IS THIS RACISM?

Let us talk about it! 

I was glad that some of my friends caught on to something I said in my last article, suggesting that we must talk about race, if we are to overcome racism.  And so they asked me some good questions, which I will summarize into three main questions as follows: 


1. How does one distinguish between racism and other legitimate exercise of authority or legitimate decision-making that might be adverse to Black people but is due factors that have nothing to do with racial prejudice? 

2. Why “Black lives matter” and not “All lives matter?” 

3.Why the fuss about this one man George Floyd, who allegedly was no boy-scout, since he had a criminal record? 

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(1) A case of the Boy Who Cried Wolf?

A quite legitimate question is whether every adverse action against a Black person or Black people must be considered racism? 

Let us look at a few examples. 

• A Department Store security officer asks to check the bag of a Black person who is wearing baggy clothes, to check for unpaid-for merchandise. Is that racism? 

• A person is afraid to go to an inner-city neighbourhood that is crime-ridden and is also majority Black.  Is that racism? 

• A professor suspects that the term paper of a Black student contains plagiarism because the register is markedly different from the student’s usual language.  Is that racism? 

These examples remind me of one of Aesop’s fables, The Boy who cried Wolf.  This fable has given the English language the phrase of the same name, which means to give false alarm or to make a false claim, so that when there is a true claim, it is not believed. 

And so, aren’t many cases of so-called racism merely a case of the Boy who cried Wolf, and so undermining the case for systemic racism against Black people? 

First, we have to establish a definition of racism.  For my purposes, I have combined the genus of prejudice and the species of race to come up with a definition of racism as being “the adverse treatment of a person or people based on prejudices about their race.” I understand that there are other definitions out there (Webster, Cambridge, Oxford Learners).  But for me the prejudice and action that is based simply on the prejudice and not on particular information about the person is what constitutes the wrong-doing. 

And so, let us examine the three examples given above. 

1. (a) I would say that if the Department Store security officer asks to check the bag of a Black person because he usually checks people who wear baggy clothes then he is not acting on a prejudice about Black people, but on concrete factor, the baggy clothes.  If the only factor determining his action is the person's race, then that is prejudicial and racist, unless for example, there is reliable information that a Black person, fitting a certain description that this person fits has stolen something. 
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2. (b) As for the person afraid to go to an inner-city neighbourhood because it is crime-ridden, again if he is doing so not just because it is majority Black, but given its criminal reputation, then he is not acting in a racist manner.  For those who watch the show Last Man Standing, you might recall in one episode Chuck the Black neighbour of Mike admitting to Mike he too would not move to a particular neighbourhood like Mike's daughter and son-in-law were planning on doing, not because of the race of its inhabitants but because of the lack of security there.
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3. (c) As for the professor with the plagiarism case, I have been in that exact situation.  I once flagged for plagiarism a student who happened to belong to a minority group.  When I brought the matter to the Academic Dean, her first question was, “Why did you suspect that this student had committed plagiarism in the first place?”  She wanted to make sure that I did not pick on this student because of their provenance.  Fortunately I had clear race-free evidence, not just of the plagiarism, but of why I suspected plagiarism in the work in the first place, and came out of the dean’s office with my head held high. 
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Distinctions must therefore be made as to when there is true racism and when there is not.  It does not serve advocacy for racial justice to cry wolf every time there seem to be an injustice against a Black person.  It has to be established not only that there was injustice, but that also the injustice was motivated by racial prejudice or animus. 

(2) Don’t All Lives Matter? 

A second question surrounds the use of the phrase “Black Lives Matter”, to which some have responded, “Don’t All Lives Matter?” 

Of course all lives matter.  The statement “Blacks lives matter” is not a first principle or a statement of exclusivity, but is a contingent statement based on a particular context.  As someone put it well in the form of a Logic 101 syllogism: 

All human lives matter. 
Black lives are human lives. 
Therefore, black lives matter. 

And so, to state that Black lives matter is not to exclude the value of other lives, any more than when the American Cancer society promotes the fight against cancer with pink ribbons in October, it is refusing to acknowledging other debilitating diseases like diabetes, AIDS and malaria.  The issue at hand is Black lives that are taken unnecessarily and prematurely.  That is the focus, not a general definition of what lives matter. 

In my previous article I briefly touched upon the need to focus on both the genus and the species of evil and sin.  Even in the criminal code, homicide is the genus, but homicide is subdivided into different species or categories such as first-degree, second-degree, third-degree murder etc. based on motivation. It is also categorized according to the killer or killed e.g. matricide, patricide, fratricide, infanticide, suicide etc. Then we have special kinds of homicide like abortion. To speak about any of these specific kinds of homicide is not to deny the general nature of homicide or the other types of homicides, but is to address the specific causes and circumstances of the particular kind of homicide, and then hopefully find the appropriate solution.  While there is no physical difference between sexual abuse perpetrated by a stranger, an uncle or priest, the three crimes are quite different from each other based on the relationship of trust and authority, and so must be distinguished from each other and named so. 

And so, returning to the value of life (genus) and the dangers to it, there are distinctions based on

various factors (species).  In the US context today the value of Black lives takes on particular urgency based on the history of the US with regard to people of African descent. One does not just erase the effects of centuries of slavery, decades of Jim Crow laws and natural prejudice overnight.  Hence, at this time, Black lives matter.  But in another situation, such as when it is open season on law enforcement one could rightly say “Blue Lives Matter.”  You could have no bigger billboard proclaiming "Unborn Lives Matter" than the March for Life in January.  And in the early 2000s, when President Mugabe forcibly seized the farms of White farmers in Zimbabwe some of whom were killed in the mayhem that followed, one could right say “White Lives Matter.” 

Of course the issue is complicated by the fact that there is a movement called Black Lives Matter, (BLM) some of whose activities are questionable and some even profoundly antithetical to Christian values.  That is why many who agree and proclaim the sentiment “Black lives matter” do not subscribe to the BLM movement.  For just as with the advocacy against abortion, there are so many different groups in the Pro-life movement, some of whose methods Catholics would not want to be associated with. And so while they too advocate for the lives of the unborn, even in cooperation with these other groups, they do so in a Catholic way, and not necessarily in the manner of any particular organization. 

(3) Is George Floyd a Martyr? 

Many have asked why there is so much national and international outrage about George Floyd, outrage that does not seem to be commensurate to what happened. 

Of course I want to assume that those who ask this question first acknowledge that the punishment of death that he received was not proportionate to the crime he was suspected of, (a counterfeit $20 bill and resisting arrest) to say nothing about the fact that the sentence was executed extra-judicially.  I would hope that they also don’t agree that just because a person has a criminal record from here to Timbuktu, he deserves to die in the manner that Floyd died. 

And yet, even after first acknowledging that a man needlessly lost his life at the hands of what was seemingly police misconduct, they still ask: isn’t the national outrage in the media, with both peaceful and violent protests, a bit too much for this one man?  How about many other people, even non-Black ones die in similar circumstances; where is their outrage?  Why is this man being given hero status, even considered a martyr? 

My response is that it is not about George Floyd.  He is only a symbol of systemic racism, the tip of the iceberg.  He is another proverbial last straw that broke the camel’s back. He is the catalyst of the desire for change.  Let me give three precedents for this phenomenon. 

1. (a) Pupils in history class have repeatedly been told that the cause of World War I was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Sarajevo.  But clearly that assassination was only the immediate cause of the war, with the real fundamental causes being imperialism, nationalism, militarism and alliances.  And yet the death of this one man, in concert with the real underlying causes set in motion events that killed millions of people and changed the course of history. 
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2. (b) Similarly, the start of the Arab Spring is often set in December 2010 when a Tunisian street vendor called Mohammed Bouazizi killed himself by setting himself on fire when the police took his vegetable stand because he had failed to obtain a permit.  But clearly the protests that would follow in more than a dozen Arab countries and would bring about some change, both good and bad, cannot be attributed solely to the death of this young man.  He too was only the catalyst for what were bigger problems in those countries, such as corruption, dictatorship, economic hardships, tribalism etc. 
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3. (c) A third example has to do with President Donald Trump – and I realize I must tread carefully here.  But since we are talking about difficult subjects, I will put my toe in the water.  One of the paradoxes of his surprise rise to the highest office in the Land is that he did so with the support of many fervent Christians, both Catholic and non-Catholic.  For a man who has ignored a couple of fundamental Christian values such as marital fidelity, a man who does not seem to go to Church regularly, a man who allows for abortion in the case of incest or rape, a man who has said he does not apologize, one would rightly ask, why Christians, for whom these things are important would still support him.  And yet the answer is simple.  Like Floyd, Trump is a symbol of the vision that a significant section of the American people, especially those who would define themselves as conservative, want.  That is why they are willing to overlook, not necessarily endorse, his short-comings, in pursuit of a greater goal. 
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And so, the protests and the accolades are not really about this one man George Floyd. If those who are fighting for racial justice for Black people had their choice (as happened in test cases against slavery and segregation brought to court), he probably would not be their first choice, much like for many Conservative Christians, Trump would probably not have been their first choice.  But you play the hand you are dealt.  And that is why Floyd has become a symbol for racial injustice and a catalyst for racial justice, not because of any merit on his part, in fact, despite any merit on this part, but because of a serendipitous coincidence of events. 

Although it is complicated, reform must happen 

Like I said in my previous essay, issues of racism are complicated and do not admit of simplistic diagnoses and solutions.  In fact, my two essays barely touch the surface of the subject.  Others who are more qualified and have authority must come together to find lasting solutions. 

And yet I return to a few things that for me are as clear as daylight. 

Prejudices (feelings) and stereotypes (beliefs) exist and we are all tempted to act on them whether they be regarding race, nationality, sex, age, accent etc.  Let me give just one of many instances where I have fallen in this regard. 

I once went to a Walgreens Store and needed some help.  The White lady at the front counter could not help me because my issue was above her competency and so she pointed me towards the manager, who she said was at the other end the store.  There were three people in the general area to which she pointed: a young black woman, a middle aged-white woman, and an older white gentleman.  Without asking them which of them was the manager, I went straight to the elderly white gentleman, who fit the three qualities that my taxonomies of age, race and sex told me a manager should have.  As I quickly and rather embarrassingly learnt, I was wrong.  The manager was the young, black, woman, who, in my mind failed to meet my categories of age, race and sex.  Clearly my reliance on prejudice and stereotypes failed me badly. 

Racial prejudices have taken on a particular reality in the USA, based on historical factors going back centuries.  These prejudices and the consequent injustice arising from them must be addressed. There are no two ways about it, otherwise we will just continue having cycles of what is happening now.  It would be best if they were addressed à la Martin Luther King, rather than à la Malcom X, the way of the older Nelson Mandela rather than of his younger iteration.  Unfortunately, the riots of today are following the way of Malcom X and the younger Mandela.

They must not be confused with the many peaceful protests and advocacy involving even bishops and priests, that are going the way of Martin and the elder Mandela.  Just as some bad cops don’t act for or represent all law enforcement, some bad advocates for racial justice do not speak for all who fight for the dream of Martin Luther King: that all will “live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”