Dictionary.com says:
- a belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one’s own race is superior and has the right to rule others.
- a policy, system of government, etc., based upon or fostering such a doctrine; discrimination.
- hatred or intolerance of another race or other races.
Professor William A. Jacobsen, at his blog Legal Insurrection, reports on comments made by Professor Cornel West on the radio program Democracy Now. The program’s host played a clip of an interview with President Bush about his memoir and specifically about his response to the comments of rapper Kanye West, who, in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, said that “George Bush doesn’t care about black people.” Professor West said,
“No, I think Kanye West was actually right, but we have to make a distinction between being racist in motivation and intention versus racist in effect and consequence…. But I think what happened was that President Bush understood this in an individualistic way, which is the way most fellow Americans understand racism: ‘Do I actually hate black people individually?’ No, I don’t think President Bush individually hates black people. His policies were racist in effect and consequence and especially classist in terms of generating misery among poor and working people, disproportionately black and brown.”
Professor West is wrong on two counts. Most Americans don’t understand racism as hating black people individually; they understand it the way the dictionary describes it: hatred or intolerance of another race as a group. And there’s no such thing as racism “in effect and consequence.” Racism is solely a belief, a state of mind… an intention. If there is no racist intent, there is no racism.
