Racism - (One Hand Clapping)

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July 29, 2013

Racism, Conversations, and the Sound of One Hand Clapping

An old Buddhist koan asks, "What is the sound of one hand, clapping?" A related - and more amusing - one asks, "If a man speaks and no woman is around to hear him, is he still wrong?" We laugh at the second one because there's an element of painful truth to it: the battle of the sexes often leaves women feeling frustrated and men feeling unfairly demonized. The answer to the first question is that, unlike our lonesome man (who is wrong simply by virtue of being male regardless of whether he has an audience), the sound of one hand clapping is actual silence.

Clapping, you see, is an act that requires two hands.

The same insight applies to conversations; any true exchange of views requires the active participation of at least two people.

Moreover, two people with exactly the same memories and opinions can't really be said to be exchanging views, can they? Imagine a buyer and a seller, each offering exactly what the other already has: "I'll trade you this brand new crossbow for the identical one you're holding". Not much of an exchange, is it? After all that trouble, each walks away with exactly what he had to start with.

By its very nature, conversation - like any real exchange - implies some back and forth; one person offers his viewpoints and the other counters with a different set of ideas, recollections, or thoughts. The entire point is that, having sincerely tried to understand each other's position, each party walks away a bit wiser, hopefully with a better understanding of how the other person views things.

Pundits love to chide white Americans for their reluctance to speak honestly about race, but that reluctance should not surprise anyone.

Attorney General Eric Holder, who commenced his last plea for honest racial dialog by calling the invitees "a nation of cowards", recently renewed the call for yet another national conversation about race; this time, one that is more open and presumably courageous. Mr. Holder (who is black) and our half black/half white President offered up memories of what they clearly presume to be uniquely black - and therefore uniquely painful - experiences: having people lock their car doors as you walk by, women clutching their purses in elevators, and perhaps most amusingly, "The Talk" (only) parents of black teens have with their sons about dealing with the police.

Victor Davis Hanson accepted Mr. Holder's invitation by offering up a few racial recollections of his own. His purpose, like that of Richard Cohen (who was quickly branded a racist), was to explain that the experiences cited by the President and Attorney General are all too often grounded in the actual (and painful) racial experiences of American whites. But rather than provoking that honest dialog

Mr. Holder envisioned, the response to Mr. Hanson's recollections was aptly summed up in the title of Ta-Nehisi Coates' response: "It's the Racism, Stupid".

What stood out to this white reader was just how careful Mr. Hanson was to wrap his memories in caveats and context:

... my father was a lifelong Democrat. He had helped to establish a local junior college aimed at providing vocational education for at-risk minorities, and as a hands-on administrator he found himself on some occasions in a physical altercation with a disaffected student. In middle age, he and my mother once were parking their car on a visit to San Francisco when they were suddenly surrounded by several African-American teens. When confronted with their demands, he offered to give the thieves all his cash if they would leave him and my mother alone. Thankfully they took his cash and left.

I think that experience -- and others -- is why he once advised me, "When you go to San Francisco, be careful if a group of black youths approaches you." Note what he did not say to me. He did not employ language like "typical black person." He did not advise extra caution about black women, the elderly, or the very young -- or about young Asian Punjabi, or Native American males. In other words, the advice was not about race per se, but instead about the tendency of males of one particular age and race to commit an inordinate amount of violent crime.

It was after some first-hand episodes with young African-American males that I offered a similar lecture to my own son. The advice was born out of experience rather than subjective stereotyping. When I was a graduate student living in East Palo Alto, two adult black males once tried to break through the door of my apartment -- while I was in it. On a second occasion, four black males attempted to steal my bicycle -- while I was on it. I could cite three more examples that more or less conform to the same apprehensions once expressed by a younger Jesse Jackson. Regrettably, I expect that my son already has his own warnings prepared to pass on to his own future children.

Mr. Coates' response was typically dismissive. The racial experiences of blacks are poignant and touching: the young man who feels alienated by the suspicious glances of complete strangers, the father who finds it exquisitely painful to explain to his teenaged son that he mustn't give the police cause to arrest him, are meant to elicit sympathy.

The racial experiences of whites, on the other hand, are deemed not germane to this "honest" and frank racial discussion. For reasons not explained, they simply don't signify. Actual experiences like being robbed or threatened illustrate no larger theme about race relations in America. In this, they are different from the woman clutching her purse or the click of a car door. These more privileged experiences clearly underscore Deep, Racial Truths. The experiences of white folk, on the other hand, are treated as isolated incidents with no deeper meaning. Bringing them up is Not Helpful - it can only lead to forbidden thoughts and proscribed ideas (like the notion that people of all races are slow to forget unpleasant experiences, or that we all have an unfortunate tendency to generalize from particulars). The President is right to think purse-clutching women are indicative of some larger problem. Hanson is wrong to think that menacing teens are symbolic of anything.

This morning, Patterico highlights a similar attempt to shut down that honest national conversation. It consists of a list of Things White People Shouldn't Say When Discussing Race:

I went to the linked article, by Jenée Desmond-Harris of TheRoot.com, a black online magazine run in part by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. with corporate ties to Slate and the Washington Post. It is a “nonexhaustive list of ground rules and reminders” for conducting our “national conversation on race.” Given the site where it appeared, you will probably not be surprised to learn that Ms. Desmond-Harris’s piece reads like a list of things white people had better not say to black people. Here are some examples:

1. Talking about race isn’t racist. Don’t say that. Vilifying people who discuss race and point out racism — making them the bad guys — is one of the ways racism is maintained. So is acting as if “blacks suffer from racism” and “whites suffer from reverse racism” are equally valid points of view. . . . .
5. Black people shouldn’t have to fit your definition of what’s respectable to deserve equality or justice. It’s silly and unfounded to blame inequality caused by institutionalized racism on, say, sagging pants or rap music. If you want to celebrate black people who are educated and high-achieving and defy persistent stereotypes, great, but that can’t be a requirement for fair treatment. We got into trouble with this type of thinking when evidence that Trayvon Martin was a normal teenager messed up so many people’s impression of him as a sympathetic victim.
. . . .
7. Individual racism and systemic racism are two different things. We should care about all the structures that maintain racial inequality, not just individual actors. (This is why it’s not unreasonable to jump from George Zimmerman’s impression of Trayvon Martin to racial profiling by police.) That said, individual acts can provide strong reminders about larger attitudes and problems. Ahem, Paula Deen. Ahem.

Individual racism is irrelevant, apparently, unless we’re talking about a white racist, in which case it is super-meaningful and illustrative of whites’ attitudes in general. Got it. Al Sharpton’s racism? Just one guy. Paula Deen’s?

That is representative of “larger attitudes”!

The other numbered points are more of the same: don’t cite blacks like Bill Cosby on race issues; don’t talk about black-on-black crime (with a link to a piece titled Exposing the Myth of Black-on-Black Crime); and so forth. They’re basically rules for white people on things not to say to blacks.

Desmond-Harris’s piece noted that Saletan had done his own piece on how to have a conversation on race. I looked at that piece and noted that, with a couple of perfunctory nods to even-handedness, it too was basically a compendium of rules for white people on how to talk to blacks about race (e.g. don’t freak out if someone calls you a racist because, hey, maybe you really are one!).

I wondered: are there any pieces on how to talk to white people about race? Or is that not an important topic?

That's a good question, actually, and it's one I've been thinking about quite a lot lately. If this conversation is worth having then shouldn't it permit a real exchange of views and not just one side lecturing the other (or setting forth ground rules that essentially prevent exactly the kind of honest dialog we're told we're cowards for avoiding)? If we're ever to have a real conversation, then both sides need to be more respectful of each other's experiences, more aware of each other's sensitivities, and more forgiving of unintentional slights.

And neither side gets to unilaterally set the rules.

If we are to have that conversation, whites need to be willing to share their experiences and blacks need to be willing to listen. Here are my experiences with race:

I grew up in New England. When I was thirteen or so, my father was stationed in Washington DC area. Up until that time, my experience with blacks was limited to playing with the friend of a friend in 3rd grade. One of my most vivid memories is of lying in our bathing suits on my neighbor's lawn and holding hands as the sun warmed us. I will never forget looking at her hand in mine and marveling at the deep pink of her palms. My only other memory is of several encounters in the 4th and 6th grades with the lone black girl in my classes. Her name was Linda.

The fact that my very first experience with bullying involved that lone black girl was, to my way of thinking, just a coincidence. Yes,

Linda relentlessly bullied the other girls on the playground, cutting in line, pushing people out of her way and grabbing the jump rope whenever she decided it was "her turn". Linda had two turns to everyone else's one. And yes, Linda hung around after school and repeatedly tried to draw me into fights. But that had nothing to do with the color of her skin. It was simply, I thought, that she was miserable and lonely. She had few friends. Given her personality, that wasn't surprising. Linda was like a fish out of water. A tiny white girl named Joy clung to her side like a remora. Linda didn't really like Joy, but even a parasite was better than being alone.

Eventually I managed to make friends with Joy, but while I never got into a fight with Linda, I was never able to connect with her.

In the 7th grade we moved to DC. My new junior high had recently started bussing blacks from the city and rural whites from the surrounding farms into our middle class school district. For the first time, as I walked down the hallways between classes I was groped by black boys and often witnessed black-on-white fistfights. I was uncomfortable with the verbal backlash to this aggression and belligerence. But oddly, I never heard the much-discussed "n word" pass anyone's lips (black or white).

One day, leaving school, a large and vicious group of black girls began beating up another girl. I had never seen a group of kids beat up a lone victim, and it terrified me. At about this time, I lost a new jacket my mother had just bought me. It was very distinctive - a brightly colored plaid. I later saw it on a girl in one of my classes. She was at least two sizes larger than me, and the jacket's buttons were strained to the breaking point.

My name was inside that jacket, so there was no doubt that its new 'owner' knew exactly who it belonged to. Yet I didn't report it stolen.

The girl was the one who had incited the group beating I had witnessed the week before. I got the message and suddenly, the jacket didn't seem worth having to fight off her numerous friends.

The next year, we moved to high school and the racial tensions continued. They were, so far as I could see, instigated by a small group of students. I had several black friends - students I shared classes with - so it was clear that not every black student in our school had a problem with whites.

But there is a hard, hard truth here. If it is acceptable for the President of the United States or the Attorney General to regale us with a remembered litany of racial slights, why is it racist and wrong for Victor Davis Hanson to share memories that left an imprint upon him? Why is it racist and wrong for me to do the same?

I don't think I grew up racist. The worst argument I ever had with a friend occurred in my Junior year. My father, a Navy Captain, had transferred again and I now attended a private school in Tidewater, Virginia. There were only 2 blacks in the entire Upper School and there were no fights, ever. My best friend came down to visit me, and one night we sat looking out at the water and talking about school. I'm not sure how we got onto the subject, but the racial problems at my old HS came up and my friend, the daughter of German parents, dared to say something unacceptable.

She dared to say that she deeply resented having to worry about being groped or bullied or beaten up because of events that occurred over a hundred years before her parents came to this country. She resented being targeted because her skin was lighter than the skin of certain other students. She was the descendant of German Jews who were targeted by the Nazis. And she really didn't see why she should have to tread carefully around people to whom neither she nor her ancestors had offered any offense?

I responded with all the airy platitudes I had been carefully taught. Slavery was wrong, and had left deep wounds. She should understand and make allowances. She should watch what she said (and how she said it), lest she compound the injury.

In my defense, I was a child still. But I was still wrong, and what's worse, I was deeply unfair to a friend who had done no wrong except to speak honestly about race during a private moment when there was no possibility of hurting anyone. That's a reaction many whites are familiar with - when they attempt to honestly share their feelings on this topic, they are insulted, vilified, dismissed. Make no mistake - the racial memories of white folks can be painful, too. But the bad experiences - the ones that make us angry, or frighten us - are not all there is because thankfully, bad people of all colors are still in the minority.

Like most Americans, I have other racial experiences; happy ones. Friendships filled with laughter and good times. Acts of kindness and compassion. But pain looms large in our recollections.

Another old friend came to visit me in Virginia - a young, black man I had dated at my old school. I've told that story before, here - how his mother stood up for what was right and held her son to the standard we all should aspire to: seeing the person beyond the culture, the clothes, the accent, the skin color.

Does either side of the racial divide honestly want to understand where the other is coming from?

It's hard to escape the thought that Holder's remembered conversation with his father is offered to white America as some sort of teaching moment: "See? This is what we've been going through all these years. This is the world we live in..." But I read it with a sense of disbelief, because most parents I know have had exactly the same conversation with their sons at some point. Ours occurred after my well groomed, red haired, and very white-skinned son came home from an evening out, complaining that the police had "hassled" him and his friends for "no good reason".

"You're a teenaged boy, out driving around late at night. It's not exactly unknown for groups of teenaged boys to get into trouble, son", I remember responding. "Look at how you're dressed".

How he was dressed wasn't unacceptable, but it was a far cry from the way he dressed at school: no t-shirts, jeans that fit, shirt with a collar, belt, leather shoes. He was wearing baggy jeans, a t-shirt with a flannel shirt over it, Sketchers-type sneakers, and a beanie. His attire was a cross between West coast 90s grunge and hip-hop. I expect his demeanor was subtly different as well.

"What did you expect, son?", I asked. "You look like you're up to no good". And that was the entire point of the costume: to look older, hipper, somewhat edgy. To look dangerous.

Was it wrong for me to teach my son that people rarely look below the surface? Is it profiling when I - a grown woman - instinctively throw my shoulders back and walk more briskly when I find myself alone in the parking garage of my office late at night? I don't believe that all men are rapists - not even close.

On more than one occasion it has occurred to me that a lone man in an elevator or in the parking garage can probably sense the heightened alertness in my body language - the sense of threat. It's not something I'm comfortable with, and it has nothing to do with race and everything to do with the fact that women don't often rape or attack other women. Was I sexually profiling when I locked my car doors several weeks ago while my husband ducked into a convenience store late at night? There wasn't a black person in sight, but there were a lot of men. I doubt I would have locked the doors, had the parking lot been full of women.

Are men who avoid being alone with women they work with, profiling? Or are they just prudent? How can any of us know why another human being is uneasy around us unless we know their history? This is the implied refrain running through our too often one-sided conversations about race: "You have to be extra careful of what you say because you can't possibly understand how I might interpret your words".

That's an observation that cuts both ways. Or ought to. If you only know your side of the story of America, you are operating blindly.

And if you won't allow your fellow Americans the same latitude you demand, you can't expect them to engage in conversation with you. Honest conversations are often uncomfortable and painful. They can make us momentarily angry, or paranoid, or resentful.

But at the other side of that honest conversation lies something worth attaining: the understanding that while our experiences do play a role in shaping our perceptions, they don't have to define us. They don't necessarily determine who we are or how we relate to others unless we let them. There is always so much more to learn about other people and other lives if only we are willing to risk a little pain, a little anger, a little discomfort.

A little humility.

Are we ready for that? Will we ever be ready for it? I'm game if you are.

Posted by Cassandra at July 29, 2013 07:00 AM