I'd like to believe that actual prejudiced racism, for the most part, is a thing of the past. No one is going around anymore and spouting that blacks are scientifically inferior in many ways than whites. No one is saying that Latino workers are more suited to hard labor so they should be the ones working the jobs. And if anyone is doing that they're quickly ostracized and corrected, unless they're in a particularly resistant bastion of racism of which very few exist in this country anymore. I'm sure a few readers are already up in arms by this point but I'd like you to hear me out.
It's important to define our terms so we know we're speaking about the same things. Racism as we have defined in our class is an acceptable definition for this argument, so that can stay. However there are two new terms I'd like to add, one I've used only a couple sentences ago. Prejudiced racism, where the mistreatment and possible oppression of a minority based on a personal prejudice. Economic or inferred racism, where a minority is abused in the name of the creation of wealth or due to flawed logic in an effort to proactively solve problems. Lastly a ghetto is a place of a concentrated population of a certain group or race.
I've taken some time getting here, but I believe that the racism of today that remains is economic and inferred racism. A hot topic is the over policing of ghettos and other neighborhoods of concentrated minorities. There's plenty of historical evidence of prejudiced racism by the police, especially in the Rodney King beating. The accounts in Twilight of the police cutting power to the projects then going out on patrols can also be classified as such, if true. However I would argue that for the most part over policing of ghettos are not, and here's why. Ghettos tend to be low income, low income tends to create people unsatisfied with their lives. People unsatisfied with their lives tend to be willing to resort to a lot, often crime, to better their standings in life. So according to that low income areas, usually ghettos, are more likely to commit crime. As such why shouldn't the police, be stationed and or patrolling, even suspicious of those areas if they are the centers of crime? It only makes sense. Now notice that the only potentially racial word in that entire train of thought was "ghetto." The quintessential mistake is thinking that if the inhabitants of ghettos are the most likely to commit crime, it's because of their race, instead of their economic standing. This is an example of what I've defined to be inferred racism, as those who partake infer that say blacks are criminals because they haven't bothered to look at the other possible causes. It's a correlation does not indicated causation issue, if anyone here has taken a statistics class. The improper analysis of the situation leads to the cycle of over policing, which creates more anger and discontent, which creates more crime, which creates more policing.
A good structural and economic example is the idea of the Mexican laborer. Here I can give a personal example of one of my close friends who's breaking this cycle through extreme effort. I don't know the exact history but his name is Braulio, and his grandfather immigrated to the US illegally. He worked as an unskilled laborer his entire life as he barely made enough to survive; even when working so much where sleep was the only break. He had kids, Braulio's father, who were also encouraged to work unskilled labor as to help lessen the load on the aging grandfather. His father worked the same life as his father, working all day, sleeping, then doing it again. This cycle would have continued with Braulio if not for the changing times and the friends he's made. Braulio faces heavy pressure from both his mother and father to take up his father's mantle. However he's been strong enough to say no to that and is currently attending community college so he can break the cycle and create a better life for himself and hopefully his children.
I think breaking these cycles is the only way to eliminate the structural racism we still see today. This isn't the found object, and it's very likely that most have already seen it, but I'd highly encourage watching Joyner Lucas' I'm Not Racist. The beginning can be hard to watch, but tough it out. As far as I'm concerned it's the best example of starting this discussion.
Jack Cote
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