Racism

When someone discriminates against a person in a racial group, they are carrying out a policy or taking advantage of the lack of a protective policy.

If we hope to end the disasters that the patriarchy has wrought, we have to begin within, and change the neural pathways that the patriarchy has carved into our thinking. In other words, we have to decolonize our minds.

The Princeton and Slavery Project, replete with documents, plays, and paintings, was an answer of sorts. It told the university’s sordid history, in part. There are now historical markers on campus and special tours. But the full consequences of the slave past haven’t yet been unearthed. They reached far beyond 1865. In the ’50s, James Baldwin felt

We have, as it seems to me, a very curious sense of reality—or, rather, perhaps, I should say, a striking addiction to irreality.

The fact is, “exceptional Negroes” have always been a staple of an apartheid-like educational system that separates the “gifted” from the “normal,” and both from the “naughty” or “underachieving.” Sticks and stones will only break my bones, but words can lift or crush me.

Dominant narratives are keeping us hostage. By freeing up our imagination to what is impossible, we can break ourselves free as well. Just as much as we should not colonize the possible future, we should not colonize the so-called impossible future either.

Racial-group behavior is a figment of the racist’s imagination. Individual behaviors can shape the success of individuals. But policies determine the success of groups.

Research has also shown that a major reason for this racial disparity can be attributed to the beliefs held by judges and others about the cause of the criminal behavior.17 For example, the criminal behavior of white juveniles is often seen as caused by external factors—the youth comes from a single-parent home, is having a hard time right now,