Systemic Racism Explained

I listened to people in powerful leadership roles this week deny the existence of systemic racism. It occurred to me that the denial of such a system actually helps keep an effective system of white privilege in place. These leaders keep insisting that racism is the problem of a few depraved individuals. They refuse to acknowledge that the system in place (the institutional and societal set of policies, processes, and practices) actually enable the individual acts of racism to proceed largely unchallenged and unabated. It is important to understand how systemic racism operates under the radar of most white Americans. And at its roots is a fairly recent anti-black mindset that was introduced to promote and perpetuate the institution of black slavery throughout Europe and the Americas.

Before institutionalized black slavery, the tribal mentality built into the human psyche had led to constant Us versus Them tribal conflicts. It is surreal to me how these basic conflicts continue to plague the human race today. Throughout the world, the tribe with the better weapons of war, immunity to diseases, or cool new gadgets dominate and enjoy the spoils of both land, power, and subjugated human labor. It was once normal for conquered people to be turned into slaves. Originally, slavery wasn’t based on the notion of the innate human superiority of one race over another. In fact, racially homogeneous societies operated and continue to operate under a class system where there is a ruling class, an educated and merchant class, and then a working class (which includes slaves) based on inherited family status. Humans also seem to be trapped by an instinctual need rank each other. These hierarchies serve those at the top while brutalizing those at the bottom. And to this already unjust societal norm, humans added a new layer of ranking: ranking according to skin color.

What began in the 1500s as white tribes seeking to dominate the world for wealth and power (greed) became scientific racism by the 17th century wherein white tribal success lead scientists to began to speculate that some races were inherently better than others, with the White race on top. These false notions gave moral fuel to a highly profitable system of black slavery, providing justification to classify blacks as only 2/3 human, inherently inferior to every other race, and therefore deserving of perpetual slavery. Later, the eugenic movement, led by Americans and taken up by the Nazis has solidified itself into the mentally of people all over the world. It’s like racism easily latched on to the human brain’s proclivity for tribalism and ranking. The notion that one tribe is better than another based solely on skin color has infected the entire human race. These deeply embedded beliefs pollute the minds of almost every American, including black Americans themselves (internalized racism). Since the 1940s the Black Doll Test has consistently shown that the majority of young children, including black children, associate white skin with good character traits and dark skin with bad ones. When whiteness is the standard for all that is good and right across the world, it is impossible not be a little scared and repulsed by blackness.

Racism is a combination of this inherent belief in white superiority mixed with the power to make decisions. It is the belief in the inherent inferiority of a particular person and the power to act negatively toward them. Systemic racism is the societal set of policies, processes, and practices that the ruling class has in place to uphold, excuse, and permit individual racist behavior. The following example should help to illuminate how this works.

An apartment owner has an apartment for rent and places an add in a local newspaper. A black couple shows up to view the apartment and the apartment owner, believing that black people are too poor, too dirty, and will lower his property value, tells the couple that the apartment is no longer available. This is individual racism. The individual is acting on his belief in the inferiority of the black couple and has the power to simply deny them the opportunity to rent his apartment based on his racist behavior even though there are fair housing laws on the books. In order to pursue their rights, the black couple would have to spend money, time, and energy to prove housing discrimination. And even if they did sue, they would likely face a white judge who is sympathetic to the plight of the apartment owner. The system works in favor of the racist apartment owner who can act with impunity because the process and practices in place to ensure fairness even when the policies are fair are is too cumbersome.

Examples like this are everyday happenings for people of color. With policies, processes, and practices in place that signal to people of color that the individual racist will not be held accountable for his racist actions, the system allows for teachers who have low expectations of their students of color to continue teaching with racists views, employers who don’t hire qualified people of color or set higher barriers for employment and promotion to continue to discriminate, for bankers who require additional layers of financial scrutiny for home or business loans to continue to deny loans to people of color, and for the criminal justice system that arrests blacks for crimes they ignore among whites to continue to fine, brutalize and incarcerate blacks in unpresented numbers and for longer sentences to continue to do so.

This is what systemic racism looks like and this is why people are taking to the streets. This is why black people are screaming that their lives matter. Not that they matter more than brown or white lives, but that they matter at all in a nation that continually demonstrates that they do not matter. Despite the debunked science of racial superiority or inferiority, we continue to live among racist individuals in a system that protects the racists. We are tired of living in a nation that continually demonstrates that black skinned people deserve less and that black lives do not matter. On every metric of survival and success, black lives are at the bottom. Many want to deny the racist system and blame black people for their own plight. There is no equal protection under the law and no ability to pursue life, liberty and happiness when a system of policies, processes, and practices block black people from receiving it.

I hope I have adequately explained systemic racism. I hope that now is the time that our society will begin to dismantle it. Change only begins with acknowledging the problem, confronting it, and then working really hard to fix the problem. I hope and pray that protesters will be able to force the ruling class to acknowledge the system they have upheld for centuries and then force them to tear it down. All of that is a heavy lift, but we are capable together.