Suburban Racism Pt. 1: It's In Your City Too
By Joshua Boyd
And your city is infected.
Racism is real. Few people doubt that. But tell someone there's racism in their city, in their schools, in their workplace, or in their homes and they might be shocked, appalled, and offended. Racism that happens in more affluent areas is often called a joke or mistake.
Racism in suburban America often goes unnoticed by the white population. The blindness to it has lead to many thinking racism doesn't exist in our home towns. If it is made known, it is dismissed as an isolated incident that is not indicative of the city as a whole so there is no reason to address it.
My Home Town
Batavia, IL is known as the home of Fermilab, and for being the leading manufacturer of windmills at one point.
When I was about 12, my family moved to the suburbs of Chicago to a town called Batavia. Though the population was over 24 thousand people it felt like a small town, and still does to this day. Anytime I go downtown Batavia I run into at least one person I know well enough to hug. My grandma graduated from Batavia High school, as did my dad and older brothers. My grandfather was the first black alderman in the city and county. I have roots in Batavia, and consider it my home town. I was home schooled until my Junior year when I decided to enroll at the public high school to be on the basketball team that all of the Boyd men before me played for.
Batavia is a great city with wonderful people, great schools, and I have always felt safe.
That being said, there is plenty of racism in Batavia. The thing is, most of the racists have no idea they are racists. Now, please don't be shocked or think less of Batavia, there is racism and implicit bias in your city too.
Not In My Town!
If you are white and you are reading this, you might be thinking something like "I've never seen racism in my city!" And for a good portion of my life, I would have told you that I never experienced racism either. It turns out that was because I thought racism only meant being called a nigger, being attacked, not getting a job, being profiled by a cop, being lynched, or having my house burned down by the KKK all because the color of my skin. Those would be examples of overt racism that everyone understands, but it is rare in most areas.
Before you dismiss what I am writing, I'm obligated to define racism. I can understand that you may think as I once did: racism isn't here because I haven't seen it happen. We often think of racism only as an outward action of discrimination or hate, and that you can only be racist if you do or say something racist. However, if you look up definitions of racism they all start with it being a belief.
Racism is the belief that someone is inherently inferior or superior due to their race. The thing about belief systems is that they fall on a spectrum. We can say someone is either agnostic, believes in God, or is an atheist, but those three categories are the middle and ends of a spectrum. Someone's belief in God can range from it being a part of every interaction to it being something passive they rarely think about. They can be overtly religious, or incidentally religious where it is expressed rarely, if at all, but they still believe people that don't believe like they do are going to hell. In that same manner, you can be an overtly racist KKK member, or an incidental racist who has no problem interacting with people of color but there is an almost subconscious prejudice against people of color that you don't even recognize when it comes out.
The point here is, you likely are at least a little bit racist too.
I Like Them But...
Incidental racism is what I see the most of in suburban areas, and I see it often.
It's the guy I met last weekend who said he works daily with Hispanics and commented that when one of his coworkers gets sick they all get sick because "all of those Hispanics live such an unclean lifestyle". When my white friend called him out he replied "hey, I have no problem with Hispanics, we have a great time working together, but it's true that they all are sleeping with each other unprotected and passing on whatever they have." That is a negative belief based on race, and therefore is racism. He would never call them spics. He has sat down and had meals with them. He has laughed and joked while working with them for years. He likes and openly respects Hispanics in his life, but believes there is something intrinsically wrong with or inferior about them.
You might be thinking, "yeah, of course that's racist, I would never say something like that!" But I'll give more examples, and I would bet you or someone you know fits one of the descriptions below.
It's the lady in the park that loves her adopted black nephew but hurries to her car when she sees a group of black people coming down the sidewalk. It's the guy with a good heart that went on a missions trip and talks about how bad those people needed his help (White Saviorism). It's the girl in school that asks a black student if they need help with the homework because she assumed they were having a harder time. It's the person that sees black people as exotic and sleeping with a black person was like a bucket list item. It's that parent that feels slightly uncomfortable when their kid asks to go to their black friend's house. It's the person that assumes that young black mom is a single mother and acts on that. It's that parent that was uncomfortable with the sound of hip hop music coming from their child's room until they found out Macklemore was white. It's the cop who has a "hunch" that the black person driving in a nice neighborhood might be up to no good. It's the Christian that says they love and accept everyone until their child brings home someone of color. It's the uncle that hears statistics about systemic/institutional racism and thinks it is because minorities just aren't trying hard enough.
Some may argue that the people above aren't racist, just ignorant. I understand that argument, but I question if you can hold racist ideals in your mind while not being somewhat racist. Some would argue otherwise, but I don't think someone can believe negative stereotypes or be racially prejudiced, and not be on the spectrum of racism. If we hold implicit biases based on race, that qualifies as a racist belief, even if it is subconscious. All of that being said, regardless of if someone can be completely not-racist, the solution is to be at least anti-racist.
America Is Built To Be Racist
Our daily lives are filled with systemic racism and types of racism that are invisible to most people. Racism being covert or incidental doesn't mean that it is less deadly, just that it is like a subtle and discreet poison that America doesn't recognize until someone dies from it. In these turbulent times, many are starting to see that what they thought was just a trickling of racism leaking through the floorboards is actually from an entire raging river of racism flowing through the house's foundation.
To better understand the definitions and difference between systemic and systematic racism you can read this article from Dictionary.com. A paragraph at the end of the article sums it up as this:
…Something done systematically is typically done explicitly and intentionally. Systemic problems are often under the surface and unseen to people, far more extensive than any one action—like fish who don’t know they’re in water.
Many minorities have been crying out that the system is literally and figuratively killing us, but others haven't believed it because the racism was hiding under and within a system built long ago.
Now that the secret is out, we're seeing the blue prints for systems that were crafted to allow for racism to lay the ground work for minorities to be systemically oppressed. Read up on things like Redlining, and note the effects of systemic racism from these charts.
Racists established systemic racism. The ones that deny it exists are a reason that it continues. The ignorant, the"Incidentals", and those that believed racism doesn't exist around them thought if they just put a bucket under the leaks and patched the holes when they popped up they were ending racism, but it was just the easy way to move on and ignore the bigger problem.
I love my hometown of Batavia. I'd recommend my hometown to anyone. In terms of racism, it has been far less racist than some of the neighboring towns recently in the news. What has happened in Batavia is not unique. These things happen in Suburbs all over the country. Just look up "Sundown Towns" and see the places near you that threatened black people if they were still in their town after dark. Look at the demographics of that and neighboring towns and note how white they still are. Many of our grandparents or parents were alive during the time of Sundown towns. I believe it is impossible for racism to have completely disappeared from these places in just one or two generations.
I am not asking you to feel guilty for not seeing or believing racism is around you, but I am asking that you never turn a blind eye to it again. I'm asking that you examine if there is any racism in your own mind. I am asking that you acknowledge it in you and around you and don't let it slide. I am asking that you open yourself to feeling some of the pain minorities have felt in America for hundreds of years. I am asking that you have conversations with your family about implicit biases and microaggressions. I am asking you to educate yourself about modern and historical acts of racism. I ask that you help to tear down a foundational pillar of America, and help rebuild.
Racism is real, it's in your town, and we need you to help us end it.
