Teach Your Children Well

While the vast majority of the country is looking forward with hope and anticipation to the start of Barack Obama’s presidency, a small minority of bigots are not only still licking their wounds, but refusing to accept the reality of America with a Black president.

While many bigots were concerned that Obama would win, many of them have apparently decided that his election was the end of the battle. For others, however, the concern that Obama will actually be successful is apparently more pressing. Some of the post-election hatred is coming from self-proclaimed Christians (something tells us Jesus might not approve) – and not just folks sitting around their homes. Here is the marquee from a church in Wichita, KS. Click to watch the video (below) of CNN’s Rick Sanchez’s story that includes the church’s pastor explaining (or trying to explain) the sign.

And, lest TWIR readers think the suggestions of Obama as anti-Christ were mere campaign ploys, see this Newsweek story about folks who seriously believe that he is.

The great wish that America’s racial tensions will lessen with subsequent generations is jeopardized by the resentment that some White Americans are passing down to their children. What was once implicit racial bias has, as we predicted, become explicit in the weeks since Obama was elected.

Among the most prominent in the news THIS WEEK is the incident in Rexburg, Idaho where children on a school bus chanted “assassinate Obama.” Mayor Shawn Larson issued an apology that is worthy of our analytical attention:

"I am extremely sorry that this incident occurred, and I do not believe that it reflects the values which make our community a great place to live and raise a family," Larsen wrote. "Parents must realize that things said in anger or even in jest can have lasting repercussions not only damaging young hearts and minds, but a city's reputation."

Whether purposeful or not, Larsen correctly uses language that differentiates between layers of consciousness. “Values” reside at the deepest layer under consideration here – the aspect of our thought process that is least likely to be effectively challenged. Most Americans share values and, indeed, most humans share a deep commitment to ideas of justice, equality, fairness, honesty, etc. Two layers toward (into) consciousness reside “attitudes.” These are the most likely to be challenged and changed. Adults who are open and honest about their distaste for an African American president have bigotry that resides at the attitudinal level. Most Americans do not. So when Larsen says that he does not believe that it reflects the “values which make [their] community a great place to live and raise a family,” he is technically correct.

What he misses, however, is what most of us fail to consider – the level of thought that exists between values and attitudes: beliefs. This is the place where stereotypes reside. If you have ever wondered how two Christians, for instance, can have such different political attitudes, this is the answer. While the values are identical, the degree to which and the ways in which values correspond to beliefs drive the degree to which and the ways in which beliefs are manifested in conscious attitudes. What Larsen does not identify (or perhaps even recognize) is that the collective beliefs in his community, like so many other American communities, are deeply racist. In other words, his note about the community’s values is beside the point; the values of which he is so proud have not been reconciled with resentful beliefs, which is difficult to detect under normal circumstances between at the attitudinal level, folks do not wish to be racist and know that they “should” not be (and even think that they are not), so we are skillful at hiding those beliefs – sometimes from ourselves.

But at times of high stress, fear, excitement, etc., our defenses come down, and our attitudes begin to more accurately reflect our beliefs. When this happens, we are surprised (remember how shocked Michael Richards was when he went on a racist tirade against Black hecklers at his comedy show?) because we are not used to seeing this side of ourselves. That doesn’t mean that the hatred is new; it means that the filters that we use to hide the uglier aspects of our nature fall, and we get a glimpse into who we really are.

We encourage readers to take a look at Idahoan Jeff Brady’s thoughtful op-ed regarding this incident.

In Maryland, at least one school official is working to battle the bigotry that is being reflected through children by designing a curriculum that targets racial hatred in the context of backlash against Obama’s election.

But in other places, the school officials, rather than serving as a calming force against parents’ racial hatred, are attacking minority students in the wake of Obama’s election.

In Allison Park, PA (Western PA – you know, the area that criticized Congressman John Murtha for calling them racist), a teacher’s aide went on a tirade after overhearing a Black student talking with enthusiasm about Obama’s win:

"He started laughing and went over to another student, in front of another teacher, and said that 'Oh, guess what they're going to change the flag to? The KFC flag. And they're going to change our national anthem to 'Moving On Up.’''

It's disheartening on one level, but on another level, it is very important that we recognize that these beliefs exist (and have existed) despite all of the attempts to cover it up and despite Obama's election.