Introduction
Racism continues to be a complex and controversial issue to the American society because it has diverse facets.
Racial inequality is discrimination, which is based on the races of people, particularly in the socioeconomic advancement. Over the years, racism has commonly featured in the US society. Its forms may have changed overtime, but there are issues such as infant mortality rates, unemployment, poverty rates and incomes showing that it remains as an unresolved issue. The Marxist theory shows that racism affects the potential unity between the capitalist and working classesRacism and Racial Discrimination
There have been major events that show clear examples of racism in America over the years. For instance, there was the Dred Scott decision of 1857. This was a complaint made to the Supreme Court by an African slave as he was in his search of his freedom. The court refused to do so claiming that the blacks were meant to be slaves. This led to a great eruption by the blacks and the whites who were against slavery; that decision has been seen to be a major contributing factor to the American civil war. After the civil war, during the Reconstruction, there was the Plessy v. Ferguson Decision of 1896. The decision led to a new doctrine of ‘separate but equal’; after the doctrine took effect, it led to the separation of the blacks from the whites in terms of housing, education, hotels and even churches.
The doctrine, however, was still a major setback in the strive for equality as it legalized the relegation of the blacks to an inferior state. This is because the whites, who still believed that the blacks were inferior, continued the discrimination in a completely new level as there were cases of forced evictions of blacks and many top schools and hotels refused the entry of black people. The routine went on for about fifty years until a furious parent by the name Oliver Brown filed a suit for the admission denial of his third grade daughter to a nearby school in their residence of Topeka, Kansas. His third grade daughter was denied entry to a good nearby school and had to walk a long distance to get to a school that could accept her. The debate went on for three years where the decision ruled that the segregated schools were far from equal. Finally, the Supreme Court agreed that the schools were not equal as those of the blacks had the inferior status and it would greatly affect the ability to function in American society, and ordered that segregation in every state be stopped.
What followed the decision was a mild reaction, which later erupted to violent protests in towns and cities. The brown decision encouraged every liberal-minded person to attack the ‘separation of races’ in all ways possible. In the middle of the 1970s, a more open society emerged which banned segregation. It was here that the real fight for African-American freedom began. In the 1960s, there were great protests and much violence despite the pleas of non-violent black leaders like Martin Luther King Junior.
It was then in the mid-1970s that the fight began to bear fruit. The courts abolished all laws supporting segregation and the black people were now at the beginning of being accepted into the community.Questions Raised by Racism
Many questions have risen in connection to the racism problem; questions like how racism is still prevalent in the supposedly "post-racial" society are bound to arise. In addition, there is also the question about where institutionalized discrimination of people of particular races still fits in the modern day society. To answer questions like these, and much more, one has to look at the statistics of the American progress so far in its bid to end racism. The truth is that, as time passes, people will come to realize that racial discriminations were just a mantra in the minds of American people in the many years. There is also a belief by others that they can sleep for ten years and wake up to an ‘equal’ world, but that is impossible, as racism is structural: it is not affected by the mortality and birth rates.
Many people believed that the election of Obama to be president was a huge blow to racism and racial inequality, but this did not quite turn out to be the case. White supremacy developed as a tool for justifying African slavery and preventing poor whites from joining slave rebellions and insurrections. After the American civil war, there was a segregation that was put to avoid blacks from entering into the American politics and it served in the hopes of returning the blacks to working in their near-slave status. It was believed possible by putting an end to the radical reconstruction period. Structural racism works in a way that racism opens up opportunities to benefit from inequality, thus reinforcing the unequal conditions about it.
A good example is the subprime mortgage meltdown. After the Second World War, the government enabled the buying of millions of sub-urban homes for millions of working class people-virtually all of them being whites. The government then refused to back mortgages unless there was racial exclusivity clauses present, which was done to keep the whites in and all of the rest out.
Thus, when there were chances of selling people loans, and then bring the loans together and sell off to investors, it was found out that there was a market in selling subprime loans to blacks. When there were more payments later, the borrowers began closing their businesses. A study of largest U.S. metropolitan areas showed that living in an area that the blacks had predominated was creating a huge risk for foreclosure.
Moreover, for African Americans, net worth is disproportionately bound up with home ownership. When the housing crisis hit in 2008, the value for houses was lowered pushing up the numbers of houses being closed, thus the black households lost a greater share of their wealth than the whites did. This increased the level of material inequality and racism; the corporate media leapt to their defense when they caught the banks targeting people of different color for their loans. They blamed the blacks on the grounds that they pushed for civil rights legislation forcing lenders to give them homes they could not afford. To them, racism was not a problem, it was the fact that the blacks were trying to live beyond their own means.
In addition, that was just the beginning. There is still the problem of "ghetto" economics. Poor people are seen to be huge sources of profits. Payday loans, check-cashing stores that charge enormous fees for access to cash or corner stores that sell inferior food in small quantities at huge markups make a lot of money from people trapped in the racially segregated and economically challenged neighborhood. Self-reflection oriented workshops do not even seem to scar racism, even though they are seen to help some individuals. Greedy people are making money from racism.Conclusion
In sum, it is true to say that the problem of racism and racial inequality is a vice that everyone who believes in racial equality is trying to eradicate. However, whether, knowingly or not, many are still pulling down the efforts to do so, such that it is one step up. However, judging by the way the views on racism have changed, the problem of racism will be a thing of the past.
Works Cited
