When you accuse someone of racism, you are making a very
bold claim about the character of the person you allege to be a racist. But we do
not treat it as a bold claim any longer, racism is not taken seriously. The
claim itself is usually made flippantly.
It is not made flippantly in the office or the public
sphere, where there are entities that mediate that claim and subject it to
critical analysis. It is made flippantly in the classroom. When one student
accuses another of “exercising white privilege” in an argument or using “hegemonic
white logic/rationality” they are fundamentally making the claim that the
accused individual is a racist.
As a person who is frequently accused of this kind of
so-called racism, I must candidly say that I take it very personally. It takes
me aback every time because when I contribute an argument to a classroom
discussion, I anticipate that my colleagues will respond using reason (which
permits them to disagree with me) but instead, what I receive is essentially an
attack on my character.
I believe that rational analysis of an issue is a method of
inquiry open to all of us, white or black, male or female and to have such an
attack made on me (almost weekly in one class) forces me into a position to do
one of two things: I can accept the accusation in silence or fight it.
The truth is, I am only in a position to do the former. I
know how to argue that reason is not white or how to explain that you should
judge my arguments based on their merits not on their “whiteness” but the form
of class discussion does not permit me to defend myself.
My colleagues are either ignorant of the claim being made
against me, or are otherwise prepared to accept it. When it comes to
accusations of racism, we are not prepared to engage in deliberation concerning
the charge.
My colleagues seem to want a quick judgment, a snap assessment
of the situation. And I am white (or at least that is the color of my skin) so
I must be invested in the power structure of privilege, therefore, I must be a
racist who is using privilege and hegemonic rationality to dominate the world.
The charge attaches to me because I am white, as it could
against any white person. That ought to be a comment on the validity of the
charge but it isn’t these days. In reasoned debate we say that such charges do
not “bite” i.e. they are not linked to anything that the accused has actually
done or said.
When such charges are made, they shut down my contribution
to discussion as I am forced to consider if there is anything actually racist
about my position (because I abhor racism, and would never want to exercise a
privilege I had not earned). Indeed they are a conversation stopper for all
reasonable people who might disagree because they too fear that the academic
polis will convict them of its most heinous crime: racism.
Thus, I am left to merely accept the charges lain against me
because the Athenians are not prepared to hear my plea but are ready to
rhetorically lynch me on the spot, and short of taking the hemlock of silence I
do not know how to deal with them.
I am tempted to say to race and gender studies what
Aristotle said to Athens when it was prepared to lynch him “I will not permit
this [discipline] to commit a second sin against [rational discourse]” and
leave off applying my ideas to race and gender permanently. But that seems to
be the coward’s way out, so rhetorically lynch me as you will, you will not make me leave the classroom.
Maybe one day I will become so accustomed to being accused
of racism that I snap back faster. And to those ivory tower academics who think
we have access to some privileged process of analysis, consider whether our
classrooms treat accusations of racism as stringently as the oft decried mass
media do.
*Everything I have written also applies to accusations of sexism, racism is just the charge du jour.
