"Reverse Racism"

Any time the topic of conversation comes around to racism, you will invariably hear the charge of reverse racism tossed out by a white person. This charge is usually accompanied by a tale of racial discrimination at the hands of a person (or people) of color. Many white folks have such stories, as do I.

The first time it happened to me was when I was living in a small town in East Texas. I was walking home from the store and I happened to pass a group of black guys standing around a car. They stared at me as I approached and just as I was passing, one suddenly called me a “cracker”. When I heard it I turned and they looked at me as if they were all saying in unison “what are you going to do about it?” My answer? I did nothing. There was about four of them and one of me, not that I would have wanted to tangle with even one of them let alone four. If I walked by any one of them as they stood alone, I have no doubt that nothing would have been said, but courage rises in direct relation to numbers. I walked on as they laughed and I thought to myself, “I have just been a victim of reverse racism!”

Once I got home I thought about what had just happened. I felt a bit angry and ashamed but reasoned with myself that it wasn’t worth being seriously injured and they were the cowards for ganging up on me. In truth, being called a "cracker" didn't bother me that much. It bothered me more that they ganged up on me me with the idea to intimidate me. In the end it made me think about the concept of reverse racism and what this concept implies. I realized that a charge of reverse racism is a harsher condemnation of my own race and me than the person actually being racist. Ironically, by claiming to be a victim of reverse racism, I was calling myself, and all who are white, the only real racists thus displacing blame for their racism upon myself.

Reverse racism implies that one race (in this case Caucasians) have a monopoly on racism. It implies that white people are the only people who can be truly racist and all others who commit racist acts against white people (or any other race) are simply turning our own racism back on us. What it says is that these young gentlemen are not racist, I am the real racist and they are just giving me a taste of my own medicine.

The fact is that white people do not own prejudice and racism. Anyone who has traveled outside the US will know that racism exists in all races and nationalities. I was not a victim of reverse racism. They used a racial slur in an attempt to demean and intimidate me. These young men simply committed a racist act.

Reverse racism is a term developed from a myopic point of view. It assumes there is one race that is inherently racist and another that isn't. It is a term that arises in a society in which one race has a long history of dominating and oppressing another. Racism originating from a dominant position, or from an oppressor, is far more poignant with very real repercussions while racism originating from the oppressed and powerless has no teeth.

In the US, like many nations all around the world, there is a long history of oppression that has largely been a one-way street. In the US it took the form of slavery, whites owning blacks and using them as beasts of burden, later in the form of racial oppression and intimidation of ex-slaves and their progeny. Indeed it was not until a little over fifty years ago that blacks were truly considered equal to whites by the law of the land (if not in the minds of some).

In this environment one form of racism was seen to be the only real racism but in truth it was not the only form of racism but the only racism with consequence. This is why racial slurs for whites carry so little weight and are even allowed to be used on network TV while racial slurs commonly used for blacks will cut deep, especially when uttered by a white person, and even make people of other races uncomfortable.

Strictly and commonly defined in short, racism is: Hatred or intolerance of another race or other races. Racism is not a trait exclusive to Caucasians nor is the ability to be racist dependent on who garners the lions share of power and wealth in any given society. Racism is just one color in a spectrum of discrimination's practiced all around the world in the east and the west, by poor and rich, oppressed and oppressor, white and black and all colors in between. There is no such thing as reverse racism, its just racism.