In 1896, the U.S. Supreme Court dealt a devastating blow to the cause of racial equality, ruling 7-1 in Plessy v. Ferguson that "separate but equal" was the law of the land. The lone dissenter in that landmark case was Justice John Marshall Harlan, a former slave owner, who bitterly predicted an era of inequality and racial intolerance in America. History proved Harlan right, and we now know what followed as the Jim Crow era. Indeed it took almost 60 more years for the court to begin setting things right by discarding the "separate but equal" doctrine.
Some legal scholars consider Harlan's dissent to be the intellectual wellspring of "color blindness" -- the idea that race should simply not figure in any way into consideration of rights and opportunities. But color blindness is itself a controversial concept: Some hold it as the highest ideal of true racial equality in a post-racial society, while others cynically dismiss it as a strategy for ignoring evidence of persistent racial discrimination.
A team of psychological scientists decided to take this complex and contentious social issue into the lab, to measure the consequences of a colorblind strategy in the lives of young children. Headed by Evan Apfelbaum of Northwestern University, the scientists designed an experiment that mirrors the way racial policies are actually implemented in the real world, and then measured how these policies shape kids' sensitivity to real incidents of discrimination. Here are the details.
The scientists recruited elementary school children, 8 to 11 years old, from a well-to-do Boston suburb. One at a time, the students were asked to review a storybook for possible use with younger children. This was in fact a ruse. The kids were actually reading two different narratives: All the students read about a teacher championing racial justice in the classroom, but only some read a colorblind version of the story, in which the teacher minimized the importance of all racial distinctions and considerations. The remaining kids read a version of the story that celebrated diversity, emphasizing how racial differences make each child "special." The kids were instructed to ponder the "main message" of the story.
So the kids were schooled in color blindness or in the value of racial differences. Then the real experiment began. An adult read the students different scenarios from a nearby school, each depicting inequality but in varying degrees. So, for example, one scenario described a white child excluding a black classmate from his birthday party; this was considered an ambiguous story of racial bias, since there are many reasons for inviting or not inviting classmates to a party. They also heard a more explicit tale of racial bias -- one in which a white soccer player makes an unprovoked assault on a black opponent during a game, remarking to a teammate that black kids play rough. They idea was to see which of the students saw racial discrimination in which incident, and whether those judgments were influenced by their earlier schooling in race relations.
The results were dramatic and sobering. As reported in the online version of the journal Psychological Science, almost half the kids who were taught to value diversity subsequently detected racial bias in the ambiguous birthday party story, and fully three-quarters saw bias in the soccer story. These findings are consistent with what's seen in the general population of elementary school kids with no training in race relations, suggesting that the diversity training did not make the students hyper-sensitive to racial bias.
But here's the really interesting part: Among the kids schooled in color blindness, only one in 10 saw any evidence of racism in the ambiguous story. That is, they were significantly less sensitive to evidence of bias than were those trained to value diversity. And even more remarkably, only half the colorblind kids perceived racism even in the soccer scenario, where it was overt and aggressive.
There's more. The scientists wondered if this diminished sensitivity also affects how kids report incidents of racism, which in turn determines how adults might intervene. To find out, they asked two experienced elementary school teachers -- teachers with no knowledge of the study's purpose -- to rate the students' videotaped descriptions of both the birthday party and the soccer game. They rated them for seriousness and for urgency to intervene. And again, the colorblind strategy seemed to blind kids to real problems. Their descriptions of events -- compared to those of the kids trained in diversity -- were much less likely to set off alarms for experienced school teachers.
So is color blindness going too far? The scientists believe so. It appears that well-intentioned efforts to promote egalitarianism may have the opposite effect, allowing even overt acts of racism to go undetected and unreported. This diminished outcry may in turn lead to a false impression that color blindness is working, reinforcing support for a dubious race relations strategy.
Christine Carter, PhD: Have You Talked to Your Kids About Racism?
Deborah Plummer: Inclusion Begins with 'Hello'
I want to see the entire spectrum from Red to blue and then some..........
If I could sense infrared and Ultraviolet.........., that would be nice.......
Sounds to me like they're guilt tripping the white kids. Simply disgusting.
Wrong, they merely reported their findings. That's your own opinion.
I can't imagine why anyone would think it's a good thing to train kids to color everything in terms of race, the birthday party is a good example. There are about a billions reasons why a kid wouldn't want another kid at his/her party, what do you see the benefit to training kids assume a racial motivation?
Further, the second example supplied the kids with 'facts', i.e. that black kids like to play rough. Within the context of the story, that is presented as a fact. That shouldn't have been there. I would bet good money the results would be substantially different if that 'fact' had been committed, and the story were merely about a racist kid being nasty to another kid.
Example: A woman of African heritage lives her life surrounded by white people of wealth. She is routinely treated as a servant, consequently her pysche, her behavior, her opinions, her perspective and her ideologies are influenced markedly by this experience. Much of which is probably without joy. A sad oppressed person who never saw the full potential of lifes expression. We owe this woman her voice. We owe ourselves her story and her opinions. We need her to help influence our going forward. Or we will certainly repeat history.
Additionally we cannot ignore other stories. A young white boy living in a modest white community rides his bike to school each day but must cross through a poorer culturally broken community to reach school. He does so because his parents cannot afford a second car and the bus leaves too late. He is assaulted repeatedly as he faces harrassment by other kids of color alone. His story is real. His experience has influenced his manhood and the decisions he makes. I met this man a few years ago, he's a CEO now.
We have to acknoledge these peoples experiences. We need their stories to get past this era of poisonous verbal circus chatter in the media.
If you have an environment where power, challenge, opportunities, rewards and title are all shared and treated with equality, fairness and openess you'll see significantly less if not near zero racism but people will still cluster the majority of the time with people of likeness.
Society isn't fair, equal or open and THAT is why racism breeds like mold today. Not because people wake up and feed their hate and ignorance actively. That takes energy alot more energy than just being lazy friends.
Change the structure, governance and secrets from society and you'll see racism evaporate from your eyes.
I think it's really about class, values, etc more than anything else.
Why do I think this? Because I can think of so many examples of individuals who happen to have very dark skin, get along just fine with those who don't...both in the past and present.
I remember when I was a kid...in the 70's. I had a class mate from Sri Lanka who was extremely dark but you know what? At that time I didn't even notice it. I didn't notice it because that person was a friend and we did not see the race. We didn't see his race because he was just like us in attitudes, values, etc.
Just the other day me and my bf went to Little India. They don't tend to separate themselves from people of other colors and they are very dark. We felt very comfortable. Everyone was friendly and there wasn't this hyper focus on race...it's on who you are as a person.
If you share common values, attitudes, ideals, etc you'll be friends of with anyon eof any color.
And just because you couldn't see your Sri Lankan classmate's race doesn't mean that others felt the same way. Racism is not just individual attitudes. Racism is more collective than individualistic. Not only is it possible that other classmates didn't feel as 'color-blind' as you did, but that our society as a whole doesn't feel the same way. Racism operates despite how an individual feels.
This was not an unfortunate unexpected outcome. Using the concept of race color blindness, to denigrate the legitimacy of any complaints about race was not accidental. It is has been a constant theme for the right...and it only is considered to flow in one direction from the right. THE RIGHT MAY BE COLOR BLIND WHEN IT COMES TO SEEING ANTI BIAS AGAINST PEOPLE OF COLOR...but they see color bias just fine when they think it is working against white folks.
It is rooted in white supremacist idology which gave birth to Amreican racism.
Until THIS society is willing to "look" at this "belief system" factually .... past and present ... the notion that ALL men are created equal, etc ... is just words on a piece of paper.
Fanned 251- and faved -2-
Right wingers are blind to any anti bias based on race...unless they perceive white folks as the down trodden.
People are always biased.
Probably their is a natural tendency to see bias based on ones identification. So if we accept that we will distort reality based on our identities then we need to work on broadening what and who believed to be "ONE Of US "...right ?
Being "color-blind is
1. Not possible ....after all ...IF you can see ... how then ARE you blind?
2. Why would anyone want to be "invisible"? In truth, THAT is what hs allowed white folks to ignore blatant and obvious rascism and discrimantion AND accept it as OK!
3. The person made "invisible" view is discounted, ignored at best ... at worst accused of being "rascist" and seeing everything threw a racist prism. When in fact ... they see racism ... for what it is ... racism!
EVERYONE "wants" to be seen .... especially those proclaiming THEIR color-blindness ... for this is "how" they cover THEIR racism!
The genocide and "seperation" of the Native peoples of North America, the brutality and enslavement of Africans, the internment of Japanese Americans, the demonization of Mexicans / Hispanic Americans and immigrants, etc are all rooted in white supremacist ideology.
white supremacist ideology gave birth to American racism ... until the numerical majority is willing to look at and acknowledge past and present manifestations of this "belief" ... "color-blindness" an attempt at NOT seeing other human beings is their ONLY answer ... the numerical majority (for now) WANT to be blind!
Education and self forgiveness for their roles played is the answer for ALL Americans!
Sure the first example (the party) was ambiguous. On propose. It is perfectly legitimate for anyone to think that the boy was not invited for reasons other than race. But you would have to be some sort of blind idealist innocent who's eyes are closed to the reality that racism is still a problem in the USA.
But why did you ignore what the second example showed. ? (The soccer game ) The example that seems to prove that teaching color blindness, blinds people from seeing undeniable race bias in action.
What blinded you to that ?
Why would you focus your indignity on part of the experiment, that was admittedly ambiguous ?
What a wasted life they have. Doesn't it dawn on these people that they never will succeed?