Segregating Survivor

There is no doubt: dividing tribes by race in tonight's Survivor season premier will draw viewers – the curious as well as the abhorred. But let’s be honest, the decision amounts to nothing more than a publicity stunt meant to drum up attention for a show with declining ratings. Discussion in the press and blogosphere has centered on the motivations of, or perceived inherent bigotry by, the show’s creators and producers. But this is not where the real problem lies. As we see it, the potential effects such a stunt might have on viewer’s attitudes about race in America is what so desperately needs to be addressed – much less so than motivations, about which we can only speculate, at best.

Survivor’s mere segregation by race, several critics have suggested, will call attention to racial differences in America. Such a contention, however, only reveals one of the most defective, dangerous and detrimentally persistent myths about race in America: that race does not really exist.

Science has long dismissed the validity of race, but try telling that to hordes of Katrina victims, Mexican immigrants, and Asian “model minorities” that perceived racial differences are not an American reality. Ignoring racial differences and the policies that collectively define America’s racist past only serves to keep racism on the back burner of our collective consciousness.

It’s customary in American linguistic parlance to confuse racism (which is systemic) with bigotry (which is individual) so that we never (or never have to) confront the former honestly. Racism requires access to power, something people of color have been purposefully and repeatedly denied. Bigotry is the hatred of another because of race (or gender or sexual orientation, etc.). People of color can certainly be bigoted, but they can’t be racist. Failing to recognize this difference by conflating, and thereby confusing, these constructs leaves us without the tools we need to do real work in this area.

When Kanye West spoke out against racism (not bigotry – he didn’t say that George W. Bush didn’t like black people, but rather that he didn’t care about them), he was called a “racist” and accused of making racism worse. People heard him call Bush a racist, but that’s not at all what he said. He simply pointed out that because of racism, white people in power fail to regularly consider the lived experiences of people of color in America. Calling attention to a reality does not make it worse; ignoring it and pretending it’s not there so that it continues to be ingrained in the dominant social order is much more damaging.

We do not praise Survivor for bringing perceived racial differences to light with their latest gimmick. On the contrary, we believe that profiting off the centuries of suffering of people of color is unconscionable. If there is any good to come out of the stunt, it will be to force America to confront issues of race (apparently Hurricane Katrina wasn’t enough) so that such attitudes are no longer latent.

We fear, however, that the editing and production will result in a product that fits the American myth of race by reducing it to individual-level attitudes. Contestant A will make a “racist” statement about someone in another tribe; Contestant D will make an assumption about a race that is intended to be a compliment and complain aloud that it should be about intent or “what’s in my heart”; Contestants F and R will make an alliance even though they’re from different races because the former’s cousin is married to a woman from Puerto Rico, demonstrating Contestant F’s lack of racism, thereby giving him the ability criticize others. And so the folly will go.

Such oversimplification in messaging will leave viewers with their comfortable thoughts that so long as they don’t use the “n” word, they’re not racist (the kind of statements Trent Lott, Jesse Helms, and many other prominent leaders have been so adamant about), they’re not racist, and therefore, racism is someone else’s problem. Such shirking of responsibility leaves America’s racial problems in the hands of two groups: people of color, who are disproportionately denied access to the power structure because of racism; and overt bigots, who have no incentive to make changes.

The rest of America will continue to refuse to deal with the systemic racism that has plagued America for 400 years, and this season of Survivor will allow us to stay comfortable doing so.