In his novel “White Like Me,” a wise Tim Wise (no pun intended) asked the question, “what does it mean to be white, especially in a nation created for the benefit of people like you?” (2). I am here, not to answer this question for you, but simply to get you thinking. I went into reading this book not knowing what I would get out of it. I had never heard of a white person writing a book about race, and I was unsure about the direction Wise would take with it. Truthfully, it is uncomfortable reading about how I, as a white person, am to blame for ongoing racism, which I like to think is not even part of our society anymore. However, after reading the novel, a takeaway I have is that racism is real, is still here, and is a major factor in the downfalls of society today.
Similar to my past novel “Cinderella Ate My Daughter” which dives into the issues of gender inequality, “White Like Me” takes a look into how media is plaguing the impressionable minds of young children today. Flipping through my “OnDemand” channels one day, I realized that the stars in all the shows I was skimming through were Caucasian. Being a white female of critical thinking age, I was able to acknowledge this unspoken normality and move forward with my channel surfing. However, as I thought about it, I realized the idea that the stars of these television shows were portraying was that “purity is white” (116) and anything other than that is not normal. The women I watched in the media growing up, whether princesses or attorneys, all seemed accessible to me, because they looked like me. They were the main characters of every show I watched. Images of minorities in the media are more limited to maids, goofy sidekicks, or other minor characters. With extremist groups such as the Ku Klux Klan still in circulation today, the last thing our society needs is racism in mainstream media.
The more I see members of the Ku Klux Klan and other White Supremacists making appearances in my news feed, the more I believe Tim Wise’s accusation that “whites have been damaged by racism and the mentality of privilege that comes from it” (152). Without realizing it, we’ve internalized the idea that we are the superior race and we act accordingly, often without further reflection. This notion, that white people are damaged by their sense of superiority, no longer seems like the extremist opinion of an “out-there” white, liberal, race activist anymore. It seems real. Can we blame hate groups for acting on the attitudes that so prevalently surround them? As horrible as these groups are, our society’s evident racist attitudes sink into the minds of young, white children and cause them to go along with it. We expect new generations to fight back against the racist attitudes of previous generations, yet it is human nature to do as we see our elders do. It seems to me that the biggest problem facing America is the “lack of [white] role models to whom [white youth] can look for inspiration, advice, and even lessons on what not to do” (91) regarding racist opinions and acts. It takes the willingness to be vulnerable, honest, and fearless to acknowledge that perhaps society is tilted in the favor of white people and thus it is our responsibility to tilt it back.
Being white to me means being oblivious to the racism in America until I stop myself to reflect, to read books such as “White Like Me,” and to have conversations with people of other backgrounds about their experiences. Moving forward, I am going to attempt to be more involved in campaigns such as “Black Lives Matter” and to educate myself and my peers, both white and black, on the issues of privilege and institutionalized racism. What will you do to end racial inequality?