Racism No Longer Exists: How Fabulous for Us White Folks

New Jersey legislators are currently considering a resolution that apologizes for the state's role in perpetuating slavery. Four other states (Alabama, Maryland, North Carolina, and Virginia) have already issued similar statements, and several other states have considered such resolutions. On the federal level, Tennessee Representative Steve Cohen (D) introduced a statement of apology for slavery and Jim Crow-era discrimination (Also of interest, during his first term campaign, Cohen stated that he would seek to join the Congressional Black Caucus. Only upon learning of CBC members' intentions to block his efforts, did he rethink this goal).

But getting back to New Jersey, there were some amazingly idiotic, and unfortunately standard, statements issued in response to the measure by members of the NJ legislature. Assemblyman Michael Patrick Carroll (R) said, "But, on a current note, if slavery was the price that a modern American's ancestors had to pay in order to make one an American, one should get down on one's knees every single day and thank the Lord that such price was paid" ("New Jersey Weighs..."). Is he really telling descendents of slaves to be grateful for slavery, as they wouldn't otherwise be Americans? That's perhaps the most patriotic idiocy I've read yet despite our rabid descent into patriotism. Or is he telling white America (who are the only real "Americans" in his interpretation?) to be consider slavery and African American lives a commodity well spent and the economic benefits that issued from their bodies worth whatever moral and human price? In looking back over other attempts to pass like apologies, the denial of any contemporary culpability for slavery was the most common response. There are no longer any slaveholders or former slaves, so nobody's guilty. Or another gem from NJ Assemblyman Carroll: "that debt was more than repaid through the blood and suffering of 650,000 federal soldiers who died or were wounded during the war provoked by slavery."

The continued effects of slavery and racism are, thankfully, a part of the justification for NJ's apology. It states, "the vestiges of slavery are ever before African-American citizens, from the overt racism of hate groups to the subtle racism encountered when requesting health care, transacting business, buying a home, seeking quality public education and college admission, and enduring pretextual traffic stops and other indignities." But opponents of the measure focus only on their inability to repay dead former slaves, the tacit assumption being that race no longer impacts Americans' experiences. Carroll even manages to put an exact price on the lives claimed by slavery--650,000 federal soldiers. That makes white life worth exactly how much more than every black life?

To acknowledge any guilt would require white Americans and government to acknowledge responsibility after all, and that could lead to all kinds of nationally invalidating conversations. Our national mythology is Horatio Alger, the American Dream, a country founded on democratic ideals. To acknowledge the peoples crushed in the construction of that dream: Native Americans, slaves, Chinese Americans building railroads, Japanese Americans interned during WW II, contemporary migrant workers, to name but a few, would require us to relinquish the cherished conception of the U.S. as a meritocracy. Individually, it requires me as a white person to acknowledge the ways white privilege has benefited me--that all my successes are not solely because of my brilliance. And for those of us in less privileged positions, it can make life seem less within our control if hard work will not necessarily lead to successes.

Despite the acknowledgment of the continuing effects of racism upon black Americans, NJ is careful to note, that the "resolution cannot be used in litigation." The measure forecloses any possibility of demands for reparations, and ultimately is a denial of any fiscal or social responsibility. Carefully veiled under official apology is the refusal to entertain any real conversation about the ever-growing debt our nation owes to African Americans or any of its disenfranchised folks. I have no idea where that conversation might lead us. I don't know what shape reparations take or how one values the impact of dehumanizing acts, but it seems important to seriously continue and begin and rebegin the conversation.


Source:
"New Jersey weighs becoming first northern U.S. state to apologize for slavery." International Herald Tribune Press. .