leogodin.net

It’s amazing to me that the issue of racism has come up as a divisive issue in the Democratic primaries. Republicans must be giddy at the prospects of a presidential race against Hillary Clinton after she is branded either as a racist or as being insensitive to race issues. It is more amazing to me that politicians still believe that the issues of race can be resolved by speeches and government intervention. There is very little that the government can do cure the scourge of racism in the US. Don’t get me wrong, there are still some issues the government needs to be involved in. We have proof of openly racist police forces. We have evidence that black men receive harsher sentences when committing the same crimes as white men. These are important issues that need to be addressed. However, fixing these issues will not fix racism in the US. What will fix race in America is dinner.

In the book “Who’s Afraid of a Large Black Man” by Charles Barkley there are interviews of many prominent Americans on the subject of race. The one theme that is repeated again and again is the belief that most Americans who have negative feelings about a particular race do not have any meaningful contact with that particular race. The other repeated theme in this book is that we have lost our appetite to discuss issues of race. “Race is no longer discussed in polite company”.

We live in a country where blacks and whites come in close contact on a daily basis yet live completely separate lives. We all work with people of different colors but rarely see them outside of work. Our churches come with racial divisions. We have “churches” (we whites have the luxury of having white churches without having to call them white churches), “black churches”, “Latino churches”, etc… I have to admit that I have spent more time watching blacks and Latinos on television than interacting with them in real life. How can I have an accurate understanding of my fellow Americans if most of my information about people who are different than me (in skin color) comes from the media instead of through relationships? The answer is that I can not gain an accurate understanding that way.

Now we come to the solution. It is quite simple actually. The answer to this country’s race problem is dinner. Yes, dinner, you heard me correctly. We need to sit down and eat dinner together. We need to purposely eat dinner with people of different races and cultures. Eating dinner together gives us the opportunity to discuss issues in a casual manner. It allows us to see each other as humans and Americans. While eating dinner together we will see that although culturally different, we all have the same basic wants and desires. We all want to be happy, we all want to take care of our families. We all want good jobs. We all are not all that different after all.

Until a year ago I dismissed the notion that racism was a major factor in the US. Then I read two books that have completely changed my perspective. What I’ve learned since then is that even if outright racism is not a major problem the fact that blacks and whites live separate lives and have no meaningful dialog is a problem. If anyone is interested in learning about black/white race relations in the US I highly recommend these two books. I’d love to hear of other books people are reading on the topic.

1) Dominion by Randy Alcorn. This is actually a fictional book but it really opened my eyes. The book attempts to describe the feelings and emotions that a professional white collar black man will typically go through. One interesting part of the book deals with slavery and shows that the black slaves were more dignified and civilized than their supposedly superior masters.

2) By the Color of Our Skin: The Illusion of Integration and the Reality of Race by Leonard Steinhorn and Barbara Diggs-Brown. This book is amazing. The authors take real facts and data to prove that blacks and whites lead separate lives even when they work together. Because the book makes arguments based on data instead of emotions it is as unbiased a book as you can find on the topic.