Headlines burst wildly, from every corner of the country, front page covers with bold print read, “Wilson’s Remarks Based on Racism,” “Obama’s Care Protesters Racist,” the entire country was focused on Jimmy Carter’s comment during President Obama’s Health Care speech. Americans were quickly making assumptions that Carter’s comment was based on racism. Many Americans were shocked to know, that racism still existed in modern day America and had infiltrated inside our Congress. As soon as I read a blog title, “What?! Racism Still in America?” I asked myself, “Hasn’t racism always exist in America after the Civil War?
When the first colonies in the South were getting started, people from Africa were being brought into America as slaves, in order to work the land. We never assumed it was an act of racism. Plantations needed to be taken care of, slaves were believed to be inferior because they were dark and it seemed that the perfect solution to obtain higher profits was having slaves worked in plantations. Along the way, there were a few Americans who truly believed slaves were as much humans as whites. This started high tensions between Southerners and Northerners. We can remember from our History textbooks, the Canning of Senator Sumner.[1] Charles Sumner, an outspoken senator from Massachusetts delivered a passionate speech called, “The Crime against Kansas.” In his speech he condemned slavery, and insulted the great state of South Carolina. Days later, one of the congressmen from South Carolina, Preston S. Brooks went up to Sumner and beat him with a cane, until Sumner lost conscious. This became the most problematic event in 1856.
I would never expect anything like this to ever happen in Congress. We know that different opinions can be argue, but never imposed on others. Brooks was outraged that he and his state had been insulted but there is no excuse that supports his actions against Senator Sumner. Then why is it that when Representative, Jimmy Carter interrupts president Obama, it becomes a major issue and it is explained as a racist act. We know that Carter has had many other issues relating racism or discrimination, but race shouldn’t be the first thing going trough our minds. Yes, he did interrupt our first African American president, but we shouldn't be shocked that racism exists in modern America.
Back in 1856, when the Brooks-Sumner confrontation, they were both whites, but Sumner supported the idea to end slavery. Americans who had an affection towards blacks where know as “Negro Lovers,” and as we know this people were also looked down at. Before the Civil War, racism also existed. It was in the form of slavery; Americans believed slaves were less than humans, as current Americans believe immigrants are inferior. The same idea Brooks and slave owners had of blacks, back then, Carter and many extreme hate groups think of immigrants now a days. Racism has always existed, it has prevailed trough the Civil War, the Reconstruction and the Civil Rights movements. When the thirteenth amendment was passed and Jim Crow laws were imposed, whites had to live with the idea that blacks are equal to them. Whites unconsciously formed their own way and idea to keep feeling superior, that idea was racism.
An eight-year-old black girl in South Africa recently told Ted Koppel on Nightline, "White people are better than black people. Whites know more, have more, and get more. I wish I was white but I am not.”[2] It seems that with time, these racist ideas have caused extreme acts of hate against many races all over the world. It has become so extreme that children have become apart of it.
Some Americans believe that racism does not exist in America anymore. Making laws that ban segregation, laws that “make” us equal to one another, are not enough to get rid of racism. If a new born can not distinguish race, therefore it can’t make racist assumptions. He will, at some point be curious of the different skin tones, accents and beliefs; it is up to the parents to show them that no race is superior to the rest. That no one should be considered a second class citizen. Carter never thought his comment would cause a scandal, but it did. He probably thinks his comment was not based on racism. “Few Americans of either race -- about one out of eight -- consider themselves racist. And experts say racism has evolved from the days of Jim Crow to the point that people may not even recognize it in themselves.” Many of us that accuse others of being racist, might not notice, that we, ourselves can be racist. It doesn’t take much; step by step we can reconstruct America and amend what the Civil War has left.
References:
[1] Davidson, James West, Williamf Gienapp, Christine Leigh Heyrman, Mark H. Lytle, and Michael B. Stoff. Nation of Nations: A Concise Narrative of the American Republic, Vol I. Boston: Mcgraw-Hill College, 1998
[2] "Racism in America's Schools. ERIC Digest." ERICDigests.Org - Providing full-text access to ERIC Digests. 3 Oct. 2009
[3] "Poll: Most Americans see lingering racism -- in others - CNN.com." CNN.com - Breaking News, U.S., World, Weather, Entertainment & Video News. 3 Oct. 2009
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