Saturday, December 20, 2008

Is it possible for America to piggyback on Obama’s win and consciously choose to transcend race, and realize that it serves as nothing more than a tool to divide, rather than unite? Obama’s win clearly demonstrates that when we look past race, we actually see our commonalities, not our human divisions. As a former student of cultural anthropology at Harvard, I have studied race through many different lenses, only to come to the conclusion that race is and has always been a social construct utilized over centuries across this globe as a powerful and destructive tool to categorize, manipulate, control, stereotype and dehumanize “the other." Terrifying episodes throughout this world’s history illuminate this very issue: the Holocaust, American slavery, the Japanese American internment, and the list goes on. And unfortunately, fear of the “other” continues to manifest on a daily basis in everyday life today, from unjust racial profiling of Muslims in airports to DWB (driving-while-black), SWB (shopping-while-black), or even applying for a job while being “the other” (any minority). And as much as affirmative action and other legislative anti-discriminatory measures have sought to correct blatant and accepted racial discrimination, racism did not really go away – it just learned how to adapt and evolve, and how to cleverly use vocabulary, digging deeper into the recesses of creative expressions and measures in order to further enhance systemic racism, while simultaneously wearing a mask declaring that yes, “we truly are all equal.”

So what does Obama’s victory mean for American minorities? Does this mean that we can officially kiss racism good-bye and embrace the notion that it is a thing of the past? Only the naïve would have embraced such a concept, and clearly did not notice that there was a fairly significant portion of the American electorate that did not want to vote for Senator Obama simply because of his race. However, I will say that this nation has made tremendous progress since the days of slavery, and even the civil rights movement (there are many examples of such that I will save for a future blog post – and truly deserve mention!). Obama made it a point to run for President not as a “black man,” but as a man, who had a particular vision, and allowed men and women of different backgrounds, ages, religions, etc. to fall in love with him. He refused to acknowledge himself as “the other,” and purposely made it a point to in fact identify himself as “the same” – the same as “everybody else”: an American who truly craves change, and hopes for a better future – one that is not burdened by the systemic deficiencies and bureaucratic madness.

It is nevertheless important to note the amount of attention that his race has received in just two days post-election. Despite his efforts to detach from “the other” status, the media has officially made it a point now to talk about it in depth: “The First African American/Black President!!!” And such focus has led some people abroad (and in America) to wonder – “Was he elected because he was black?” My answer? I’m sure that played a factor for many voters, but for the most part, people voted for him because they could identify with him, with his vision, with his hope, his values. In doing so, the nation chose to “humanize” a black man in front of the world, thereby declaring its choice to humanize a person from a “race” that has been historically dehumanized for so long. And in my opinion, this is amazing progress for American culture and society! People who qualify as “the other” in juxtaposition to the majority can no longer claim that their “other” status permanently stamps them out of achieving success – because they have a very clear example of a man who would qualify as “other” and made it to the top.

But is the fight over for racial progress? Nope. Nor should we depend on President-Elect Obama to rescue the nation from the tangible and intangible traces of racism that still plague segments and sub-segments of American culture. It is up to every individual to look to Obama’s win as a symbol of what they can do – that they live in a country in which anything is possible, and they can dream as far as the stars if they wanted to – and not believe the hype that the “minority glass ceiling” exists. Why? Because November 4th, 2008, officially shattered the glass ceiling. This nation just has to be careful as it walks across the broken pieces of glass now scattered across its own foundation.

-Written By: Kris B.