Because your definition of a racist and other people’s are different. For a lot of people a racist is someone like a skin head, or a KKK member. Or at the very least someone who goes out of their way to call people the N-word, complain about blacks and minorities, people who consciously disparage and feel that blacks are inferior. They lack a level of respect based solely on race.
Others consider sub-conscience decisions and how we relate and interact with like people as racist. (Note these behaviors are exhibited by ALL people, not just whites). I think one should acknowledge these biases, but when others want to throw around the inflammatory label “racist” at a person who has never uttered the N-word to anyone or looked down on someone because of their skin, you are doing nothing but hardening them from seeing your point of view.
At one point in time, the KKK and Nazis were nice, respectable, mainstream people who ran the world, and it wasn’t that long ago, in fact. Living memory for lots of people. Lots of those people are still alive and kicking and in charge. I grew up in an environment that was still, in many ways, deeply segregated. When I went home recently, I was actually struck by how intergrated my hometown felt FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MY LIFE. I’m in my late 30s. I’m not old. This is not an historical oddity…
Also, this week, we were on the road, and stopped at a rest stop on the highway. There were 2 sets of bathrooms. It took me a couple of minutes to register the reason why that was… Do you think a person of color would have done the same?
Also, some of those people who claim they aren’t racist or who would have a shit fit if you called them racist are some of the same people who are screaming about closing the borders against “illegals” or who think that the Cleveland Indians or the Washington Redskins are not offensive names (or in the case of Cleveland, the mascot) or who bitch when they can’t use the N-word. So there is that. They don’t hate them, they just “want them in their proper place.”
So, we’re not talking about being prejudice, we are talking about structures of privilege that assume certain ideas about the color people’s skin. This is not new… people have been talking about these structures since the days of slavery. Just because it’s only now seeping into the mainstream of discourse should tell you something.
ofay (n.) American English black slang, “white person,”
1925, of unknown origin. If, as is sometimes claimed, it derives from an
African word, none corresponding to it has been found. Perhaps the most
plausible speculation is Yoruba ófé “to
disappear” (as from a powerful enemy), with the sense transferred from
the word of self-protection to the source of the threat. OED regards the
main alternative theory, that it is pig Latin for foe, to be no more than an “implausible guess.”
“It was in the late 1800s when writers from the North started referring to the hayseed faction of Southern homesteaders as crackers. “[Those writers] decided that they were called that because of the cracking of the whip when they drove slaves,” Ste. Claire said. But he said that few crackers would have owned slaves; they were generally too poor. (That of course, doesn’t mean they weren’t participants in the South’s slave economy in other ways.)”
It doesn’t really work though, does it? Racism isn’t just “some words hurt your feelings” or “this caricature is a stereotype”. Without the surrounding context, without the systemic disempowerment, it lacks sting. At best you might look at it and go, oh, ha ha, yeah I guess that’s kind of weird, huh.
Here’s an anecdote. An acquaintance once tried to illustrate racism to a group of Japanese people (in Japan) by showing them some examples of racist caricatures from old American movies, particularly the I.Y. Yunioshi character from Breakfast at Tiffany’s. It completely backfired because they all just thought the character was hilarious, like, oh what a wacky guy, ha ha. They had no context for how asian people were seen and treated at the time in America, so they had nothing to be offended by.
Without some understanding of how prejudice actually works, it’s just more fuel for the “black people can say the N word so why can’t I” crowd. I’m not offended by this shirt so why are Native Americans offended by the Indians logo? Political Correctness Gone Mad!!!
Having worked in a “field job” in the DC area, I’ve been called honkey, whitey and cracker quite a bit. Not generally to my face, but in passing, in murmurs, or shouted across a parking lot. It honestly had no sting whatsoever. Being young. middle class, white, college educated, unskilled, broke and drunk is an amazing shield against race-based insults. I’d like to think the Fightin’ Whities or Fightin’ Racists would make people change their minds or at least think twice about how offensive these mascots and team names are, but frankly I think they’re more likely to be adopted by white supremacists and/or the 88% of the country that is culturally tone-deaf. We might just have to wait until the current generation of bigoted sports fans die off before we see any change.
Because the physics teacher I consult for with the textbooks/experiments she writes doesn’t need assistance now. (Yes, I actually do at least a tiny little, albeit in a different geographic area.) And because I cannot sleep. And because I am not inspired these days for writing wikipedia (don’t worry, will be again).
