The Myth: "Stop Talking About Discrimination and it Will Disappear"

"Avoidance merely delays the inevitable, but it does not make it go away"

 "Stop Talking About Discrimination and it Will Disappear"

A Myth 

Discrimination against people of color, women, and members of the LGBT community is something that this society is still trying to work on. And while small steps have been made in the years since the Civil Rights Act of 1964, this recent election cycle has made me and everyone else aware of what goes on this nation at both a macro and a micro level. It has become evident that racism and xenophobia is alive and well in this country and that it is capable of forwarding an entire political platform. 

While it has been evident that racism is a problem, something that is troubling is the view that if we  "stop talking about discrimination and racism, it will disappear." There is a inherent logical fallacy in stating this as illustrated by several analogs:

• If we stop talking about the fire burning down the the house, the fire will stop burning it down...
• If we stop thinking about the cancer ravaging the body, it will go into remission...
• If we stop talking about obesity, it will correct itself...
• If we stop talking about rape, people will stop getting raped...

All of these logical fallacies have one thing in common: They assume that a condition will cease by ignoring it. This is the problem with the American psyche today, the lack of accountability for actions both past and present and the ability to understand the implications by not taking that accountability. There are people that exclaim "Why does it have to always be about race?!"but they fail to realize that a great deal of political decisions and instances and history were done because of race. 

The Tuskegee Experiment was carried out because of race (exploiting the fact that people of color were not well educated and that they could be used as guinea pigs. CDC Commentary ). The covenants that disallowed many African Americans to own property and produced the mass exodus of European Americans to the suburbs, was about race. ( Racially restrictive covenants: Shelley v. Kraemer , Redlining: It still exists, and Racial exclusion in suburban communities: Yale Law Journal talked about it.), even the failure to employ people is based on preferences which mainly rely on race. ( 2003 Berkley Study, Hiring of Waiters, Liability Because She Wasn't Blonde). 

Just by looking at the instances above, you can tell that the usual rule of speaking things into existence doesn't apply. It's because no matter if we are silent on it, it is inherently part of our society. To not address it as an issue is to completely fail to address what made this country what it is in the economic sense as well as the political one. 

The rationale of not talking about discrimination also is rooted in how people respond to affirmative action plans. The sentiment from many people who are not a part of a protected class is "affirmative action programs further polarize race relations by making it us against them and allowing people to not operate on merit." But once again, it complete discounts history. The history is that African Americans and most other people of color attend schools that are substandard (2013 APA Article, 2002, NY Times, 1992, The Atlantic). At first they were separate but unequal, now they are integrated (by law but in fact it could be questionable) and still mostly unequal.

 A majority of inner city public schools systems are utilized by minorities and generally they do not have the same resources as suburban school systems.( 2014, Washington Post, 2015, PhillyMag). How can we operate on a system of merits when from the instance a child sets foot through the door of the school they are ill equipped to handle and navigate the education system? Affirmative action policies are there because the help alleviate the disparities at the tail end. It is a much more conservative remedy than giving money to those struggling school systems and providing proper services that can help bring students in those inner city schools on equal footing. 

Societally, discrimination was rooted in our laws (Plessy v. Ferguson and Dred Scott, The Civil Rights Cases, Jim Crow and Black Codes) and it took legislative action via talking about the discrimination and expressing discontent that gave us Brown v. Board and it's subsequent cases. It took this conversation to get us the Civil Rights Act of 1965, 42 U.S.C. 1981, and the ADA (because people discriminate against the disabled too). It took us this conversation to get affirmative action programs that benefit all Americans who are from groups that are disadvantaged socially ( Even women who are European American benefit too). To be clear, conversations about any type of discrimination produces results whereas inaction does not make discrimination go away. Jim Crow was alive and well from 1877 until the 1950's and when it became severe and pervasive and conversations starting happening, things began to get done. 

In conclusion, we must talk about discrimination to arrive at a solution. In a 12 Step Program way, the first step is admitting that there is a problem. Until we as a country can collectively admit that there is an issue, we cannot resolve it. Everyone else sees the problem and quite clearly we cannot be post-racial until we understand that race and other bases of discrimination are a subject to examination rather than ignorance. 

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