STOP CALLING ME A RACIST

I was born on Sunset Boulevard. My mother was Mexican, and my dad was black. My friends, neighbors, and schoolmates hailed from every corner of the world, every color of the rainbow. 

My parents’ best friends were the Marshalls, the Itos, the Mendelsons, and the Dobrovics. (That is, a black couple, a Japanese couple, a Jewish couple, and a Russian couple.) Their children were among my best friends, almost from birth. 

I still believe that we kids were a colorblind generation. Of course we were keenly aware of the racial tensions in our city, as the wounds of the Watts riots were yet fresh. But in East Hollywood we lived in a melting pot, an island of civility.

On Christmas Eve, our family invariably spent the day at Aunt Bea’s house in South El Monte. There we enjoyed a dinner of turkey, stuffing, ham, and the customary fixin’s. (Plus tamales, tacos, and menudo.) Then on Christmas morning we ventured out to Aunt Sharon’s place in South Central LA. There we feasted on eggs, bacon, waffles, and all the usual suspects. (Plus grits, greens, and gumbo.)  Indeed, my sister and I grew up in an eclectic milieu of many cultures. We didn’t know that it was unusual, and we didn’t care. Life was good. 

When I was in the fourth grade, a white kid and a black kid fought on the playground. Our principal assumed that we had an incipient race war on our hands, so she decided that we all needed a quick and intense dose of racial sensitivity training.

A few days later, we watched a film that described a typical day in the life of a boy in Mexico. The narration went something like this:

¡Hola! My name is Juan. I live in May-hee-ko. This is my mama, and this is my papa. Every morning, my mama wakes me up. I get dressed, and she makes me breakfast. But we call it desayuno. Can you say “desayuno?” But we don’t have bread like you do, we have tortillas. Can you say “tortillas?”

It went on from there, in the same condescending tone.

The film ended, the lights came up, and we scratched our heads. Who do you think you’re talking to? This film didn’t tell us anything we didn’t already know. About a quarter of the kids in our class were Mexican, and the rest were already familiar with Mexican culture and cuisine. We gained nothing useful from this silly exercise.

In the early 1970s, the Los Angeles Unified School District decided to integrate their campuses. That is, they would send white kids to schools in black neighborhoods, and black kids to schools in white neighborhoods. Let’s just say that I thought it was a lousy idea.

For one, it seemed that my school and neighborhood were sufficiently diverse; we didn’t need anyone to rescue us by manufacturing a fake ideal society. My attitude was, it ain’t broke, so don’t try to fix it. Also, many of our campuses (including my own) had extensive damage from the Sylmar earthquake of 1971. In my mind, those millions of dollars could be better spent on rebuilding the schools.

On the evening news, and in the local newspapers, I discovered that my position was politically incorrect. Obviously, only a racist would ever deny a black child the opportunity for a better education in a nicer part of town. Right?

And so it began: Someone called me a racist for the first time, at the tender age of ten. Should I have felt guilty?

From that day, and through high school, ethnic-based controversies multiplied. So, if I…

·     Don’t favor a particular minority candidate for public office; or

·     Think that a company should hire the most qualified person; or

·     Believe that we should defend our nation’s borders; or

·     Sympathize with the genius Chinese student who aced his SAT yet got denied admission to college…

It can only be because I hate people who are different from me. I’m not allowed to hold a dissenting opinion.

When I worked in a restaurant, and seated the patrons in their order of arrival (forcing a black family to wait their turn), I got labeled a racist.

When I worked in a supermarket, and refused a black customer’s check (he had a record of passing bad checks in the past), he reported me to my manager as a racist.

In my current career as a literary agent, I receive over 5,000 submissions each year. From that number, I must turn away all but a few. Sometimes I get angry retorts. And about once a year, someone calls me a racist. Even though I had no possible way to know the author’s race at the time.

Just a few weeks ago in Minneapolis, a white police officer murdered a black resident. Right on cue, the local activists and news media cried “racism!” Before any investigation, they reflexively jumped to the most sinister possible motive. (As if a homicide wasn’t terrible, all by itself?)

Since then, I’ve witnessed countless speeches by preachers, politicians, and news reporters. And several of these commentators informed me that I, too, am a racist. Apparently, as a member of the human family, I just can’t help it. All of this, from a group of people who have never met me. And when they insist on being called by the title Reverend, my disappointment only grows.

Often, when I see the big-name activists give an impassioned speech to decry the evils of racism, I don’t hear a love for their own people. What I hear instead, is hostility toward the other guy. They fail to denounce the rioting and looting, which mostly punish the innocent. This kind of language doesn’t heal anything or anyone. It only makes the gulf wider and deeper. 

In an era where so many invoke the Constitution’s guarantee of Equal Protection, it saddens me that we apply this outrage so selectively. No one marches in the street, or torches a police car, to avenge the death of a white man. No one cries “racism!” when a black man did the deed.

All over our country, we hear cries of “end racism now!” This sounds familiar: A few years back, Attorney General Eric Holder pledged that he would “end racial profiling, once and for all.” More and more, we look to the government to fix our problems.

There’s only one problem with this plan: No government agency, anywhere, has the power to do it. Affirmative Action won’t do it. Hate crime legislation won’t do it. The most passionate rhetoric in the halls of Congress will never change a thing. No threat of punishment will ever turn a hater into a lover. 

With the iron hand of the state (aided by the sensationalist media), you can bully me into good behavior. (At least, for a time.) You can shame me into a closet with my prejudices, so that I make sure to get my picture taken with a black guy and a Jewish guy and a lesbian. (At least, for a time.) See, some of my best friends are...! But only God can change a person’s heart. Only God can reconcile enemies. Only God has the answers we seek.

What we need, is more mothers like Toya Graham. (Look it up.)

When I was a child, the ultimate political accusation was to call your enemy a Communist. The Soviet Union was the greatest threat to world peace, and Senator Joseph McCarthy worked to expose the evil hiding among us. In the process, he ruined the reputations and careers of many innocent people.

But today, Commies are cool. College students around our country proudly wear t-shirts bearing the image of Che Guevara. Socialist candidates win millions of votes, based on the promise of endless joy and prosperity through an economic system that has never worked anywhere.

Now, the ultimate political accusation is to call your rival a racist. Without evidence, we claim to know the private thoughts and attitudes of strangers. But for some reason, this (generally) only applies to white people. Only minorities are allowed to favor their own; and when they do, somehow, it’s downright virtuous. I don’t get it.

Surely, we must call the haters to repentance. And yet, it seems that we sometimes break out the heavy artillery far too quickly. It can be a cudgel, a careless act of retribution. When we pull the trigger on that “R” word too hastily, it adds another brick to the wall. It forestalls the conciliatory engagement that can start the process of healing. And nothing ever changes.  

Oh, how I long for those days of innocence at Lockwood Street School. I am proud, and profoundly blessed, to live in a free and prosperous country. This is the land of opportunity, where any child can grow up to attain his fondest dreams. This is by the grace of God, not because any of us have earned it.

I’m searching for a word. What do you call it when you form an opinion about someone you’ve never met? Oh yes, that word is prejudice. So please, until you get to know me…

Stop calling me a racist. I don’t deserve your scorn.