*It is wonderful that so many white conservatives are calling for South Carolina to take down the Confederate flag from state government property. But, it’s shameful that it took the slaughter of nine black Americans by a soulless white supremacist during a church Bible study to force widespread white support for removing the Stars and Bars.
The arguments against flying the Confederate flag on state land are not new. African Americans and well-intentioned Americans of all races have called for the flag’s removal for decades. But convincing a majority of our white brothers and sisters to hear our grievances about race has always been an uphill battle for black people. And events of the last few years make it painfully clear that a large segment of the white American population still does not hear us. Indeed, many of our white brethren seem predisposed to ignoring us, tuning us out or indignantly disputing our legitimate complaints about continuing racism.
President Obama was pilloried by right wing opinion leaders in July 2009 after he said a white police officer “acted stupidly” when he arrested black Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates at home on a baseless charge of disturbing the peace. (Mr. Obama stated that he didn’t know if race was a factor in Gates’ arrest but he reminded the nation that “there’s a long history in this country of African Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately.”) Conservative radio icon Rush Limbaugh blasted the President’s response to Gates’ arrest as “the militant black reaction, the Cornel West angry reaction.” Limbaugh went on to say, “Obama is not a force for positive relations in this country…He played into stereotypes with this… He [should have] kept his mouth shut.” On Fox News, Glenn Beck claimed that Mr. Obama’s comments about Dr. Gates’ arrest proved that the President had “a deep-seated hatred for white people.”
The insensitivity of many whites to black concerns about racism was reflected in the reactions to the fatal 2013 of shooting of Trayvon Martin. The unarmed 17-year-old African American was merely walking to a relative’s house when pistol packing neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman needlessly called 911, then ignored the dispatcher’s instructions and followed Martin. 87 percent of black respondents to a Washington Post/ABC News poll said the shooting was unjustified, but only 33 percent of whites felt that way.
Similar statistics emerged after the 2014 police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri and the riots that followed. According to the Pew Research Center, 80 percent of black Americans believed that the Michael Brown incident raised important issues about race. Only 37 percent of whites agreed with that statement and nearly half of whites (47 percent) felt that race issues got more attention than they deserve. (Half a year after the shooting, the Justice Department cleared Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson in Brown’s death but also criticized the Ferguson PD for longstanding patterns of racial bias.)
Early responses to the mass murder at Emanuel AME Church also revealed the reluctance of some whites to acknowledge the effect that racism continues to have on our nation. A number of prominent white conservatives – including those running for President – were quick to overlook Roof’s obvious racial motive and ascribe his murder spree to insanity or anti-Christian bias. They did this in spite of the white supremacist imagery (the old flags of Rhodesia and apartheid era South Africa) in a photo of suspected killer Dylann Roof, and despite an eyewitness statement that Roof said he wanted to kill black people because they “rape our women” and are “taking over our country,”
Skeptics may want to dismiss the examples I’ve listed here as unrelated cases rather than a pattern of reluctance by whites to validate African Americans’ ongoing outcry against racism. These doubters should consider the eye-opening results of a poll published this month by the Public Religion Research Institute. This study found that 67 percent of white Americans believe that speaking out against unfair treatment by the government is always a positive thing for the country. But only 48% of whites said that the nation always benefits when black folks protest against the government.
Black Americans and other so-called “minorities” do not have the power to end racism in our country. Whites must do that. Indeed, throughout the long and tortured history of the United States there have been many whites who have spoken out against racism and promoted the values of brotherhood and equality. More such persons are needed to counter the powerful social forces that continue to downplay, deny and dismiss black people’s valid complaints against the persistent cancer of racism. More white folks need to listen to us – and not only listen when tragedy of the worst magnitude forces them into a corner.
Thank you for listening. I’m Cameron Turner and that’s my two cents.
Subscribe to Cameron’s YouTube channel at www.YouTube.com/TurnersTwoCents. Drop Cameron an email at [email protected]
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