White Man's Guilt

[TaraJo]

Race is one of those issues where everyone wants a simple answer to a complex issue.

Truth is, white privilege exists.  There is a lot of bullshit black people have to deal with that white people are basically immune to (this video is a simple example):





So, yeah, we aren't really post-racial.  But that doesn't mean that there are a lot of people who use the term 'white privilege' to justify asshole behavior.  And that's wrong, too.  In fact, if your goal is racial equality and harmony, being a jerk is counter-productive to your cause.  Lemme tell you a story about that:

When my dad was growing up, his family was the only white family in a ghetto on the west side of Chicago.  And this was during the civil rights era of MLK and Malcolm X, and his neighbors, who were mostly black, had very little love for whitey.  He was regularly beaten up, threatened, robbed.  One neighbor even trained his dog to chase white people (which resulted in him having to run home at top speed).  So, fast forward to now; the racial jerks of today would say that my dad has no right to say anything about race, despite the fact that he was routinely victim of some serious racial violence.  What's more, he's still got some psychological issues with race in that he's uncomfortable with black people; I can't say I entirely blame him for that, seeing as how his formative years were often spent running for his life from hostile black people.  

If you want to hear a much more constructive route to healing racial divides, I recently heard about Daryl Davis who will be the center of an upcoming documentary called Accidental Courtesy.  He's a black jazz musician who, since the 80's or so, has been befriending klansmen, and he's convinced around 200 of them to leave the clan.  I wish more people would follow his lead.