On Dangerous Ground

Posted on August 9, 2003 in Human Rights Social Justice

Lynn came to see me during my stay in Zagreb, Croatia. I was showing her and a couple from France a view of the old city. As we passed an iron-gated court yard where an audience was listening to music, a soldier bearing an AK-47 challenged us. What were we doing up here?

The Frenchman I was with broke into a loud protest about how his civil rights were being violated. Before he could break into full stride and get us arrested, I turned to him and said two loud, forceful words” “Shut up“. I then explained to the guard that we were going to enjoy the view of the old city, that we only needed two or three minutes to take photographs, and that I understood that he was only doing his job. This was, after all, a country at war, a war in which actual shells came in from suburbs twenty miles to the south.

The soldier granted us two minutes and we honored our end of the pact. I put into practice a simple principle: that he was a human being, too.

That episode in my life emblemizes a whole difference between me and some others who share my concerns for peace and social justice. There are all too many loud mouths in these movements who don’t know when to shut up. They ruin rapport that could be used to build inroads for people of color and women by their awful rhetoric, (e.g. the quaint theory that only white people can be racist) and loud mouths. I’ve seen more than a few good causes gunned down after ill-considered language from an ally.

Much of this rhetoric has reasonable roots. Take the idea that “only white people can be racist” that some people of color and camp followers play. There’s a grain of truth in it: in America today, white male racism and sexism dominates all other forms. It’s the racism of this class that gets to name the rules in our society, decide who is “in” and who is “out” of line for promotion, business opportunities, and elective office. I concur that institutional racism of this kind exists. But, as many of all colors and sexes can attest, personal racism knows no color boundaries.

Personal racism can often be understandable, for example, native American distrust of proposals made by white people, whose institutions have a track record of screwing them royally. The same can be true for the distrust felt by African Americans, Asians, and Latinos. It is also true that many people of color who succeed in the white world do so by being sell outs to the values and culture of their own people. This is due to the forms that institutional racism takes and its heavy reliance on tokenism as a means of showing potential critics — chiefly those within the white community — that the accusations of undue privilege are unfounded.

Those who do not check their personal racism end up playing a key role in upholding the values of the racist system. They are held up as evidence that the opposition is “unreasonable” and obstructive of the “good intentions” (even though it is patently obvious by the merest of statistical checks that no real progress is being made) of the power elite. They promote the idea that a person’s nativity is cause to criticize, rebuke, belittle, mock or reject her or him.

There have been many times when I have been moved to tell someone to shut her or his mouth before they damage a good cause. More often, I just stand back and let them do the damage, resolving that in my own life I shall continue to work for the higher principles of tolerance that I affirm.

The fact is that I support many leftist programs: affirmative action, withdrawal from Iraq, national health care, reasonable quality of life, local authority, more realistic representation, reparations where they are due, etc. I am for questioning authority, especially on matters involving taxation, real estate development, civil liberties, and military escalation. What I do not think is helpful is attacking the middle of the road: to win any election, we need them. Some dream of an uprising of the disenfranchised. That will not happen if we don’t realize that among those are white people in the middle of the road. Failing to make the distinction between institutional racism and personal racism is one major impediment to achieving a diverse society which feeds on many points of view and is stronger because of it.

For most white men, the lesson to be learned is that there is an overwhelming force that favors a small subset of their numbers, founded on the idea of the supremacy of those individuals. Their interests are not with the lunar elite but with other members of the working class. For others, the lesson to be learned is that while institutional racism in America does favor white people, prejudice based on race infects the thinking of all of us. Self-examination and self-challenge is an important element for the success of an activist against such a powerful and entrenched system as the one we face. We must be mindful of our definitions and of our personal failings, strive to overcome them, and strive to create a culture in which diversity propels our debate and our decision-making. We might strive for genuine inclusivity of all the disenfranchised — all the people who are screwed because of lack of national health care, because of the war-based recession, and the policies of the Bush Administration — and not alienate them with ill-considered, false rhetoric. I’m for new voices and new perspectives. I just don’t want my erstwhile allies acting like that Frenchman and getting good causes shot down by some frightened guy with a gun.