[Marxism] America's deep-seated racism

[Walter Lippmann]

Thanks to Louis for posting this timely commentary to the list.

As a child of the sixties, who participated in the civil rights
movement, an understanding of the centrality of racism in this
society is something which, once acquired, is hard to lose, 
and that's a good thing!

Racism may well turn out to be an even more profound dividing
line in the life of this country than is class. In the final
analysis, I still think that class is the ultimate source of
power for the layer in society which has the possibility of
reconstructing the country in a sustainable, which is to say,
a socialist direction. That basic point being said, we must
remember that the entire political life and culture of this
country is so thoroughly polluted by racism that it has to 
be assumed as a probably cause of nearly anything basic or,
at least, it would have to be specifically ruled out before
analyzing other matters. 

Looking at Iraq today, I still have difficulty disagreeing
with DuBois who said that the problem of the 20th century
was the color line. I think that color and class are both
distinctly separate, but closely related at the same time.
BUT THEY ARE DIFFERENT, and racism is a central building
block to the maintenance of capialism in the United States.

Today, the forms of racism have changed. Blacks today have 
a legal right to vote. They can buy a house in places where
they couldn't before the civil rights movement, providing
they have the money. There are Black faces in the highest
levels of government, like the Supreme Court. But look at
the U.S. Senate? Look at Death Row in America. Look at the
story of the teenager in George sentenced to ten years in
prision for having consensual oral sex with a teenage girl
a few years ago, while Lewis "Scooter" Libby, convicted of
federal felony charges walks away free. That's RACISM as
well as the ruling class protecting its own.

TALK TO ME, the new film starring Don Cheadle is an example
of the kinds of cultural expressions needed to educate folks
in this country about these issues. A DAY WITHOUT A MEXICAN
is another. When people in the United States think about the
term "racism", typically they're referring to the prejudices
against Blacks. That's also the reason why the Black people 
in South Africa continue to support the African National
Congress. 

Anti-Black racism and anti-foreigner xenophobia are similar, 
and closely related. We don't get anything at all like the 
racism against undocumented Latinos get when we hear about 
undocumened Candians, as there clearly must be. We do hear 
of the occasional undocumented Irish, but it's as nothing 
compared to what the Latinos get, and now compared to what 
Arabs or other kinds of Muslims get.

Most people in the United States, especially if they happen
to be white, can't understand how profound this phenomenon
continues to be. Most white people, nearly all, suffer from
a kind of color-blindness when it comes to racism since it
doesn't affect white people in an immediate, sensory or an
experiential manner. My skin color is white, but I do not
think of myself as white. I think of my ethnicity as being
something else. I'm Jewish by ethnicity, when viewed in a
precise, scienific manner - I NEVER, EVER think of myself
as "white", though that's not a crime, it's merely a fact
of my existence. 

A friend (Sylvia Wilhelm) once explained to me something 
which I'd never heard before, but which immediately made
sense - that since I'm not Cuban, nor am I Cuban-American,
what I really am is an "American-Cuban", and that makes a
good deal of sense to me. This is my personal identity.


Walter Lippmann
Los Angeles, California
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LOUIS PROYECT posted this:
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/pipermail/marxism/2007-July/015008.html
MICHAEL YATES writes:
Richard Greener's comments were extremely 
interesting amd moving.  Racism is such 
a great fault line here and shows no 
signs of ending anytime soon.



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WALTER LIPPMANN
Editor-in-Chief, CubaNews
writer - photographer - activist
http://www.walterlippmann.com
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