When Party Talk Turns to Race

I was at a pretty low-key party last night with some friends, mostly all just sitting around a large dining room table eating and drinking.  I don’t exactly remember how, but somehow the conversation turned to race, which is of course normally quite charged; we’re not a bunch of social activists or race experts, but a group of scientists who have a lot of different opinions and, my guess is, different exposure to the study of race and class on either an academic or personal level.

I was most happy to find one of the new guys in our department was not afraid to adamantly point out his white male privilege and “white liberal guilt” and to question “Why don’t we have any black friends, why is our department all white, why is this CITY all white?”  Ahh, new friend!  (You can definitely question whether or not he should feel any guilt, that is legitimate, but at least give him props for admitting his feelings.)

You can imagine the knee-jerk reaction of most at the table:

“I’ve just never lived anywhere with a lot of black people.  Are you saying that I should go seek out black friends?  I think that’s MORE racist!”

“Why should I feel guilty?  I’m not doing anything wrong.”

“Anybody could move to this city if they wanted to, no one is stopping them.”  (The cost of living is over 150% the national average here.)

“Well what are YOU gonna do about it, what is your anger doing?”

“There’s no real problem because everyone is treated equally.”

It’s amazing to me, who immerses myself in blogs like Feministing every day, that people still don’t see a problem with inequality and just say that the blatant injustice in this world “is just how it is” or “is not a problem.”  Certainly, I read about these sentiments, but don’t expect them to be expressed by my own friends.  

A few of us continued in the conversation for the whole night.  Some upsetting things were said, but in all we felt like we wanted to engage in the conversation.  However, that was only a few of us.  Sitting here the next morning, I think that the most upsetting thing to me was that most of the attendees (all white men, and later one woman) just got up and left the conversation less than ten minutes after it started.  

I think what I’m most upset about is the fact that I should have used this to explain my anger.  Because later in the conversation, when the first guy and I were pressured on basically how to solve inequality, I pointed out that we don’t have to have all the answers, but people have to recognize it and be angry about it before anything can change.  Someone asked me again, “What’s the point of being angry?”  I should have better explained that if this conversation had never happened, if we had kept our mouths shut, then no one else would have recognized the problems at hand.  Another guy kept saying that within 100 years, there would be no discrimination, but I pointed out that wouldn’t be the case if people aren’t angry and if people keep saying (as he did earlier that night) that everyone is treated equally when they are not.  I should have explained that when half the party gets up and leaves the table to avoid having this conversation, things will never change.  When they are insulted and offended and defensive when you try to suggest that they have an inherent privileged position in society, they’ll never see what’s wrong and resist ways to change.

It was definitely an experience that was thought-provoking and that I haven’t had since moving here for graduate school.  Although I’m still offended by the words and actions of some of my friends, I’m glad that at least these things came out in the open rather than being hush-hush about it all.  And at least now they know how I feel, too.