In recent discussions of racism within American society, a controversial issue has been whether racism is a permanent facet in today’s society. On one hand Derrick Bell, a prominent African American scholar , feels that the legacy of slavery has left a significant portion on the race “with life-long poverty and soul-devastating despair “. Bell also believes that slavery will continue to have an impact on countless African Americans day in and day out. Consider the 5.7 unemployment rate gap between blacks and whites, which was reported by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2014. The disparity of the unemployment rate has been a problem since the 1960s and 70s, when the unemployment rate for blacks was 2.5 times the rates for whites. During …show more content…
From this perspective Souza continuously degrade the fact that racism still exist. According to Souza’s view, racism cannot be the blame for most of the contemporary struggles African Americans face. Souza strongly believe that even if racism goes away, African Americans will continue to seek hand outs and make excuses. Such as, kids growing up in single parent households, excessively long predominately black welfare lines, and inner city crimes. Souza goes to the degree of being irrational when he states that he want a repeal of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. By this Souza mean the law should be changed so that its nondiscrimination provisions apply only to the government. In sum, the real issue is how America can progress over time and live up to being the land of the …show more content…
Dinesh D’Souza‘s assertion that racial discrimination against African Americans has diminish due to culture rather than racism is contradicted by Derrick Bell argument that “black people will never gain full equality in this country”. Derrick firmly feels that a meticulous examination of African American and Caucasian associations supports that racism is a permanent feature of American society. Both Derrick and Dinesh made valid points and used examples throughout history to get their point across. Although both made valid points, I agree, and maintain that racism still exist in modern society. Growing up I have witnessed racism with my own eyes and have personally went through it. With everything taking into account, I personally feel that racism still exist in today’s society because, white people see African Americans as an inferior race. Their actions show it as they continue to patrol our communities like we are uncivilized animals. Furthermore, African Americans that are making progress such as being successful in the corporate business still have to deal with “the plight of our less fortunate brethren who struggle for existence in what some social scientist call the underclass”. The African American culture in this case study is perceived as being the reason why blacks have not progress from racial discrimination, according to Dinesh D’Souza. There’s a
One of the most critical observations about the state of our sociological health is observed by MacGillis of the Atlantic’s article entitled “The Original Underclass”. That is that the social breakdown of low-income whites began to reflect trends that African American’s were primary subjects of decades ago such as unemployment, and drug addiction.
William Julius Wilson creates a thrilling new systematic framework to three politically tense social problems: “the plight of low-skilled black males, the persistence of the inner-city ghetto, and the fragmentation of the African American family” (Wilson, 36). Though the conversation of racial inequality is classically divided. Wilson challenges the relationship between institutional and cultural factors as reasons of the racial forces, which are inseparably linked, but public policy can only change the racial status quo by reforming the institutions that support it.
In her article “From America’s New Working Class”, Kathleen R. Arnold makes clear that welfare/workfare recipients are treated like prisoners or second class citizens. Likewise, In Michelle Alexander’s article “The New Jim Crow” she describes how blacks is made criminals by a corrupt criminal justice system. Alexander also points out in her article “The New Jim Crow” that shackles and chains are not the only form of slavery. Furthermore, Alexander states that although America is thought of as the home of the free, blacks are more likely than any other race to be arrested, unemployed, or denied housing. Freedom is not an absolute value in America, as slavery is more ubiquitous than ever.
While the formal abolition of slavery, on the 6th of December 1865 freed black Americans from their slave labour, they were still unequal to and discriminated by white Americans for the next century. This ‘freedom’, meant that black Americans ‘felt like a bird out of a cage’ , but this freedom from slavery did not equate to their complete liberty, rather they were kept in destitute through their economic, social, and political state.
Black Power, the seemingly omnipresent term that is ever-so-often referenced when one deals with the topic of Black equality in the U.S. While progress, or at least the illusion of progress, has occurred over the past century, many of the issues that continue to plague the Black (as well as other minority) communities have yet to be truly addressed. The dark cloud of rampant individual racism may have passed from a general perspective, but many sociologists, including Stokely Carmichael; the author of “Black Power: the Politics of Liberation in America”, have and continue to argue that the oppressive hand of “institutional racism” still holds down the Black community from making any true progress.
While parts of America presented and declared themselves as being against racism, they continued to not use their full power to better the lives of African-Americans. For example, Zinn points out that amendments such as the Fourteenth and Fifteenth gave the President enough power to crush racial discrimination, yet none of the men who took office attempted to use this power, and while Congress eventually declared laws that made segregation legal unconstitutional, the fight for equality continued to move to slow for black Americans. Using these points, Zinn discusses how America failed to see the signs that led to actions being taken by black Americans to gain equality due to the fact that white Americans believed progress towards equality was moving at a rapid pace. However, black Americans did not share this point of view, because even with laws for segregation declared unconstitutional, the lives of black Americans barely improved and they continued to face harassment and violence daily. When African-Americans began to protest, they faced harsh treatment by their oppressors, but leaders and Congress slowly began to recognize that African-Americans were no longer going to stay silent on the harassment and violence they faced, so they began responding to calls for change by passing laws such as passing the Civil Rights Act of 1968. In conclusion, all these points lead back to Zinn’s original point, which as that America should not have been surprised when black Americans finally decided they’d had enough and took action against their
Though slavery was arguably abolished, “for thousands of blacks, the badge of slavery [lives] on” (Alexander 141). Many young black men today face similar discrimination as a black man in the Jim Crow era - in housing, employment, public benefits, and so-called constitutional rights. This discrimination characterizes itself on a basis of a person’s criminal record, making it perfectly legal. As Alexander suggests, “This is the new normal, the new racial equilibrium” (Alexander, 181).
Du Bois argues in this quote that “basic racial difference between human beings and had suffered not change,” meaning that racism is still a pressing issue. In this quote he essentially asks the questions, why wont the idea of racism die? Du Bois then links the persistence of racism to economic incentives when he states, “and clung to it… the modern African slave trade a tremendous economic structure and eventually the industrial revolution had been based on racial differences.” As illustrated in this quote, the link between economics and racial indifferences is one reason Du Bois offers as an explanation for why racism has been able persist even until today. The perpetuation of racism and racial difference is how society allocates status and wealth, while socialization maintains the idea of racism Du Bois argues
...disparities between the two ethnic communities that can be traced back to the legacy of slavery and other forms of oppression that blacks have suffered.” Supporters of this view felt that educational achievement correlates more strongly with economic status than with any other single variable. Since the majority of the black community lags behind whites in income and wealth, the educational inequalities are caused by the economic inequalities. They believe that once the inequalities disappear, the educational disparities will as well. Many argue that this is not a viable argument. They point to other minority groups such as Asians, some of whom are financially worse off than blacks, and they excel in school . They felt that because the civil rights legislation removed all roadblocks back in the 60’s and 70’s something else must be contributing to the large gap.
If more research about America’s racist history was conducted, there could be a more accurate understanding of our current society, specifically race relations. It is imperative for a nation to acknowledge and understand it’s past in order to truly progress. America tends to hide its history because of guilt. This guilt leads to the teaching of revised history, which is detrimental to contemporary society because it leaves out crucial events that should have been learning instances. For example, if people do not understand or even know what redlining is or how it affected black people, then they would not understand black people’s current status in America. Redlining is the practice of denying services, either directly or through selectively raising prices, to residents of certain areas based on the racial or ethnic makeups of those areas. Redlining was exercised through financial services such as banking and insurance services. Banks denied black people mortgages because of racism. This impeded the development of black wealth. A person who doesn’t know this history may blame the current economic state of black people on laziness or incompetence, but in reality the systemic oppression of racism is to blame. Research and data could be used to debunk harmful myths associated with black
Racism (n): the prejudice that members of one race are intrinsically superior to members of other race (Wordnet search, 1), a controversial topic in today’s society, a subject that many people try to sweep under the rug, but yet a detrimental problem that has been present in America since the colonial era. Will this dilemma come to a halt? Can all Americans see each other as equals despite their skin color and nationality; and what role has it played in past generations versus today’s generations and how will it affect our future? Has this on going way of thinking gotten better or worse? These are questions raised when many think about the subject; especially members of American ethnic groups and backgrounds, because most have dealt with racial discrimination in their life time.
Ghettos, low-riders, hip-hop, rap, drugs and crime, it has got to be a Black man right? Saggy pants, unintelligible language, lazy, and the lists continue to both stereotype and describe Blacks. Do Black Americans perpetuate their own discrimination? Are Black Americans creating their own low status in society? Black people around the world have been hypnotized into believing all their failures in life are due to discrimination, but are they correct? Blacks are often their own worst enemies, often the cause of their own disasters, and many don’t see that until it’s too late, if ever. Discrimination and prejudice are imposed upon Blacks, often because the culture they live in is not “acceptable” to the dominant society. On the other hand, an understandable reason for Blacks actions is often due to unattainable opportunities towards the American Dream.
This article I choice is called Racism and Structural Solutions. It’s written by Michael A. McCarthy. He talks about the racism in America and how the progress is slow in correcting it. We all understand that racism demonstrates itself in lots of ways. It sorts from detached bigotry, stereotyping, prejudice, hate-speech, assaults and murder to anti-immigrant actions, labor market segmentation, police brutality, racial profiling, unequal incarceration rates, corporate attacks on the welfare state, gerrymandering and imperialist foreign policies. Just to name a few he stated. Then it goes into more details about the inequality many African Americans face. Like people of color are more than three times likely to have subprime loans, which is
Black youths arrested for drug possession are 48 times more likely to wind up in prison than white youths arrested for the same crime under the same circumstances. Many people are unaware how constant racism has been throughout the years. It is important to understand the problems of racism because it is relevant to society. Racism in America is very real and Americans need to know it.
In this paper I will argue that America should pay reparations to black communities that have suffered most from institutionalized racism. My view is not that reparations should be paid via checks mailed by the federal government, of an undeterminable sum, to families that are most eligible, but rather, through changes in policy. These policies would tackle racial inequality at it most obvious sources, the wage gap, the mistreatment of black Americans by our criminal justice system, quality of education, and the disparity in housing between black and white Americans.