who they are, for example with the creation of organizations like the Queer Student Union or National Organization for Women. In doing so, they fortified the wall around themselves and drew attention to their plight. But that wall threatens to prevent them from being seen -- or even seeing themselves -- as people just like anyone else, and this is precisely what was taken away from them in the first place.
At various forums, such as last Sunday's "Reflections on Complexions," some members of the African-American community have derided the "white male establishment" with only a quick disclaimer that they do not mean those white males present. The tendency to react to problems of race relations by becoming more aware of racial differences and drawing the lines between the races more darkly shuts non-minorities out of the progress that we all want. This is not a call to give up different cultures and join a melting pot of homogenized mainstream America, but do we suppose that something beyond skin color should link every African-American? At a certain point, correcting past wrongs will no longer mean dealing in terms of race, but rather dealing in terms of class or economic opportunity.
We have certainly not reached the proverbial color-blind society, but we have to start judging people by who they individually are and what their own situation has been. This requires a delicate balance. Those who are not minorities must realize that there is a reason why the lines have been drawn more darkly, and those who are must realize that many of the people trying to erase the lines do so because they want to be on the same side. It will only be by breaking the walls down, and realizing that who we are is more significant than the color of our skin, that we can get to the equality we should have started with.
(Dave Algoso's column appears Fridays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at dalgoso@cavalierdaily.com.)
Read More
EDITORIAL: Carla Williams deserves her seat at the table
By Editorial Board | 6 hours agoLooking beyond basketball and football reveals that Virginia Athletics is, in many ways, thriving.
UPADHYAYA: The Great and not-so-Good sides of U.Va.’s 2030 housing plan
By Apal Upadhyaya | 2 days agoInstead of improving the dire state of existing infrastructure, however, the University has shifted attention away from it and chosen to expand.
EDITORIAL: Support low-barrier shelters in Charlottesville
By Editorial Board | 3 days agoInvesting in low-barrier shelters now will pay off in increased stability for the homeless, which will undoubtedly improve the safety of shelters and the community writ large.
