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Right and Left Both Have the Color Line at the Center
Commentary
By Roberto Lovato, Pacific News Service
Both Republicans and Democrats are touting their racial
inclusiveness this electoral season, but the color line is alive and
well not just in the parties but also many of the non-governmental
organizations that oppose their policies
NEW YORK-September 16, 2004- This election year, both parties are
taking credit for their supposed progress on the ever-ticklish topic of
race.
The Democrats are giving Barack Obama a prime-time starring role while
Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie makes repeated
references to "celebrating a milestone achievement in our party's
connection with America's minorities." One of the delegates to the
Republican Convention, Dominican American Fernando Mateo told me, “In
terms of minority representation, the party has grown by more than 70
percent since (2000)."
Of course, a closer look at the convention showed the Republican Party
is still an overwhelmingly white institution, a glorified gated
community where non-whites (excluding those propped up for photo
opportunities) sweep, caretake and do almost everything except exercise
power.
The claims of inclusiveness don’t stop with the rhetoric of Democratic
or Republican leaders. Peace-minded protesters, progressive
organizations like United for Peace and Justice (UPJ) and others outside
of the politico-corporate consensus claim similar advances.
Judith LeBlanc of UPJ pointed out that the Republican platform (and the
hawkish Democratic platform) would continue to put disproportionate
numbers of African Americans and Latinos on the squalid floors of
abuse-laden prisons and on the deadly desert grounds of Iraq rather than
on the green lawns of good schools.
Yet, Leblanc, who is Native American, also acknowledged a "major
problem" facing those opposed to the mainstream political agenda--the
depressingly low number of non-whites in media, nonprofit organizations,
and left-of-center groups and coalitions. One visible measure of the
contradictions and depth of the racial problem is that those who make up
the new majority in New York probably constituted fewer than 5 percent
of the labyrinthine line of those who marched against war, poverty and
other injustices disproportionately affecting these same non-white
communities. Similar statistics can be found in organizations and
marches in Boston, Washington, Los Angeles and most major cities where
whites are now minorities.
This lack of concrete non-white power in Republican, Democratic,
conservative and progressive ranks bodes ill for social change in the
United States. In effect, the central debates of the 21st Century have a
"color line" running through them. The "color line" may be less black
and white than the one described by W.E.B. Dubois, but it is still with
us, and with a vengeance.
The problem in today’s struggle is that minorities – white minorities –
are running both sides of a fight that will define who succeeds and who
suffers, who lives and who dies. The national debate is still run along
the same lines as the upcoming Bush-Kerry debates: two or more white
people speaking authoritatively about issues affecting the rest of us.
With the exception of some labor unions and a few other, mostly local
organizations, the internal debates and daily work within 527
organizations like Move-On, within anarchist groups, alternative media
and others doing truly important work in left-of-center America also
suffer from the lack of voices echoing the new urban majority
surrounding their hip workplaces and their ungated but gentrified
neighborhoods. The struggle against gated global empire is itself gated
off from the majority.
Viewed from inside, it’s clear that too many non-white leaders are
placing too much emphasis on mobilizing Latinos and other non-whites to
vote, their vision has a horizon that doesn't extend beyond November
2nd. These leaders, too many of whom have become cartoonish professional
"people of color,” make too little effort to build leadership in their
communities at a time when oppositional movements will need even
mightier momentum after November.
While efforts to broaden their movement should be applauded, UPJ's and
other progressive organizations’ efforts aren't enough. Deep change in
this country won't take place until large numbers of non-whites, and
whites, are marching, protesting and acting to change priorities. While
it may take another Bush victory for most to realize this, some,
especially those of us in the non-white community, are increasingly
cognizant of our own role in the solution to a problem we must all own
up to.
"We need to organize ourselves and then step up to the table to
negotiate with Caucasians," says Mallika Dutt, executive director of
Breakthrough, a New York-based human rights and social justice
organization. She adds, “Only then can long-term change take place.”
Among those as aware of the color line as South Asians and other
non-whites like Dutt, race cannot be relegated to the back of the
progressive bus because we may, in fact, have to take the bus apart and
rebuild it after the elections.
“Even within the so-called progressive movement if you're not actively
confronting racism and white supremacy you're building a house of
cards,” says Michael Novick, a veteran education organizer and author of
a book on whites and racism. Novick, a white man whose lessons in
activism grew out of helping to organize Vietnam War protests at
Brooklyn College, says, "It's not just a matter of pointing your finger
at the powerful and saying, 'He's the problem.'”
All of us, white and non-white, it seems, must fix a broader problem
that will vex us as much as national security long after November’s
elections. Regardless of who wins, we all lose if we forget the color
line.
PNS contributor Roberto Lovato (robvato63@yahoo.com)
is a Los Angeles-based writer. |
