Black History Month

Dear Friend,

As Black History Month draws to a close, it is important that progressive people of faith renew their determination to eradicate racism, both from our culture and from our individual lives. The very word “racism” is one of the most ironic in our language in this country. We almost universally abhor it and consider racists immoral, even despicable, people. Yet, in our deepest and most honest moments, we all find lingering pockets of prejudice and bias in our minds and hearts.

Maybe that is why as a nation we disdain racism but we continue to discriminate. Oh yes, we have made progress. The most egregious examples have been eliminated from our culture. We no longer have separate water fountains or “Colored Entrances” to restaurants, but this fact may make our lingering cultural racism even more insidious and difficult to eradicate.

On May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court, in the famous Brown vs. the Board of Education, ruled that the idea of “separate but equal” was unconstitutional. The idea was that segregated schools would become a thing of the past. Of course, it took the National Guard to make that a reality in places like Arkansas and Alabama, but today students think of segregated schools as a part of a mythological past. Yet at this very moment in Dallas, Texas – a city that is 50% Anglo – over 90% of the children in public schools are non-white. Many of the schools are as segregated today as they were in 1954. White parents live in all-white suburbs, or send their children to almost all-white private schools. We have yet another generation of children growing up in segregation. This time it is segregation enforced by economic realities rather than government regulations, but the effect is almost identical.

As a parent, I understand the desire to secure for your child the best possible education. If I were an agnostic, my children might attend private school as well. However, my faith compels me to find a way to secure for them a good education but guard them from inheriting the racism of their elders. People, from the President to the unemployed, all bemoan the deterioration of public education. To some the solution is school vouchers, whereby parents receive financial motivation to send their children to private schools. This further abandons and reduces the funding for public education, thereby ensuring that children from poor families, who are largely children of color, will receive an even more inferior education.

Despite the public relations bonanza given to “No Child Left Behind,” the President’s most recent budget proposal would further reduce funding to public education. The color of racism in the 21st century is obviously green. Under-funding public education will assure that only those with financial means get an adequate education. It makes college an even more distant dream for children growing up in low-income homes who attend public schools. While more socially acceptable and cleverly disguised, the effects are just as oppressive and insidious as the segregation prior to 1954. The effect is the same – to ensure that the overwhelming majority of people of color in this country remain uneducated and forced into menial jobs doing manual labor for those who grew up going to private or suburban schools and attending the college of their choice.

But did you know:

• Race remains the number one most consistent factor in predicting the ultimate income a baby will earn as an adult. If the child is non-white they are likely to earn more than one-third less than a white child born at the same time and in the same hospital. Over 33% of black children grow up in poverty compared to 13.5% of white children.
• That same child is also one third more likely to die before reaching adulthood and six times less likely to have health insurance and receive proper medical and dental care as they grow up.
• The median income for a white household in 2001 was $44,517. The median income for a black household was $29,470, and for a Hispanic household was $33,565.
• Black citizens are significantly more likely to receive longer sentences, including the death penalty, if the victim is white. Those arrested for crack cocaine abuse receive sentences 20 times longer than those arrested for powdered cocaine.

Unfortunately, this is a list that could go on and on. Since most of you who are reading this are good progressive people of faith, you don’t need to be convinced that race should not be a factor in determining the destiny of a baby. All children deserve adequate education, health care and cultural nurturing, but how do we combat racism in America?

Well, we must begin by acknowledging that it exists. It is no surprise that surveys indicate that African-Americans unanimously believe racism is a problem in this country, while a significant portion of the Anglo community thinks it is no longer an issue. We still live in segregated worlds where we are informed solely by our own realities. In researching this newsletter it became apparent that articles and resources about racism on the internet were far more frequent from other countries than from the U.S. Ironically, it is less of a problem in most of those countries, yet they are doing so much more to combat it.

If you are receiving this newsletter, you probably don’t need convincing that racism exists, though we probably all still need a great deal of cultural sensitization to even begin to grasp the magnitude of the problem. Nothing can substitute for close relationships with people of a race or culture different from our own. These relationships may take deliberate initiative on our part, though it is not helpful to create them artificially. We who are white cannot expect that people of color should take responsibility for educating us. Reading is always helpful, and, in particular, reading books of fiction by African-American authors about the African-American community can be enlightening. One place where we need to work to eradicate racism is in our own souls.

In addition, when we hear about legislation or proposed government actions we must make an effort to consider those issues through the lives of others. For example, you may not have children, but we all have a profound investment in funding education and health care for children. We would all love to pay less taxes, but at what cost to the poor and to our children?

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke of the “Beloved Community” and of his dream of the day when we would be one human family. It is a dream we also share, but it is only a dream unless each of us, and all of us, seek ways to make that dream come true.

Below are some resources you might find helpful:

1. Racism in the LGBT community. One would hope that the gay community would be less racist, since they have themselves been victims of discrimination and oppression. Unfortunately, that is not true.
2. Healing racism. Our white, left-brained-dominated thinking approaches any problem as one which can be “fixed.” Perhaps this is a wound that must be healed. That is the mission of this organization.
3. Dr. King’s Dream. Since we share that dream, we must take some responsibility for keeping that dream alive.
4. Self-Education. This is a great reading list.

Let me leave you with this quote and a prayer that Dr. King is right:

Blessings,

Rev. Michael S. Piazza
Executive Director, Hope for Peace & Justice and
Dean of the Cathedral of Hope