Racism: A Little Hard To Grasp At First (Like A Mirror)

Our first step in ending this vicious cycle is to change the commonly held definition of racism as meaning extreme hate. Racism is lack of awareness, lack of access, denial of history, willful blindness in regard to privilege, and the institutional norms and mechanisms that have disparate impacts on minority groups (like how we police, imprison, sentence, etc.). Racism means never getting the benefit of the doubt, the privileges of complexity, the right to make mistakes—if you are black or Latino. Just as an example, the Texas judge who allowed a white 16 year old who used the affluenza defense to avoid jail time after stealing cases of beer and killing four people in a drunken joy ride also sentenced a black 14 year old to 10 years for landing one punch that severely injured a victim who ultimately died two days later. That is why race matters.