RACE III: EX-RACISTS. In the post below, I mentioned that I believe that there are lots of white racists in the US because I’ve met a bunch of white racists here. However, I should note something else: Almost all of these racists were quite elderly, or else they were still racist but a lot less so than they used to be, or both. Except for the stupid time that I stupidly went and counterprotested the stupid KKK (it only encourages them, and was a totally ugly scene, and did I mention stupid?), I really don’t run across young people who think blacks are inferior/troublemakers/lazy/etc. Then again, I’m pretty seriously not looking to find these people. Anyway, that’s a hopeful sign.

It’s important, while we’re talking about racism, to look at why people stop being racist. This article is James Kilpatrick’s heartfelt explanation of his own shift in worldview (via Regions of Mind).

As far as I can tell, the things that make people start viewing black people as equals (and yes, I do realize that I’m talking almost completely in a black/white framework today, which is increasingly inaccurate–but that increasing inaccuracy is a subject for its own post, and for the moment I’ll stick with the traditional American-dilemma-style framing of the question) are, in no particular order: a) seeing how bad it is. I bet Bull Connor siccing dogs on protestors did a lot for the civil rights movement. Ditto the photos of whites screaming at black girls going to school. Ditto the famous Norman Rockwell painting of the young black girl walking calmly past as tomatoes are hurled at her.

b) heroes, whether public figures or people you know personally. This is just one of the five hundred reasons that the “don’t act white,” “don’t be a token” pressure in some black communities is totally crippling: Heroes are inspiring. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s speeches; Condoleezza Rice’s press conferences; Tiger Woods’s cool; Oprah Winfrey’s… well, I don’t really know what Oprah brings to the party, but apparently I’m an outlier here. Heroes, whether they’re celebrities or people from your hometown, can startle us and make us reconsider some of our preconceptions. (This is one reason the gay community tries so hard to get closeted stars to come out, of course.)

c) success and progress. Seeing black people (or members of any other group against which you’re prejudiced) build businesses, create safe neighborhoods, write novels, and generally remove all the excuses for hating them. Now, new excuses will spring up to replace the old–but at least some people will see the bad faith that prompts this continual reshuffling of rationalizations.

d) religion. As Virginia Postrel pointed out somewhere in her forest of hidden permalinks, “One thing a lot of critics just don’t get is that, with a few notable exceptions like the BJU administration (as opposed to the students), the South-based Christian right is not a racist movement. Billy Graham won that debate. Bob Jones lost it. (To see what contemporary evangelical Christianity looks like, check out these photos from Graham’s recent Dallas mission.) The Christian right has a lot of nasty qualities, but race hatred isn’t one of them.

“As David Frum noted on Friday, ‘As the Republican right has become more and more explicitly religious, it has become more and more influenced by modern Christianity¹s stern condemnation of racial prejudice as a sin. My own guess is that the kind of talk Lott engaged in is much more likely to be acceptable at a Connecticut country club than it would be at the suburban evangelical churches in which the Republican base is found.'”

I’d love to say that d) is the biggest factor, but actually I think it goes something like b, a, d, c.