Letters to the Editor: The idea that Black people cannot be racist is preposterous
To the editor: After reading Clyde W. Ford’s piece defending former WNBA star Sheryl Swoopes for saying that Black people cannot be racist, I feel that such baloney should not go unchallenged.
I don’t care what the Kerner Commission is or how it defined racism in the 1960s. To say that people of any particular American racial or ethnic minority can’t be racist is absurd.
Racism does not require the superiority in power or numbers on par with white people in America. It can and has infected individuals and small groups of people who have little or no power. It is merely an attitude or belief, usually derogatory, about a race or ethnicity that is not true.
But even if you believe the Kerner Commission’s requirement of superior power, that doesn’t exclude individuals. Any time a Black person or a member of another group is stronger than someone else and subjects that person to harm because of race, that is racism.
Al Fisicaro, Los Angeles
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To the editor: Apparently, Swoopes has never met North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, who happens to be Black.
He is a Holocaust denier who has made other antisemitic statements. He is against women’s bodily autonomy. He is also running for governor.
His opponent, Josh Stein, is that state’s attorney general and Robinson’s polar opposite. He believes all Americans deserve equal rights as stated in our Constitution, regardless of race, sex, religion or place of origin.
These are the facts. Please look them up.
Marcy Bregman, Agoura Hills
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To the editor: Although competing definitions of the term “racism” risk controversy and being tagged Orwellian, Ford is right: “If we don’t talk about race in this country, all we will do is fight over it.”
Saying that Black persons can be racially prejudiced, but can’t be “racist,” tees up a worthwhile discussion of the proposition that prejudices held by the more empowered can be more damaging and therefore merit higher remedial priority than prejudices held by the less empowered.
However, it also risks losing sight of the fact that racial prejudices, coupled to power or not, are still damaging.
Anyone treated less respectfully because of their skin color suffers injustice — which may make them less interested in discussing the proffered distinction between racism and prejudice.
Racial prejudice isn’t “mere” harm, any more than minor assaults and petty thefts are “mere” misdemeanors. It’s still wrong and still part of the discussion.
G. Andrew Lundberg, Los Angeles
