Where Do We Stand Today with Racism - Literature review Example

Racism: Where Do We Stand Today? (s) Racism: Where Do We Stand Today? Introduction Racism has always been a major issue in United States since the colonial era and the slave era. Although significant strides in the fight against racism have been made over the past decades, particularly during the civil rights era, racism continues to poison America in its diverse number of forms some of which include racist police violence, racial discrimination in the criminal justice system, economic and social inequalities among others. According to Alexander (23), racial case system in America has not ended but has merely been re-designed. The author particularly cites a number of instances of contemporary racism such as the current systematic discrimination of the people of color in the U.S criminal justice system, and the war on drugs that has relegated millions of blacks to second class status. Racism can take the normative form of social actions, political systems, practices that considers various races to be made in rankings as either inherently superior or inferior to each other. Generally, racial segregation has been in the time immemorial based on presumably shared inheritable traits, qualities as well as abilities. In the U.S racial segregation, this system has been marked as sociological anomie whereby racism holds that members of different races should be treated differently. For example, the native whites in America have viewed themselves as the legal citizens. The manifestation of the racism in the US is like the other cultures came much later to the United States. The truth of the matter is that the non-European Americans migrated into the US as early as over 100 years ago. It is currently estimated that almost a third of the American nationalities cannot trace their roots in Europe. Cities like California, Chicago and New York, the minority are growing to become the majority (Takaki 3). Currently racism is not directly expressed in individuals but through political ideologies that express racial segregation. Americans who trace their roots from other nations like Africa, Asia among others have suffered as victims of racism in the past few decades. The black Americans originated from Africa as slaves and for along time received the same treatment. The Negro term was developed as a result of a different skin colour of the African natives in America. Black Americans are easily identified by their black skin. They were viewed as a less superior race and were believed to serve the ‘white’ fraternity. The blacks were not allowed to own property or share the same social places like their white counterparts. In the late twentieth century, Asians were not allowed to become citizens. As a result they were brutally killed. Currently this state has changed. Blacks are allowed to work in public offices and even go to the same schools as the whites. As much as there is a change, traces of racism are seen. Black students always stay together in most cases. Sports like basketball are majorly reserved for black students. Sororities are majorly dominated by white ladies. Asian citizens are present in the modern America able to enjoy all the benefits associated with citizens. In the past, non Native Americans never had the right to education. In modern America there is an emerging multiculturalism. Non natives are found in these universities and there has been a need to include ethic studies as part of the curriculum. Many universities across several states believe that the many cultures that are encountered daily need to be understood (Takaki 4). Most principals believe that in order to understand the cultural diversity, the history of its existence need to be understood too. It is debated that racial crisis seems to exist between different ethnic groups in the United States. The crisis is depicted in killings, riots and the constant strain between the civilians and the police. Multicultural existence in the America is a reality that needs to be embraced. Racism is no longer about the black and white. Racism includes the non native Americans like the Hispanics and the Asians (Takaki 5). The diversity of the cultures in the United States have been important in the building of the economy. The blacks, Asians and other non natives were used a cheap source of labour. They worked in plantations, factories and in homes (Takaki 12). The world war was a war of resources and included labour from the black Africans. The war on racism is not yet over but it has come a long way. The different cultures in the US played a big role in economy development and are still doing the same. The respect and appreciation of each ethnic group needs to be appreciated for a peaceful coexistence. According to Massey (89), the people of color, Asians and the Latin Americans have always been discriminated based on their color as well as their social ways of life. The author suggests that the inconsequential American social stratification may act as the gate pass of the ever racism activities undergoing in America. Despite the substantial gains of the civil rights movement in the 1960s and 1970s, racism and racial stigma is still prevalent in the contemporary American society as evidenced by the continued systematic discrimination of the people of color in the U.S criminal justice system recent racial injustices, racial profiling of black youths by law enforcement agencies and socio-economic inequalities. The History of Racism in America Ethnic discrimination and racism as personal identity related issues have been major issues since the slave era and colonial era in this country. By law, racist sanctioned privileges and rights for the original white American inhabitants got granted to the Latin Americans and Native Americans differently. The European Americans, specifically the Anglo-Americans were unconditionally granted rights different with others relating to matters of immigration, education, citizenship, voting rights, land acquisitions and criminal procedures. These rights were presumably adopted putting into considerations the personal identity over periods of time extending from 17th century through to the 1960s. In the American 17th century racial segregation, many non-protestant groups emigrating from Europe; particularly the Poles, Jews, Irish people and Italians suffered inhuman xenophobic exclusions as well as other forms of empirically based discrimination in the American society. The major ethnically and racially institutions in America during this period included; slavery, Native American reservations, Indian wars, segregation, internment camps and provision of residential schools for the Native Americans only. Throughout his book, Takaki (1993) particularly attempts to trace the political and socio-economic history of the African Americans, Native Indians, Japanese, Mexicans, Irish, Chinese and Jewish people currently living in the United States with particular focus to their experiences of racism. One of the themes prevalent throughout the book is the attitude of "us against them" of the ruling structure with regard to the minorities seen the past in the form of the fear of the giddy multitude, the enactment of Chinese Exclusion act and the present day accusations that the Latinos are taking away American jobs. Racial politics which was majorly based on the class versus classless societal members remained a major racial phenomenon in the American society. Racism until today in the American political scene continues to be reflected in the American socio-economic inequality. This has diversely taken more as per modern and indirect expressional forms; mostly prevalent on the symbolic racism. Racial stratification additionally continues to be reflected in the employment fields, lending, education, housing and governance. Accordingly, in the view of the United States Human Rights Network, a network formed to deal with the ideological persistence of racism, discrimination engulfed in racism permeates all the conceptualized aspects of life in the United States; racism additionally extends to all the communities of color in the United States of America. Generally, racial identity journey in the United States, it is evident in the American history that everyone living in this country has in one way or another experienced racial identity problem as well as personal racial identity journeys. The racism in United States has been experienced in local communities, religious communities (Unitarian Universalism) and the overall American history of white supremacy battle (Michelle 134). While the racial categories currently are more fluid today’s because of more mixed race peoples, everyone born the united stated often finds themselves put in one of the racial segregation categories. However, McGuire (2010) challenges a number of misrepresented historical narratives of the civil rights movement including the role of Rosa Parks, the white backlash in the form of gendered violence and the courageous resistance by the black women. Instead, the author critically McGuire’s highlights the racial justice and discrimination in America specifically the case of the black women during the Civil Rights Movement such as Recy Taylor and Rosa Parks and how they were silenced. In addition, the book also talks about the civil rights movement, economic intimidation, terror and sexual violence during the Jim Crow era. Racism and the Civil Rights Movements In the middle of the twentieth century, the Afro-Americans strongly emerged to answer the call of transforming the world in relation to the predominantly ongoing racism. During this period, the comical social and economic ravages of Jim Crow era when racism was an all-encompassing and deeply rooted in the world interaction system. Liberal thinkers’ emergence in the mid-twentieth century ideally led to the appearance of racism and civil rights movements across the world. The ever rising phoenix from the lynch mob ashes, residential and labor discrimination, rape and debt peonage; the racial and civil rights movements raised a collective call of “no more!” The maintenance of color domination by the people of color and the whites resulted into an outrageous growth of the fight against racism. This research paper explains the emergence of racial and civil rights movements. The maintenance of white power by the 20th century had been perceived all over the world; let alone the United States, South Africa or even the West colonies but every place in the world experienced racism at large. The maintenance of white power henceforth had been innovative and even pervasive. People therefore had to fight in unity on how to get out from under the whites’ veil had to be equally of an unrelenting nature full of improvisational tactics and strategies . The normal understanding of the civil rights is that it was in fact a grand struggle for freedom extensively extending far beyond the valiant aims of legally formulated rights and protection. From court cases and awareness to popular culture, freedom was finally arrived at in liberal ways which challenged the discriminative authorities and even paved way for a well-established and contested ways of doing things in moments of crisis. Gains in Fight against Racism The fight against racism has always been an urgent and immediate challenge to the societal ways of life. To meet this challenge all the civil rights activists have collectively come up with ideological struggle among people in order to understand one another and their societal ways of life. The whites and blacks have been ultimately indulged in various supportive and communal works in order to bring these two races together. Assessment of position of the people’s movements is in a fight against racism and its impact on the class struggle. Towards mitigation of racism, the increase in racism has been conceptualized in relation to the deepening of the capitalism systematic crisis. Putting racism as per the context of crisis of capitalism has ultimately reduced the initially experienced racial discrimination with a major aim of improving the standard of economy. Kivel (2002) comprehensively explores the various manifestations of racism in the contemporary politics, workplaces, communities and family lives. For example, the book has explored how racism has been entrenched in the prison industrial complex, in the new economy, attack on recent immigrants and health care policy. However, the author moves beyond the usual unlearning and definition of racism to address some of the privilege areas for the white people as well as suggest a number of ways through which individuals can challenge and eventually uproot the structures of racism. According to Anderson (2010), despite the entire progress towards the elimination of racial segregation in the American societal system, Afro-Americans remain virtually disadvantaged in every aspect of daily interactional activities and well-being. Segregation henceforth has overly been the only factor to blame in relation problems encountered by the people of color in the American society. The past 40 years the civil rights have struggled to gain rights for the Afro-Americans that existed for the white citizens. These movements all over the world fought for the individual populations’ rights to apply for employments non-discriminately or even sit in a restaurant without any form of racial segregation. The civil rights, due to their constitutional provisions do not necessarily have to fight in bloodshed in order to protect the rights of the majority. The American civil rights movements nonetheless did not come without bloodshed without bloodshed on the civil rights protection part of the African-American people. Through the emergence of civil rights movements we have come to an equal society in which we have the first black president in America. Without the endless effort of the civil rights activists, getting achievements such as having the first black president would have been evitable even though the freedom fighters believed in inevitable changes regarding the ancient racism world. Modern Day Racism in the United States Racism is an ideological concept consisting of deferentially related concepts to the term race. In both modernity and post-modernity era, variants of racism are always viewed in relation to biological differences in personal identities, races and the class of different groups of people. Miller(34)identifies a number of forms of contemporary institutional racism in the United States and how taken together, they can form a web of oppression that may ultimately obstructs the economic, political and social mobility of the people while the whites continue to enjoy their status of privilege. Similarly, according to Loury (44), it is no longer racial discrimination but racial stigma that is preventing many people of color especially blacks from achieving their goals. Loury attributes the persistent inequality between whites and blacks to the continued racial stigma rather than racial discrimination in the contemporary American society. The continued prevalence of racism in the United States has been clearly demonstrated by a visual map project known as the geography of hate. According to the Geography of hate (2013), the incidences of online bullying and prevalence of race related hate speech is still high in certain regions in the country. The map which highlights the socio-spatial contexts and the geography of online hate speech across the United States was particularly created based on geotagging of racist tweets from each and every region. According to Troutt (2), racial injustice as seen in the relations between the police force and the black youths such as the recent shooting of Michael Brown has been adversely promoted by the American civil unions. The racial justice possibility, though being put into perspective is challenging may be achieved one day in the American societies. In pursuit of discrimination free world, the racial justice programs bring some of the most influential lawsuits in federal and state courts throughout America. The racial justice in addition cordially aims at having a far-reaching and significant effect on community of color. On the other hand, West (2008) argues that a harmonious race relation in the United States is currently being hindered by what he refers to “nihilism”, a sense of worthiness among the blacks. In addition, West also challenges the concept of color blindness by arguing that American society is multi-ethnic and race and racism are woven in the American history and therefore should not be ignored. This is supported by Lee (44) who suggests that the ongoing efforts to roll back the gains of the civil rights movement in the 1960s and 1970s. According to Lee (2013), the origin of the word race is to blame on social-cultural diversity and gender inequality. This is one of the most tenacious related aspects of prejudice the world has ever witnessed in the history of deviant behaviors and conformity. Lee believes that Racism as an egoistic prejudice has caused clashes among human groups. Racism in the United States has persistently gained roots in the modern societal settings beginning from learning institutions through to employer’s field. The people of color are still discriminated against by the whites with the recent cases being aimless shootings of the people of color by the whites and vice versa. Accordingly, apart from the continuous civil rights movements consistency in the enlightenment processes of equality between the American inhabitants, various groups of United States still do not believe in equality between themselves. This is seen beginning with the isolations of the whites and blacks from the States in which these people stay in to the overall political framework of the United States. In the United States, the people of color, Asians and the Latin Americans live in isolation as a result of racism thus implicating socialization process among the upcoming individuals in the United States societal systems. This research paper explains the forms of modern day racism in the United States. The racial politics is one of the major attributed facts of racism in the United States of America. The socio-political inequality in the United States is a bare reflection of the socio-economic inequality in the United States economy status. Racial politics in the American society remains a major racism phenomenon; this process has taken a more of modern and indirect racial expressional form in a symbolic attribute of racism. Racial stratification additionally in the recent United States’ sharing of national cake appeared to be sidelined towards one people as opposed to the overall constituents of the society. Additionally, racial stratification as per political affiliations reflects segregations in employment fields, education, housing, lending and the governmental bureaucratic elements in the social system. In the ideological view of the U.S Human Rights Network, a network established through the scores of U.S’s societal rights and human rights organizations; “Discrimination permeates all the socialization aspects of life in the United States, and extends overly to all communities of color” The white’s discrimination against the people of color in the social set-up is additional attribute of racial segregation in the United States. Most hate crimes in the social settings target victims in relation to their racial of ethnicity and races basis. This is done for federal purposes and crimes targeting Hispanics based radically on the identity as per the ethnicity considerations. Leading forms of racial segregation cited by the leading security agency in the United States that is the F.B.I postulates that anti-black, anti-white, anti-Jewish, anti-Hispanic and anti-homosexual racial prejudice in that order are some of the highlighted forms of racial segregation in the United States. Accordingly, the Bureau of Justice Statistics Whites, Hispanics and Blacks present similarity in relation to the rates of violence in relation to hate crimes victimization between the consecutive years of 2007-2011. Finally, the blacks have been found to be more of emotionally vulnerable to the commitment of hate crimes. The New Century Foundation, argued extensively that the blacks are more likely to commit racially concomitant hate crimes than the whites; and that F.B.I records an inflated figures in the number of hate crimes committed by the whites by making a count as per the Hispanics as whites by default. Generally, racial crime in the United States has never been predictive of criminal behaviors. Lastly, the hateful views from Americans shows continuity in of anti-Semitism in the United States has remained an issue in the modern United States societal system. The recent world economics recessions have ultimately resulted into increased anti-Semitic viewpoints among the Americans at large. These powers include: Power one: this is the power to racially oppress, destroy or adversely control the people of power. Historically, this power has overly manifested itself in the enslavement of African people, exclusion of Asians, extermination of Native Americans and interment of the Japanese. Power two: this is the racial power aimed at the provision of authority, benefits and privilege and benefits specifically to those who are white. This power basically tends to favor the whites at the expense of the people of color. This is basically the ultimate goal of racism. Power three: This is basically the most treacherous power of racism. This racism power often shapes the racial identity. This racial segregation power socializes the whites into being racists and the people of color into wholesomely being on the receiving end as the victims. The American racial segregation untimely embarked on a socialization process whereby racism is the centrality of theme of the internalization of messages from our overall socialization processes. According to Hollinger (1995), multiculturalism in the American societal system has been one of the major attributes leading to the continuous execution of racism. An embracement of cultural diversity among the American societal cultures should be aptly upheld in order to come up with one united society bound together regardless of their ways of life, social stratification and political affiliations. Blitz and Greene (2006) also highlights some of the invisible aspects of racism (trauma, abuse and stress), domestic violence, social functioning as well as foster care with specific focus on Afro-Caribbean, women and West Indian and Mexicans. Finally, the recent racial injustices that have been met by the black youths in the United States including racial profiling and inequality under the law as seen in the recent unlawful killings of Eric Garner and Michael Brown have further confirmed that racism is still alive in the American society. Belton(3) argues that the far reaching impacts of racism has resulted into the current leadership use of traditionally organized methods as well as the newly initiated school tools such as social media in the endless fight against police brutality on either races as well as social, political and economic inequality amongst the people. The overall socialization process in the American States is a bare reflection of a society which has been and continues to be based on race, class and personal identity. Racism permeates all the social institutions in the American society as a whole. The mass media, religious institutions and schools are some of the social networks under which racism continue to be experienced in the American societal system. No matter what our racial identities are, each and every individual’s behavioral and social view of the society is shaped by the societal institutions. Schools ultimately educate individuals in relation to the social view of race while the mass media bombards individuals with information which in turn shape their views regarding the society either positively or negatively. To some degree, the current American societies have in one way or the other been socialized and encouraged to internalize the anti-racism messages in the modern social set-up not only in America but all over the world Conclusion In conclusion, although significant strides in the fight against racism have been made over the past decades, particularly during the civil rights era, racism continues to poison America in its diverse number of forms some of which include racist police violence, racial discrimination in the criminal justice system, economic and social inequalities among others. In addition, the attitude of "us against them" of the ruling structure with regard to the minorities is still persistent in the today as seen in the recent accusations that the Latinos are taking away American jobs. As a result, it is widely seen that racial case system in America has not ended but has rather been re-designed. Works Cited Anderson, Elizabeth. The Imperative of Integration. New York: Princeton University Press, 2010, Print. Alexander, Michelle. The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness., 2011. Print. Belton, Danielle A. “Youth Groups Working for Ferguson’s Future”, 2014. Web. 03 April. 2014. Blitz, L.V. and Greene, M.P. Racism and racial identity: Reflections on urban practice in mental health and social services. New York: Haworth Maltreatment and Trauma Press, 2006.Print. Geography of Hate A Visual Map Project. http://www.floatingsheep.org/2013/05/hatemap.html Hollinger, David. Postethnic America: Beyond Multiculturalism. New York: Basic Books, 1995, Print. Kivel, P. (2002). Uprooting racism: How white people can work for racial justice. Gabriola Island, BC: New Society Publishers. Lee, Cokorinos. The Assault on Diversity: An Organized Challenge to Racial and Gender Justice. New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. 2003. Print. Loury, Glenn. The Anatomy of Racial Inequality. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003. Print. Massey, Douglas. Categorically Unequal: The American Stratification System. (New York: Russell Sage, 2007.Print. McGuire, Danielle. At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance--a New History of the Civil Rights Movement from Rosa Parks to the Rise of Black Power. New York: Knopf, 2010. Print. Miller, J., & Garran, A. M. (2007). The Web of Institutional Racism (Reprinted from Racism in the United States, Implications for social work practice, 1st Edition). Smith College Studies in Social Work, 77(1), 33-67. Takaki , Ronald. A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America.  New York, NY: Back Bay Books, 1993. Print. Troutt, David. “Is Racial Justice Possible in America?” Is Racial Justice Possible in America?, 2014.Web. 03 April. 2015. West, Cornel. Guest Lecture, CSU Sonoma. Youtube Video.2008. Retrieved on April 3, 2015 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZzWWq_rQt8 Read More