At the conclusion of the #25 article in the “For Racial Healing” series, I asked whether there were many white Americans who believe that the inhumane and often illegal activities of ICE against Black and brown immigrants in the country presaged a 21st century version of Jim Crow.
There are those who will express the view that to ask that question is without merit and conveys an unrealistic and melodramatic response to Black/brown and white racial relations in the United States today. Even if the view were true, which I do not believe it is, are we then prepared to risk another phase in American history of brutal and evil conduct by the white race over Black and brown peoples that will not only bludgeon minorities but also, once again, render whites mere apologists and prevaricators about our own behavior, which will have been effectuated by the base qualities of our nature?
I will therefore emphasize that it actually took very little to establish the circumstances surrounding the implementation of Jim Crow in the latter part of the 19th century, which persisted into the 20th century – a compliant court; strong local governance, guided by the Ku Klux Klan, in favor of color preference; and the absence of opposing leadership nationally. Moreover, when we hear American language now turn a little more rude and crude, if not a little more cruel, a little more racially suggestive, if not a little more racially pointed, and a little more revealing about generative tropes, the tell-tale signs of danger toward a more prejudicial era have more than begun.
Since 2019, my wife, Freda, and I have known a quite notable writer and lecturer on racial matters. A couple of years ago, this writer, who is Black, joined Freda and me for dinner at a small restaurant in our neighborhood of New York City. At the end of dinner, Freda left the table to secure a taxi so that our guest, who suffers from an uncomfortable condition, especially when standing, would have immediate access to a cab. I’m old, white, and can’t move as quickly or as easily as I used to move. As our guest and I were making our way to the exit, sort of arm-in-arm, dependent on each other’s partial steadiness, a middle-aged, white woman, pointing to us, yelled out from a five-to-six person table, “See there. What an odd-looking couple.”
The speaker had said it intentionally loud over the restaurant’s din so that everyone could hear her. She may have thought someone else would have joined her audibly in an attempt to mock two, elderly, Black-white colleagues just working their way haltingly out the door. She spoke, expecting either another sympathetic, collateral voice or an assent by a like-minded soul of a comrade. I learned many years ago that racism is hidden until it is not – until it is no longer necessary to be hidden. On cue, the woman who spoke out at the restaurant felt she was safe with a racist outburst. Sensing the company of others whom she thought would have wanted to say the same, she proceeded to be unhidden in her views.
So, do I think there are rising voices in America, both official and among ordinary, white folks, who desire and expect another round of institutionalized Jim Crow during the 21st century? Yes, I do, and their voices of racism can be heard mostly at a slant but occasionally in direct form. Their words are now less inhibited and less prohibited than they were a few years ago, and that should tell us something about the ways such voices become unleashed and become engaged in proceeding along a path that the nation marches, as if unwittingly and unconsciously, but no less viciously toward the child or cousin of Jim Crow.
Everything in pursuit of that direction is done under the excuse of appearing to be a normal response to indecent and lawless conduct, but which is, in effect, racism of the rampant kind – whether it is attempts to reduce Black votes, to increase surveillance of Black behavior, or to make Black (and increasingly brown) peoples to be a root cause of our nation’s social and even economic problems. Still, we know that much white racism, which has been hidden, is not as hidden anymore, and the same old tropes and filiopietistic retreats regain usefulness – make America great again, for instance.
The intent has become more obvious. Many provisions of the Civil Rights Act and protective clauses of the 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution that were put into place to support Black participation in mainstream American life have recently been undermined or are now under constant threat. For example, the Black voting prowess is continuously attacked as being illegal, highly corrupt, or procedurally biased. Today, there is an institutionalized desire to neutralize the impact of the Black voter. While public, popular, and counter resistance has been helpful in combatting such antagonistic attacks against Black participation in the American election system, there is no indication that the attacks will lessen at all in the future or that success won’t be achieved in bringing about a 21st century version of Jim Crow.
Racial intent is usually not actually mentioned in these contexts, even though it is nearly always the motivation, reflected in some kind of strange retribution or defensive response against Blacks (and increasingly brown) by white provocateurs, whether in official or unofficial roles. It is our responsibility to look through the fabrications or false rationales at the essence of racism that drives these institutional and personal attacks and to see them in an unintimidated and brave manner as we were meant to behave. We must look coldly at those acts, such as the use of ICE that is ostensibly an enforcement arm of national law and order, but whose real purpose is to weaken and severely damage the public image and credibility of both Black (and increasingly brown) people in America.
Those who are white and participate in one-on-one, racial healing not only know all of this, they also recognize and understand racism’s machinations and workings that have allowed this racism to continue to renew itself, as it has done in the present, and to survive over endless time. They also realize that new precedents, such as individual allyships, have to be established, energy has to be quickened, and consequential acts have to be completed if good is going to happen and prevail.