(Another) Busy Week in Race

It seems as if we have been saying this a lot lately, but it really was a very busy WEEK IN RACE. The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on the confirmation of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court gave us an opportunity to examine some of our most pressing national issues related to race and equality, including affirmative action. Combined with the 100th anniversary of the NAACP, the Young Republicans' national convention, and the appointment of an African American woman, Dr. Regina Benjamin, as U.S. Surgeon General, as well as some other issues scattered throughout the week, there is an awful lot to analyze.

Still, we always seek to provide thorough but relatively brief analysis of the week's events, so we will not take too much of your time. If you would like to have more timely updates of events and analysis, we encourage you to become a fan of the all-new RaceProject Facebook Page. Doing so will allow you to have the most recent news and commentary appear on your Facebook News Feed. If you'd rather not have that much contact from us, simply bookmark the page and visit when you have a chance.

THIS WEEK, Charlton penned an op-ed for Newsday in which he briefly traces the history of racism and explains the ways that it applies in the contemporary context. Specifically, he noted that term has come to embody vastly different connotations as folks strive to use it against anyone who disagrees with them in a way that is racially relevant.

Take the Sotomayor hearings as an example.

As students of racial communication, we focused on the degree to which stereotypes of Latinas surfaced. And did they ever! As expected (and as predicted by conservatives' and Obama opponents' response to Sotomayor in the weeks since the nomination), there was a lot of attention given to the judge's speeches over the past couple of decades, as well as her rulings. Her now-famous "wise Latina" comment was mentioned by most Republican Senators on the Committee, including ranking member Jeff Sessions (over and over and over again) and minority whip Jon Kyle. Senator Lindsey Graham asked Sotomayor if she had a temperament problem (the fiery Latina stereotype and the angry minority stereotype), and Tom Coburn joked with Sotomayor that she'd "have a whole lot of 'splainin' to do," reminding us of that omnipresent one-dimensional caricature of Hispanics, Ricky Ricardo, from the 1050s classic television series I Love Lucy.

Believe it or not, the racial rhetoric actually got worse THIS WEEK. During a House debate on health care reform, Kansas Republican Congressman Todd Tiahrt suggested that having cost-free access to abortions could provide incentive for women to terminate pregnancies that they would otherwise carry to full term. He wondered aloud about the great leaders whose mothers might have aborted them. The only two examples he gave: African Americans Barack Obama and Clarence Thomas.

As the great comedy writer Dave Barry says, we could not make this up.

Progressives weighed in throughout the hearings, attempting to point out where racialized language was being used. We were reminded more than once about the ways that opposition to civil rights has characterized much of Senator Sessions' career. Indeed, Sessions was arguably the most notable Senator to use race in his questioning of Sotomayor. At one point, he suggested that she could have voted differently on a case by noting that another judge of Puerto Rican descent voted with the other side.

On Sunday, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy pointed out the racism during a CNN interview with Senator Sessions in attendance. The exchange is worth watching.

To put things into context, Melissa Harris-Lacewell put forth a thoughtful reflection of what was really happening at the Sotomayor hearings. She argues that since the Republicans do not have the votes to stop the nomination, it was all about public humiliation for Sotomayor, which has been a consistent aspect of American racism.

The comics had a field day over the course of the week, too, by exposing implicit racism. See Jon Stewart's brilliant "White Men Can't Judge" piece below or here, for instance.

On a slightly different note, Elon James White really has blossomed as a politically astute comic over the past two weeks through his This Week in Blackness multimedia website and his tweets @elonjames. His piece ("Why You So Black?") that was reprinted at Huffington Post explores how he came to do racial humor, even though he did not wish to do so.

We definitely understand where he is coming from. While we study race with less reluctance, it has certainly been overwhelming for us to try to distill so much racial communication each week. Take a look at what we have to work with. In addition to all the happenings in the official corridors of power THIS WEEK, Pat Buchanan continued his efforts to defend the rights of the oppressed White man. First, he offered a strategy for the GOP that actually included accelerating the racial attacks on Judge Sotomayor, and then he unleashed a rant on The Rachel Maddow show that would have been almost unbelievable if it had come from anyone other than Buchanan (or perhaps Tucker Carlson). Watch below or here. (Maddow had promised via Twitter to refute the points one-by-one on Friday, but the unfortunate passing of Walter Cronkite understandably altered those plans. Tune in tonight at 9pm EDT to MSNBC to see if she gets to it.)

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We focus so much attention in this space on implicit racism because we feel it is important to point out where and when it surfaces to show that none of us is immune to such latent resentments that have been programmed into our subconscious throughout our socialization. But incidents of overt bigotry such as this should not go unnoticed. LIFE magazine released a small but chilling set of pictures THIS WEEK taken at modern gatherings of the Ku Klux Klan that we strongly recommend.

Of course, one does not have to be as crass as Buchanan or as sickening as a KKK member to embrace racial resentments or to allow such resentments to continue to affect our public policy. President Obama's speech to the NAACP on the occasion of the organization's 100th anniversary contained a great deal of thoughtful rhetoric about how systemic racism continues to operate. We had to shake our heads when, seconds after the speech ended, CNN's Lou Dobbs complained that the speech "could have been given 4o years ago." A more sophisticated view of the speech reveals that Obama spent a great deal of time talking about the progress that has been made and (to some criticism) about how personal responsibility has to be part of the equation (Jesse Jackson was not heard anywhere threatening to castrate the president this time, however). But he was very clear (in the speech and with the Black press beforehand) about how much work is left to be done -- apparently this is work with which Dobbs is no more willing than Pat Buchanan to help.

Finally, we want to update our discussion of the controversy in the election for president of the national Young Republicans. Audra Shay, who was accused of bigotry (and who some conservatives and many progressives urged should be defeated), won the election. At the convention, Republican National Committee chair Michael Steele was asked about how he was going to increase diversity in the party. Steele's answer got a lot of attention, and we wanted to take just a moment to provide our analysis.

Steele started to answer the question by saying that everyone is invited into the Party: "My plan is to say 'Ya'll come.'" That got some laughs (presumably because of the direct nature of the answer), and Steele continued "cuz a lot of you are already here." At that point, someone is heard to say "I'll bring the collard greens." It's impossible to tell for sure if it is the person who asked the question (who appeared to be African American) or someone else, but Steele responds lightheartedly (and laughing) by saying, "There you go. I got the fried chicken and potato salad."



There are a number of ways to read this. First, if Steele was not Black, we would predictably be all over the comment as an improper play on a stereotype of African American culture. But he is, which means that he has license to invoke such messages for effect because he cannot personally benefit from the resentment among Whites that such stereotypes activate (though his Party might benefit by perceptions of Steele being self-loathing or not "really Black."). It's possible that Steele was making fun of the question, suggesting that because he is Black he is presumed to spend all his time figuring out ways to get "people like him" into the Party. More likely, though, he was at once dismissing the comment as presumptuous but also playing along to be polite and affable. This is particularly likely if, in fact, the person who made the comment was African American. In that case, Steele is making an attempt at demonstrating solidarity with the presumably like minded conservative with whom he shares an ethnic heritage.

But Steele's remarks (and the response to it) cannot be examined in isolation. In the greater context of all that has happened in the past two weeks with respect to explicit racism (i.e., the suburban Philadelphia pool situation has continued to remain in the news) and implicit racism, Steele certainly understands that Republicans are not on track to be picking up support from racial minorities. The degree of insensitivity that was on display during the Sotomayor hearings and the flat-out resentment that was visible in conservative commentators' critiques of Sotomayor specifically and affirmative action generally only makes that part of Steele's job more difficult.

If, in fact, Steele was chosen at least in part as a symbolic gesture that the GOP does not embrace bigotry, he is going to need a little help from his friends -- no matter what sort of picnic food he decides to serve.

Bad Apples: Dealing with Pools, Fools and Tools

It's been a busy WEEK IN RACE. As we move to recognize the 100th anniversary of the NAACP, we are reminded about how far we have come, but also how much work needs to be done. As we expected, we are seeing a noticeable backlash against racial justice since Barack Obama took office in January.

Pools

Most notably was the so-called "racist pool" incident THIS WEEK, where children from an inner-city youth summer camp was turned away by a suburban private pool, with several reports of racist language coming from the White swimmers and their parents. The video reports (watch here and here) are heartbreaking. There is no way that those kids will ever forget the feelings they had when they were insulted and discriminated against on that early summer day; as Dr. Melissa Harris-Lacewell reminds us, the event will very likely stick with them for the rest of their lives.

As some posters noted on the (new) RaceProject Facebook page, there is a long history of segregation and discrimination with respect to leisure in America, even though most of the attention is paid to workplace and education. The reported reaction of the children and parents is eerily reminiscent of stories and footage from the 1950s. Unfortunately, as you will read below, it's not the only connection THIS WEEK to that time.

Fools

Later in the week, it was discovered that readers of the conservative Free Republic blog unleashed a flurry of racist comments about Malia Obama after a picture of her in a t-shirt with a peace sign (left) was posted. The Vancouver Sun reports comments including: "A typical street whore." "A bunch of ghetto thugs." "Ghetto street trash." "Wonder when she will get her first abortion." We encourage you to read the article for more of the vitriol (though we recommend you do so on a empty stomach). It's important to note that Free Republic is considered to be a mainstream conservative site (unlike the White supremacist social networking site on which some U.S. military service members have apparently been participating). It would be difficult to dismiss this as rantings of a few fringe "wing nuts."

One of the commonalities, of course, between these two stories is that the racist resentment is directed at children. Imagine the power the (mostly anonymous) posters must have felt as they typed away within a mob mentality reminiscent of historic lynchings. Angry Whites (mostly men) who are convinced that their power is endangered because of affirmative action and a "radical" Black president who is either a radical Black Liberation Christian or a closet Muslim, must have felt a tremendous sense of satisfaction as they read, wrote and contributed to this assault on a little girl whose only crime was to signal her wish for (gasp!) peace.

Thoughtful conservatives, though, have not been taking this lying down. GOP insider Larry Gellman wrote a magnificent piece for Huffington Post THIS WEEK wherein he admonishes that the "hate speech" (his words) coming from the right is more dangerous than any radical language from the left because the former comes not from the margins of the movement but from the power source.

Hate speech is different. It's when you accuse the President of the United States of being a socialist, a terrorist, a Muslim, an anti-Semite, or a traitor based on lies and distortions. And it becomes particularly meaningful when the venom comes not from the radical fringe -- as it often does from the Left -- but from the heart of the party leadership -- as it often does from the Right.

His comments were written in the context of the election for the president of the Young Republicans of America, as the front runner was recently discovered to have permitted and (at least tacitly supported) hateful, racist language on her Facebook page by supporters.

In her weekly Daily Beast blog, Meghan McCain implored her fellow Republicans to "NOT elect a racist" (her emphasis). While we would have liked to have seen Meghan reflect the scholarly differences between "racism" and "bigotry" in her language, it was refreshing to see that she and Gellman both realize that endorsing someone who fails to stand up to bigotry is a tacit endorsement of the bigoted beliefs.

Tools

Frank Ricci, the most famous firefighter from New Haven, Connecticut, was exposed as a tool of the Republican Party this week. Some may have always believed that he and the other White firefighters who sued because the city decided that a test that resulted in only White promotions was invalid were tools, but as we noted when the case was decided, it was actually quite complicated. Of course, the case was all the more notable because the appeals court summary ruling was made by a panel that included Judge Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama's nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Republicans decided to call Ricci as a witness against Sotomayor in the hearings that will begin next week, though we wonder now if they might reconsider.

You see, it appears that Mr. Ricci got his job with the New Haven fire department by way of a lawsuit alleging -- wait for it -- discrimination. When he was not among the 40 selected from a field over over 700 back in 1995, he argued that the civil service exam was biased against him because he has dyslexia. The settlement included a job for Ricci as a firefighter (presumably keeping out a qualified firefighter who did not have dyslexia).

The problem is that Ricci was correct in the first place. Whether he was correct enough to have been awarded a job as a result of his lawsuit is beyond our ability to know, but he certainly had a point that a seemingly "objective" timed written test is not fair for someone who has a reading disability if the position in question is not directly related to one's ability to read or write quickly. He was discriminated against, and he deserved to have that case heard. What he apparently cannot cannot see, however, is that an otherwise "objective" test that relies on knowledge and skills that Whites and persons of color do not have the same opportunity to acquire is similarly unjust. The fact that he went crying to the courts instead of seeing the similarities is what justifies cries of hypocrisy.

Bad Apples

In The Political Mind, cognitive linguist and progressive political writer George Lakoff notes that a conceptual frame that is consistently employed by conservatives is the "bad apple" frame (chapter 10). This is where we come to resolve problems by pointing to the one person (or handful of people) who are caught and feel comfortable that we have solved "the problem." Lakoff mentions the Enron scandal, for instance, where we made ourselves feel as if we took care of the problem by collectively (and metaphorically, of course) pointing fingers and chanting "shame, shame on you" to Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling as criminal proceedings commenced. But the problem of corruption in corporate America is systemic. That doesn't mean that everyone in corporate America is corrupt; it means that there is something about the system that facilitates and even encourages such behavior.

The same is true with racism. As we argue regularly in this space, changing people's conscious attitudes about race (which as been largely successful over the past 50 years) will not solve racism. It reduces the number of bigots (though they're popping up like whack-a-moles lately!), but it does nothing to deal with the root causes of racial inequality and injustice.

So we can demand that the president of the suburban Philadelphia pool be fired, but who cares? All that does is let the racist members of the community feel as if he was the problem instead of looking at themselves. We can refuse to elect Audra Shay, the Young Republican presidential candidate, but so what? The attitudes that exposed her unwillingness to stand up against bigotry are still firmly in place. We can hold up the Free Republic posters out as examples of horrible people, but the context in which they felt empowered and encouraged to air such feelings is the real issue.

As Larry Gellman so elegantly put it, "There is nothing wrong with criticizing people in power. It is essential in a democracy and our ability to do so has helped make our country great. But there are ways to do it hatefully and ways to do it with dignity. It is the hatred and anger that seem to ooze so effortlessly from the leaders of the Republican Party that are so disconcerting."

That anger is not only oozing effortlessly, it's oozing more frequently and with more vitriol as the weeks roll by. It will be up to conservatives and Republicans to decide how to handle such attitudes and language. If they follow Gellman and Meghan McCain, they will move toward the Jack Kemp model of conservatism that we heralded on the occasion of his death a few months ago. If not, they will continue to spiral into political irrelevance as younger voters reject such messages and gravitate toward other electoral options (either Democrats or Libertarians, we suspect).

In other news. . .

While we do not have the space to elaborate, we wanted to note a couple of other important stories from THIS WEEK.

First, Illinois U.S. Senator Roland Burris, the nation's only African American Senator, has (wisely) decided that he will not seek reelection in 2010. We argued upon his initial nomination that he was a bad choice because of his close ties to impeached (and now removed) governor Rod Blagojevich, and revelations about his ties to "Blago" since Burris was seated have done nothing to alleviate concerns. To date, none of the prominent names on either ticket is a person of color.

Second, it appears that the Southern Christian Leadership Council is ousting the president of its Los Angeles chapter, Rev. Eric Lee, because he supports gay rights. We agree with Rev. Lee when he said of Martin Luther King, Jr., who founded the organization, "Dr. King would be turning over in his grave right now." Dr. King would have been appalled by the politics of intolerance, hate and division being advocated or accepted by his organization, which has a history and a mission of fighting against injustice.

Finally, we want to join those who have expressed disgust about a disrupted graveyard in the Chicagoland area where some 300 caskets of mostly African Americans have been disturbed in a scheme to re-sell the burial plots. (All four suspects are also African American). It's poetic that one of the caskets (though empty) was the original resting place of Emmett Till, the young man whose murder helped to spark the modern Civil Rights movement in the 1950s. Till's body was exhumed in 2005 as part of a federal investigation, and he has since been buried elsewhere. (Charlton has written extensively about cultural differences with respect to death and dying.)

So here we are: The 100 year anniversary of the NAACP, the first African American president, and millions of Americans walking around feeling proud to live in a "post-racial" nation. Yet it's little Emmett Till who has surfaced again, 54 years later, to remind us that we're not done. Not by a long shot.

As usual, the kids (whether from the pool, Malia or Emmett) have a lot to teach us adults.