Did you know that a single two-second distraction can cost you 15 minutes of your day? When your concentration is interrupted, it takes up to 15 minutes to get your focus back.
Footsteps pounded the sidewalk behind us. We turned as a young man careened around the corner and headed down the narrow Boston side street toward us. My wife and I stepped out of the way. At 25 feet, I noticed he was clutching a woman’s purse to his chest. His quick glances over his shoulder made it obvious that he was being pursued. At 20 feet, I realized that everything I was seeing was telling me he had stolen the purse and someone was coming running after him. At 15 feet, I sized him up to determine if I could stop him. He didn’t have a weapon, wasn’t any bigger than me, and his haste would make him easy to delay. At 10 feet, I decided I could easily stop him by tripping him to let who ever was chasing him catch up. At 5 feet, I realized he was black.
In a fraction of a second, my mind raced back over the past three years. I had moved from a rural Fort Scott, Kansas to Grand Rapids, Michigan to head up the IT department for a large non-profit. The non-profit was trying very hard to get more “diversity.” They were bringing in diversity speakers to do training sessions. They were careful to have various cultures represented at all their events. Any printed materials showing people had to show minorities in a much higher percentage than were native in that part of the country.
As the runner closed the distance, my mind went back to what one of the speakers had said. He explained how, even though you don’t realize it, most people are racist against black people and told everyone to count how many black friends they had. I couldn’t think of a single one. While I didn’t think I was racist, the fact that I didn’t have any black friends hit home.
As the runner approached, I decided that, based on everything I had learned over the past three years, there was a high chance that my judgment was being influenced by the fact that this person looked like a thief because I was unconsciously prejudiced against his skin color. Maybe the purse contained vital medicine for someone at home and he was looking back to see if the person with the syringe was keeping up. Maybe he was part of some sort of delivery service that would bring someone their purse when they forgot it. As the distance closed, I stepped to the side and let him pass. Two seconds later, a policeman tore past us in hot pursuit of the purse snatcher.
Had it not been for the diversity training, he wouldn’t have gotten away. In those few split seconds, I was practicing racial discrimination–the fact that he was black made me treat him differently than someone else. Had it not been for the diversity training, I wouldn’t have noticed the color of his skin. How do I know? When the speaker asked everyone how many black friends they had, I couldn’t think of one, but it wasn’t because I didn’t have any. I just didn’t define my friends in terms of their skin color. It turned out that, of my close circle of friends, 20% were black. It just took me a very long time to realize it. After deep soul searching prompted by being told that I was a racist for not having any black friends, I finally started noticing the color of people’s skin.
Isn’t this the opposite of what we really want?
Before “diversity training” I saw people in terms of who they were and how they acted–not the color of their skin. If you treat people differently because of the color of their skin, you are practicing racial discrimination. Training that tries to emphasize, “See that person over there? He/She looks different than you. How do you feel about that?” teaches you to treat people differently based on the way they look.
I am certain that there are still some serious racial issues with certain people and in particular parts of the country, but many of the current approaches do more harm than good. If someone is really racist, then it is very unlikely that “diversity training” is going to change anything, and if someone isn’t racist, much of the current training methodology is going to create problems that don’t already exist.
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Thank you for writing this. I will share this with everyone I know. You are absolutely correct about all this manipulation which amounts to good, old divide and conquer strategy. I cringe every time I have to fill one of these HR forms demanding my ethnic profile. I refuse to be defined and refuse to define other people – “Define me, and you neglect me”.
What a strong story. I hesitate to say this, but I believe that many stereotypes exist because they are predominantly true and are constantly reinforced. I’m also not sure that the goals of diversity training are as many people expect. They tend to result in ‘affirmative action style’ programs instead of making people more aware that skin color is only skin deep.
It is easy to forget that some people don’t know the stereotypes. I was at a wedding and right before the ceremony the groom realized he left the ring at the house. He asked a friend of mine to go get it. My friend (who is black) said, “Oh sure, ask a black man to get the ring.” I asked him what he meant and he explained that black men stereotypically drive fast. He told me I needed to brush up on my racial stereotypes a bit. :)
Delicate issues you tackle here. From my point of view, official thinking usually “overlabels” everything, and it does not feel natural. Like ripping to pieces a Picasso and then saying: “hey! If you put all those pieces together you’ll have a Picasso!”. You didn’t have to rip it in the first place. Categories are not there unless someone mentions them.
Well, ok, sure. You took an extra split second to think about whether or not your opinion about a guy running like a bat-out-of-hell and carrying a woman’s purse was unduly influenced by the color of the guy’s skin.
But you’re an idiot for not tripping the guy. Really. A guy, running like a bat-out-of-hell, carrying a woman’s purse. Occam’s razor says that the simplest explanation is almost always the correct one, which means that skin color or no, he’s probably a purse snatcher. Trip him. If you were wrong, apologize. If he calls you on racism, say “Ok, maybe, and yes, I’m sorry. But dude, you’re running like a bat-out-of-hell, carrying a woman’s purse. It seemed like a safe bet.”
The idea that racial diversity training is bad because you let a thief get away because you didn’t want to be racist is completely missing the point.
And let me be the first non-white person to pander to an Anglo Stereotype and say “you know, i’m not surprised that a white person would come up with a post like this.”
My point is that before my “diversity training” I wouldn’t have noticed the color of his skin. The fact that the thief got away just illustrated how my mindset had changed.
If we want to have a non-racist society we need to work toward skin color being just like eye color or hair color. Something you don’t really even notice even though technically you see it. The more time we spend training people to notice skin color, the worse things will be.
Right on, Anonymous.
Mark, I won’t try to substantiate my opinion since I agree with the suggestion that “If someone is really racist, then it is very unlikely that ‘diversity training’ is going to change anything.” White privilege includes the privilege of being able to believe a concept like colorblindness works.
Fran – The people I’ve known who are really racist don’t like black people and they will tell you that. If someone points out to them that they don’t have any black friends, they aren’t going to care. It won’t make them feel bad–they already know it and would say, “Of course I don’t have any black friends. I don’t like black people.”
Regarding color blindness: Here are two scenarios. Which do you think is the most healthy:
1. I get asked how many black friends I have and I say “zero”–overlooking the fact that 2 of my closest 10 friends are black. Not because I forgot they were my friends, but because I don’t notice their skin color.
2. I get asked how many black friends I have and I say, “I have eight white friends and two black friends with no hesitation.”
I believe that people who fall under option 2 are more likely to act in a racist manner simply because they have categorized their friends in two boxes: white and black. If you disagree, I’d love to hear why. Simply saying that it is “white privilege” is rather insulting. I’m speaking from my personal experience here. I’m open to what other people have to say, but give me some logic as to why you think option 2 is a better state for the world to be in.
No matter the color, catch the person. You can always apologize later. But that’s the situation in Europe, I don’t know about the US.
While I’m tempted to feel the same way as you do – that, naturally and without intervention I’m colour blind -it’s more complicated than that. And, unfortunately, it turns out that not talking about it and not thinking about it is not the solution.
Somewhat related: http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2010/02/how-to-raise-racist-kids#ixzz0gDjA7rZZ — the same principles apply to grown up kids also.
Interesting article, but without knowing the methodologies it is hard to know what to think of their findings. For example, when someone asked me if I had any black friends I said “no”. This wasn’t true, but I didn’t consider them my “black friends” they were just my friends. Is it possible that the kids being polled said the same thing?
Now I believe culture is something completely different. It has to do with how you act, talk, view the world etc. My friends who have dark skin are very similar to me in culture. While I do have friends from other countries and cultures, my close friends share a lot of my cultural values. People whose cultures are opposed to my cultural values aren’t really the type of people I’m likely to become close friends with.
This is a interesting story Mark. You wanted to stop the runner based on his actions, but you let him go because of what the speaker said about black people. There was a bit of irony here. I think it’s more powerful to base a person due to their actions than the color of their skin. When you let that person go, you were basing him on his skin rather than his clear actions of robbery. Maybe you’re right; something like diversity training which focuses on color may have more negative effects towards human beings than negative ones.
Too many suffer from eroneous white guilt. In this case you WERE acting as a racist. You determined your actions, based on the color of his skin not his behavior, putting aside your instincts because of some mumbo jumbo you heard at “diversity training”. This is how Fort Hood happened. Good on you for seeing and saying is like it is. Thanks for posting this.
Carol – I was going to call this post “How I became a racist”, but didn’t because some definitions of racism include treating other races poorly–not just differently.
I have been surprised at the people here (presumably minorities of some type) who are saying that a color blind society isn’t what they want.
Mark,
Diversity training teaches people, especially white people, to feel guilty about “disliking” minorities. It does not teach us anything about the institutionality of racism. It does not teach us why a white person with a criminal record does better on the job market than a a black person with qualifications; it does not teach us about neighborhood and nutritional segregation; it does not teach us anything about disparities in public schooling; and it does not teach us about disparities in mortgage rates. Diversity training makes of racial attitudes a matter of dislike, personal feelings, rather than a matter of institutional disparities. Diversity training sugar-coats things. It also creates a false sense of identity because it does not deal with issues of class difference. In other words, it does not take into account that all white don’t like each other just because they are white. There are class disparities, which are historical, that separate groups.
Quite frankly, I don’t give a damn if my white neighbor hates me because I’m not white. However, when I go to the bank, when I get stopped by the cops, when I go get food, and when I try and buy a home I’d like to get fair treatment. Most of the time, however, that is not the case. And, even us non-white people will treat white people better than ourselves because we have racial issues within our communities that privilege skin fairness. You probably didn’t know that.
Again, the problem with diversity training is that it makes people, in particular, people who identify as white feel guilty for disliking minorities. But it does not get at the fact that when I move about most people, including non-white people presume that I’m an illegal alien and a criminal. Put differently, it does not get at the fact that when most people are moving about in their daily lives they do not exist with the presumption that the next white man or woman they meet will be the next Tim McVeigh, a Klansman or skinhead, someone who is going to run a plane into the IRS building, someone with a low credit score, an ex-felon, a thief or a rapist.
Racism is about stereotypes but it’s about a much broader form of affirmative action that white people have benefitted from within the contexts of education and schooling, food, shelter, voting rights (i.e. does anyone know about the voting rights act of 1965?? anymore) among other things. But we don’t think about historical white access to education, the job market, food, shelter, etc. in the US as affirmative action. We just think of it as hard work because we don’t think historically anymore in this country. In fact, we refuse to think historically. We don’t think about George Bush getting into Yale with a below average grade point and becoming the President as affirmative action.
So, those are my two cents. I respect you for writing this piece because race/racism can polarize audiences. In other words, I appreciate your risk. People both white and non-white get real nervous when race and and racism come up. Quite frankly people don’t know how to talk about these issues but they do nonetheless indirectly or in private. So, I appreciate you going public.
Should you have stopped the assailant? Well, I think not, but only because you are not a cop and may have gotten hurt. You are not trained, in other words; and, it’s crazy out there. Would you have thought that a white man running towards you in the same context was a thief? That’s something you have to ask yourself. Would most people think that a white person running towards them was a thief? That’s something we have to ask ourselves. Should you not critique black people? Of course not, we all have our opinions but we also ought to look into things a little deeper than just personal feelings. Personal feelings are inherited and reinforced across time; but they are not necessarily driven by educated assumptions, research, or facts.
Cam – I agree that there would have been risks in stopping the thief. My concern was more about the way I was thinking than whether he got away or not. The bigger point, that many people seemed to miss was the fact that before “diversity training” I didn’t think of my friends in terms of their skin color.
To me this seems quite a bit better. But I’m getting told I’m an idiot and only think that way because of “white privilege”. So I have a question for you. Would you rather have your white friends think of you as their “black/mexican/etc friend” or not immediately realize they have any black/mexican/etc friends because that isn’t how they define you?
Sorry, I don’t buy it! This must have been the most effective training class in the whole universe to blame it for brainwashing all your future actions so thoroughly. You might want to package and sell the method.
You are trying to tell us that a single training session you received at a different job, in a different city, a fairly long time ago (that I suspect, the effectiveness of which, you were already not all to persuaded of and thus remember it so well) made you not stop someone that could have been doing all kinds of things besides running away from the scene of a crime? Did something like the policeman yell something like “Stop, thief” or “Stop that man” indicate that this was a crime in progress and you still didn’t stop him because of the diversity training? If no, I have a feeling that the consequences of an error in judgment played the real role in your decision to let him pass.
For all you know, as you suggested, he could have been, e.g., running to meet his grandmother at the subway after having run home to get her forgotten purse, looking behind him to see if he upset the person he may have bumped into. I could come up with several other plausible alternate situations that could be seen as a possible purse-snatcher eluding the law.
If you are honest with yourself, the fact that it was a black man running down the street/sidewalk did, most likely, influence your first impression. Just close your eyes and imagine if it had been a white guy? Denying the influence is counter human nature that dictates that humans heavily use visual queues to infer and assess threats and situations in general.
I think your story could have possibly been a better post about first impressions.
I’m not sure you read the full article. The thief was one example. Even more important is the part where I was told I was a racist for not having any black friends. With that type of predisposition, I am very confident I would have assumed a white person in the same situation was a thief.
I did read the full post, and I even just went back to check; although someone could make an assumption that you were told that you were racist because you didn’t have black friend, you do not say as much anywhere in your post. From your characterization, it does not sound like the “training” was all that productive and may even have, as your post suggests, caused more damage than it was useful.
No one should be considered racist just because they don’t have friends of a certain skin color. Although racism causes the separation in the USA, the problem of people of different ethnic backgrounds not intermingling as much as the mythical melting pot suggests, also has a lot to do with insecurities and discomfort about how the cultures are to approach each other. This is a far bigger issue than could ever even be discussed in this post, but I would suggest to you that you seek out some quality university classes on the subject. Unfortunately, Universities are the only place in America where the topic is thoroughly discussed and examined.
I still am not all that convinced that the potential consequences of tackling someone who may not really be committing a crime did not play a bigger roll than the consequences of a single “training” session. For that matter, just the fact that you are probably not someone who is regularly poised and ready to tackle common criminals out in public. Depending on the laws where this incident happened, it may have even been quite a bad situation if you tackle someone; because it is still assault when you just tackle, restrain, or physically stop someone. If you were going to simply, lets say, block the path; I also don’t think it would have been all that productive to potentially land in the hospital as a man, in full sprint checks you and busts open your skull on the pavement.
To get back to the point you seem to have been wanting to make, that it is better to just be “color blind”, I would like to offer the following article regarding research, generally, on this topic http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2010/02/how-to-raise-racist-kids/
My point with the article was to examine the thought process that was going on in my mind during those few seconds. Stopping him may or may not have been a good idea, but that wasn’t the mental difficulty I was facing at the time.
Yes the speaker was implying that a good barometer of how racist you are is the number of black friends you have. If you get a bunch of brown eyed people in a room and tell them that they are probably unconsciously prejudice against blue-eyed people you are going to start creating problems that don’t already exist. However, that is basically what we do with skin color. Other studies of children have shown that when you start giving them ways to categorize themselves, they start seeing their own category as superior to others. That doesn’t mean you can’t ever talk about race, but making it a major way to categorize ourselves and others isn’t helping. If we’d treat skin color the same as hair color or eye color, I think we’d be much better off as a society.
Now cultural issues are an entirely different issue. There are a number of cultures I do not care to extensively associate with and many of them predominately populated by people who share my skin color. Cultural differences are not something I was talking about in this article.
Yes I’ve previously read that link. They talk about how depressing it is that only 8% of white kids have a best friend that is from another race.
I’m not saying that we should never teach kids anything about race. Any decent education will give kids a good understanding of how various races have been mistreated over the years and an appreciation of what some historical figures had to overcome, but this can be done without recreating an emphasis on different skin color in the present.
Hey Mark – I just wanted to say that this was a great piece.
Signed,
Someone who gets it.
I once volunteered in an adjunct to a church’s donation center. We had a line for Spanish speakers and a line for English speakers. I worked behind the English-speaking window, meaning I helped the blacks and the whites. People seeking assistance needed to have several forms filled out BEFORE we could help them with food, shelter, training, etc. I got tired of people standing in line for hours, just to ask me at my window if I could give them money or food without having filled out any paperwork, so I posted several HUGE signs telling them if they had not yet picked up and filled out the church’s paperwork, DO NOT stand in line here until they did fill it out.
Surprise, surprise, people STILL stood in line and on a daily basis asked me at my window for food/assistance claiming no knowledge of any need for paperwork! This got me angry, and when WHITE people stupidly ignored the signs, I ripped into them. But when BLACK people did the same thing, I politely told them that they’d have to go to whichever church it was that referred them and fill out that church’s paperwork before we could assist them.
This was racism in effect. I reacted differently to people based on their color; I could feel fine reprimanding people of my color for not following the basics, but I very kindly told the black people the steps they’d have to take, for fear that they’d accuse me of racism. Yes, until we truly treat ALL people the same, we will all be “racists”.
You may “forget” that your friends are persons of color, but as Cam described, society doesn’t.
We don’t need diversity training. We are already diverse. Such training should focus on anti-racism work and working on institutional racism.
We don’t pay significant attention to hair color or eye color because people aren’t always pointing it out. You don’t say, “How many blue eyed friends do you have?” Perhaps society would treat skin color more like eye or hair color if there wasn’t as much effort going into making it different.
Cultural differences are a separate issue.
Mark, how many people have been enslaved because of their hair or eye color ? Have there been a mass of lynchings of blue-eyed individuals ? Have blonds been denied the right to vote? Are those with green eyes profiled by the police. In Tulia, Texas, a large number of blacks were targeted by police, had drugs planted on them and were wrongly arrested. It’s a major case, Google it. Any groups of blue-eyed people receive similar treatment ???? In Philly this summer, a group of black children were refused entry to a pool even after they had paid. I don’t recall any blond students being treated like that, perhaps you can refresh our memories.
The diversity training officer merely pointed out something that is already noticed by society. I don’t think you’re racist, but I do think you are very ignorant. You cannot compare people of color to people with blond hair or those with blue/green eyes because the latter groups aren’t catching hell like people of color.
While you yourself may not judge people based on color, society for the most part does.
Shane – It would be better if we treat skin color the same way as eye or hair color. Diversity training often tries to emphasis differences with people who don’t notice the color of other people’s skin. If you read my post, you’ll see that the example I gave was this: I didn’t realize I had black friends until I was called a racist for NOT having black friends. Then I started noticing the color of my friends skin. I couldn’t tell you how many blue eyed friends I have and it would take me a bit to count the number blond people I know. So if you call me ignorant because I classified my friends in one bucket (friends) instead of two buckets (black friends and white friends) so be it. I think the world would be a better place if everyone only noticed skin color like they notice hair color.
My point is that society is being trained to notice skin color and trained to see, notice, and treat black people differently than other people. That is where I think diversity training is harmful.
(I think it is interesting/odd that you referred to the person doing the training as an “officer”. )
having grown up in a multi-cultural society, we were though to recognized people’s, race, nationality and gender. and to respect every part of it. its like noticing and appreciating the color of someone’s hair or eyes.
it doesn’t make me a racist, it makes more informed because i’m acknowledging these details. people are not colorless homosapiens with atitudes, i dont think i wanna be remembered as one either.
But if you start thinking about all blue eyed people in one way and all brown eyed people in another and treating them differently, I would argue that your recognition is causing harm.