Neal has always been a little more apathetic about the issues than I am. But lately he’s had a new-found interest in discussing the issues facing our society. And I have this video to thank for it. I urge you to consider these issues as well:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5tmnBeNv18
Think about it.
Five living presidents
Seeing this picture made me think about the fact that I was intending to write a post following the election in November. I wanted to wait a little while, let things simmer down (for me, mostly, because this election got really old to me a long time before November 5th!!!). But it’s probably been long enough now for me to say the few things I wanted to say.
First off, I did not want Obama to be the next president. I find some of his positions troubling to my very core. I worry constantly about some of the directions he’ll take us in. I guess deeply troubled is the best way to put it.
But there is one thing–one REALLY BIG thing–that excites me. Even though I worried about Obama winning in the weeks and months (or was it years we were talking about this darn election?!) leading up to it, I worried as much about the possibility of him not winning because he’s Black. In past years, I’ve read psychological and sociological theory related to voting behavior (I used to be a political junkie until…well, we won’t go into that here) and some of those theories would suggest that it would ultimately be difficult for many people to vote for a Black man, despite what they might say to pollsters before entering the voting booth (see social desirability bias, for example).
This was particularly on my mind this summer as almost 70% of our interviewees were Black Americans. If anyone wonders whether racism still exists, you need look no further than our criminal justice system. It is rampant with both institutional racism (e.g., harsher punishments for crack cocaine violations, a more commonly Black crime, than powder cocaine, a more commonly White crime) and racist attitudes (“you don’t want to interview ‘those people’”). Not that our interviewees complained much about it; very few either subtly or overtly blamed their situation on racism. But it is there, everywhere, and in some moments, it felt so thick I could cut it with a knife.
So I rejoice in this: a significant boundary has been crossed. I believe it is psychically important for all Americans, but especially Black Americans, that the new first family looks like this:
