Rosa Parks is dead. The next generation of civil rights heroes must be white people.

This morning, I got an email about the death of Rosa Parks.

 

“I’m 46,” the man wrote. “It’s hard for me to imagine that only 50 years ago prejudice was so rampant. I feel good about the progress that’s been made, but I also know that prejudice is still alive: stagnant and dormant in some people and ‘in your face’ in others. As a modern civil people, we must continue to fight prejudice, stand up against intolerance, and educate our youth about the importance of acceptance.”

 

“Where are the heroes of today?” he continued. “We need another Rosa Parks. We need another Martin Luther King. We need to do a lot more than what we have been doing.”

 

What we actually need, I replied quietly, are more white people who are willing to be civil rights heroes.

 

We need white people to be as outraged about racism as people of color are. We need white people to realize that racism is not a black issue—it’s a white issue. We need white people to refuse to participate in a system that privileges them over fellow human beings. We need white people to actively, visibly, and publicly examine their own role in perpetuating racism in subtle and unconscious ways, acknowledge and own their part in the problem, verbalize the unearned privileges that accrue to them simply because of their skin color, and demand those same privileges for people of color.

 

Fighting racism isn’t only the job of people like Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr. The next generation of civil rights activists in this nation must be white people who realize that winning this fight will be the result of individual, daily actions on their part, not grand pronouncements and history month celebrations.

 

In “The Color of Fear,” a remarkable film shown during the community dialogue program, Building Bridges, a young African-American man named Victor puts it this way: “Most of the lethal racism we face isn’t the KKK burning crosses; it comes from people who experience themselves as decent folk, moral churchgoers.” “Racism is so deep.” he continues, “that you don’t think about it. It is insidious. It is in the very air that you breathe. White people don’t talk about what it is to be white; they talk about the human experience. Because in the U.S., white is human.”

Some say we should live in a colorblind world—that we are all human, after all. But if we are unable to see race, we cannot see racism—and denial is not a strategy. After hearing Victor’s story in “The Color of Fear,” a white man named David asks, “How can I help you?” “Help me by understanding yourself and the invisible protection you have because of your color,” is the reply. There can be no progress on the issue of racism, Victor explains, “unless you’re willing to be changed by my experience as much as I’m changed every day by yours.”

 

As long as we wait for national heroes to emerge, nothing will change. As long as we relegate the solution to the very people we’ve oppressed in the first place, nothing will change. Unless we wake up every morning determined to eliminate racism even when that work is difficult, nothing will change. Many times, racism has existed around me, but I didn’t notice—because it didn’t affect me. It’s this subtle racism we must fight. And to fight it, we must see it, not minimize it.

 

If Rosa Parks had waited for a Bi-Partisan Task Force on Unilateral Bus Seating, she’d still be standing on that bus. Sometimes, we just need to act. But let’s not confuse movement with action. Being a strong white ally doesn’t mean that we should take over, assume we know what is best for people of color, or ask them to speak for their people. Rather, it means that we should find out about people of color by listening to their stories, teach our children about racism, talk to other white people about racism, interrupt racist jokes or comments, and stand by people of color—not just when it’s easy or convenient, but always.

 

As Nelson Mandela once said: “your smallness will not save the world.” To end racism, we must make bold strokes and be active anti-racists. We must acknowledge our unearned privileges, accept our own racism, and own this problem ourselves, each individual one of us.

 

The police officer who fingerprinted Rosa Parks after that fateful bus ride was named Drue Lackey. When asked to comment on Parks’ death, Lackey simply said that he had no problem with black people and that he was just doing his job. As long as we “just do our jobs,” racism will prevail.

Comments

[J]

Wow, finally someone who can articulate the frustrations felt by many!!! Bravo on your article!

[grace]

I'm so tired of the White and all "other" classifications (personally) ....thankfully there has been tremendous change in 50 years and that whell is turning (slowly as it is) in the right direction...More of us have come to the realization that race is a cultural concept ( http://www.aaanet.org/stmts/racepp.htm) imposed specifically for oppression... as we keep mixing, mixing, mixing, our families joining together celebrating births of children who are not one race or another, we will still have to deal with the ever growing and concrete reality of Classism.
the bottom line becomes are we raising children and creating communities that care for others realizing we are all connected, all family? or are we celebrating the heiress of a hotel as she buys a pair of shoes that costs an annual income to some? The task is to inspire and motivate would be myopic BoBo's (Bohemian Bourgeoise) into action/volunteerism/inclusion.
We are at a crossroads now of privatization vs. community.
as Mother Theresa said,"If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other. "

[No guilt]

Racsim is not a black issue? Maybe you should tell that to the black person who threw a bottle at me form the 14th floor in Brownsville Brooklyn while he shouted die you white mother fucker. As for white privilage; like the time I had to sleep in the street for two days to get an application to get into the union only to find that they were given out to black people in a tech. high school, or when I apply for a civil service job with a high score only to be told that I am white and thanks to affermitive action I am shut out. I have a family to feed like everyone else. I did not own slaves but am expected to pay for other peoples mistakes.

[grace]

This country was built on the backs of slaves. Whether you or your ancestors directly owned slaves or not, you benefit from that process of torture and conditioning. The conditioning that was required to convince a group of people that they were sub human has had a lasting ill effect.
Whether you struggle financially and in many of your endeavors or not, you do not experience the effects of that conditioning daily.
You are in that way, privileged.
ie: you will not be pulled over by a cop for being a black man in a nice car with a white woman, taken out of said car, put on the ground spread eagled, harrassed for 45 min.
this will not happen to you as a white person. It wont happen to your father while you are in the back seat.

When you were "discriminated against" with affirmative action, you were reminded of your privilege, not the history of sub human treatment you were told you deserved and were lucky to experience.

[Audrey Kahn]

I am a jew. A hymie according to Jesse Jackson. I marched last year about this time against the Rainbow coalition because it was something I believed in. I was threaten by the RC that they would call the police, they told me to so to the other side of the street, the big man told me I have no rights to be there. It was just me and 20 Rainbow coalition people and a few from the NAACP who had nice yellow T-shirts, when I asked if I could have one they said No. I have called Jesse and asked for an apology. He does not have the class to answer my call.

[time to move on]

All the hatred spewed on this page is a prime example of why racism is still so rampant!!!!!!!!!!! I live in the heart of the Mississippi delta so I know good and well what rasism is. And I'm white. We are ALL God's children regardless of color. THAT is what I teach my child. THAT is what she'll teach her children. It's not what I was taught but we can all make the decision to change the cycle of hate. Stop blaming people for things they had nothing to do with and let history be taught and learned from. History should not be seperate, it should be taught equally all year round. All people should be treated and respected equally all year round. It's people like this on this page who insist that they are owed something and refuse to stop seperating us that keep this world the way it is. I mean honestly, this is not what Martin Luther King, Jr. died for. He was a good man who stood up for what was right and so was Rosa Parks. And it is disrespectful to their memory that all people and all colors aren't doing any better than they are right now. It's time to move past this and into the future. A future where my child can have a black or mexican friend if she wants to without all the crap!!!!!!!!!!! And keep in mind too that at the beginning of America, the country was built on the backs and with the blood sweat and tears of Irishmen, Who by the way are WHITE.