http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/07/opinion/coates-the-good-racist-people.html
This is a great article. As a country we need to have a lot of consciousness raising exercises for white people. While I was not raised to be racist, my education did not include much about civil rights and nothing on redlining, blockbusting or the discrimination in jobs and education. I was taught that women and people of color were discriminated against but everything was kept vague and in the past. It is absurdly easy to never have a friend of color for much of the white people in this nation. The lies of my education would never have been challenged without meeting some great friends in my life. This concept that racist are monsters and not regular people makes it easier for the ignorant to make excuses for not actively opposing the status quo. The “I’m not a bad person who would consciously discriminate” is a barrier to thinking about how as a white person I am the beneficiary of racism just by being white even if I never “personally discriminate”. Being a beneficiary of discrimination means either we make a point to only live in mixed neighborhoods, push for diversity at work, have friends from diverse backgrounds and support equality laws or we are part of the problem.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/annanorth/planned-parenthood-moving-away-from-choice