Are Americans Racist?
Recent high-profile mayhem involving American whites, blacks and Asian-Americans has prompted the question: Are Americans racist? My response: Of course we are, tragically—in this sense: The brain of the human animal became, over six million years of survival games, hardwired to predispose people to see one another as of two kinds—“us versus them.” This essay is obviously not to excuse racism, but to try to understand it.
The challenge is to rewire our brains to see the world as made up of one kind of people.
According to neuroscientist Robert Sapolski of Stanford, skin color is the strongest marker that immediately lights up the brain when you and I scan the world around us.
With apologies to scientists and readers who know much more about this than I do, I see our brain as divided, very roughly, into three compartments.
At the base of the brain is the stem, which guides our basic bodily functions. In the middle of our cranium are several interconnected brain parts that govern our emotions, and “flight or fight” responses to threats. Forward in the brain is our frontal cortex, a late comer, you might say, to our brain. This, especially the “pre-frontal cortex,” is the “thinking” part of our being.
These three parts of the brain are in continuous interaction, firing neuronal signals back and forth constantly. Based on millions of years of experience at survival, the central part of the brain is powerful, really powerful. The more recent frontal cortex “advises” the central part on how to behave.
Sometimes, but not always, the frontal cortex is successful at overriding the central part. For example, there might be an override when the brain’s initial “gut reaction,” you might say, is to lash out at a perceived, but not real, threat. How many times have we said to ourselves when stressed: “Calm down. Take a deep breath.” The more time the front part of the brain has to intervene before actions are taken, the better.
Now that you understand the brain :-), let’s zero in on racism, that is, belief in the inferiority of the “them group.” We are predisposed by the brain to think this way all the time, e.g., whites are superior to blacks; Israelis are superior to Palestinians; farmers are superior to city folk; black athletes are superior to white jocks; the Cubs are superior to the Cardinals.
And the more distant a “them” group, or the less we know about it, the easier it is to believe the group inferior. On the other hand, if a white household has had a good, black family next door for years, our us-versus-them feeling often becomes sharply diminished. It’s called “getting to know you.”
I know the above sounds glib, yet it is based on reading heavy tomes such as “Behave,” by Sapolski. He devotes a whole chapter in his 800-page heavy lift to the powerful “us versus them” dynamic, with 77 persuasive research endnotes.
There is some good news. We continue to evolve, generally in the right direction. I am amazed, for example, at how quickly attitudes have apparently changed, in just recent decades, about sexual orientation.
When I was a kid in the 1950s, my father was among our small town’s leading citizens, who literally ran a new school teacher out of town, when it was rumored that he was “queer.” And my sister said he was a great teacher, whom all the kids liked. We have generally moved far beyond that kind of incredibly cruel them-bashing
But for the coming decades, “gut” racism among many people is not likely to recede of its own accord.
It will take really hard work, by those of us who think we see the world as made up of one kind of people. And, much as it might make us feel good, wagging our finger in front of a racist, saying “Don’t be that way!” likely does more harm than good; in response, the racist will, it’s human nature, rally round his predisposition.
We must instead develop strategies to convince the brains of possible racists that they should try really hard to focus on the individual, rather than on the group.
For example, the Illinois Farm Bureau does this quite effectively with its longstanding “Adopt a Legislator (meaning urban lawmaker) Program.” Weekend exchanges on the farm, and reciprocal visits, are integral to this activity. Barriers come down, at least somewhat, as a result.
Amalgamation also probably helps, such as the intermarriage among us-and-them group members, as is happening much more than when I was a kid.
Possibly readers have constructive ideas to complement my inadequate offerings here.
Of course, many of us are racist—until we convince our brains to think and act otherwise.
