My eyes were glued to the television when the speech that transformed a nation was reported in 1963. In the years since, I have read the text. Recently I reviewed a book about the writing of that speech. After all these years, the above quote seems to stand out in my memory more than any line of that speech.
Is it reasonable to think that those who have been victims of stereotyping, profiling, prejudice, discrimination and racism can somehow find a way to avoid judging others by the color of their skin?
Is it possible for us in America today, to truly be colorblind?
Is anyone -- or any group -- immune from discrimination?
Some would argue that discrimination is discrimination, regardless of by whom it is practiced and regardless of the victim.
Have we not all been both victim and perpetrator at some point?
On Friday, July 15, 2011, Chad Garrison reported in St. Louis's Riverfront Times the results of yet another court decision involving racism. East St. Louis is predominately black. Two black citizens (who both happened to be on the city's Board of Fire and Police Commissioners) advocated the hiring of several Caucasians to serve as police chief and officers. Wyatt Frazer and Della Murphy filed a civil rights lawsuit after experiencing what they described in the suit as harassment and discrimination. They won. Then in November of 2011, the THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS upheld the ruling and denied the defendants a new trial.
Mayor Alvin Parks had told the two plaintiffs that East St. Louis, "wasn't ready to hire a white police chief."
It reminded me of the Allan Bakke case from 1978. Bakke, a white student, was denied admission to medical school at the University of California -- due to racial quotas -- not affirmative action. His case led Supreme Court Justice Lewis Powell to say, "Preferring members of any one group for no reason other than race or ethnic origin is discrimination for its own sake." The court ruled in Bakke's favor and also clarified that affirmative action systems are legal and quota systems based on race are not.
Mayor Parks's statement seems to make it clear that the East St. Louis case is all about race. No wonder the plaintiffs won.
The East St. Louis case involves events that occurred in 2007. Flash forward to April of 2009 when the Associated Press presents an update on Bakke and a look at still more active cases of a similar nature.
A friend that voted for the incumbent assured me that having a black man as President of the United States would go a long way towards ending racism. Perhaps we have made significant progress since 1963, but are we close to being the nation of Dr. King’s dream?
Would anyone be surprised if the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr. would be disappointed with our status quo and agree that color blindness is a characteristic only of stereotyping, profiling, prejudice, discrimination and racism?
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