Is racism still alive in America?

Former President Jimmy Carter claims that much of the criticism of our current President, Barack Obama, is based on racism, which has its roots in the south. Racism is often cited as the cause of poor schools, inadequate health care and a lack of economic opportunity for minorities in America.

Barack Obama is on record as saying it is time to have a discussion about race in America, so lets talk about it.

I grew up in a racist environment during the sixties in the South. I remember seeing riots on TV and hearing my friend’s mother say "they should send them all back to Africa."The first African American (black) person I saw up-close was probably when I was ten years old, when my family moved to Baltimore for a brief time. The neighborhood I lived in previous to that had no black families, and there were no blacks in my school, or at the store, or anywhere else I can remember. They all lived together on the other side of town.

When I was in high school, I recall there was quite a bit of turmoil over a community pool that was voting on whether to de-segregate and allow black members. I also recall at school lunch time how all the black students would sit apart from the whites.

I was in the band in high school and once a year we would have an exchange concert where band members from a school in another city would come and stay in our homes for a couple of days. I recall the band instructor informing us to let him know if we did not want to have a black student assigned to stay in our home.

After I graduated from College I worked for a company that was headquartered in St. Louis. The company employed about one hundred people in their Baltimore facility, where I worked, and more than that in St. Louis. The professional staff in St. Louis used the "N" word when referring to African Americans, and the company employed no black people that I was aware of.

I believe my experiences demonstrate that racism was prevalent in the communities and institutions I was associated with during my youth and early adulthood. I do not, however, feel that it is prevalent in modern day America.

There are plenty of minorities in the neighborhood I live in now. My children attended public schools and always had minorities in their classrooms. I never hear the “N” word mentioned at the workplace anymore, or just about anywhere else. Just about the only time I ever hear a racist comment or attitude anymore is from a retired person who is still living in the past.

While impoverished neighborhoods, poor schools and bad health care were a consequence of racism, they are no longer directly associated with it, in my opinion.

This being said, I am not arguing that minorities will not continue to struggle. What I am saying is that the struggle is now being brought about because of economic realties and politics.

Minorities do not have the same economic resources and political advantages that non-minorities have, so it is harder for them to advance economically and socially. While these forces were once racially motivated, this in no longer the case.

Racism is not dead in America, but it has been diminished to an extent that it should no longer be used as a tool to criticize legitimate opinions and pit one group against another. What was done in the past was wrong, and it had terrible consequences that we as a county will live with for decades.

It is time to stop living in the past if we want to begin repairing the damage that has been done and start looking forward to a brighter tomorrow.