The 'Black' and 'White' Divide

This is the first, to the misfortune of my readers, of a series of 'alternate perspective’ articles I’ll intersperse amongst my usual pseudo-pithy commentary on social events. However, I do promise to keep their ratio to a minimum…

So, let me ask you, have you ever known a black person? Really? And, being a part of this melting pot of races we’ve become, I’m sure you know a white person or two. Yes? Good. Now, let me help remove the visors a bit so you might realize you’ve never met either of those creatures in your life before. Never.

‘Balderdash’, you cry. ‘Of course we all know blacks and whites’, another says. Well, sorry ladies and germs, but that’s sheer nonsense, I say in response. Look at the background color of this blog page (or ‘tone’ for the sticklers in the audience)…that’s black. Real, true, pitch black. Now are you still going to tell me you know a black person? And the text you’re reading right now is white. Personally, although I once knew an Albino who came close, I’ve never met anyone who made one cover the eyes from such, well, such whiteness.

‘Foul’, I heard someone out there shout. ‘Nothing but semantics’, someone else prepares to write in a comment. Sadly, not only is this not a matter of semantics, it’s a culturally accepted practice that, instead of helping us with improving race relations, serves as a perpetually drawn line-in-the-sand to exaggerate the differences between Caucasians and African-Americans with every single utterance; ultimately maintaining the ethnic divisions that have plagued our culture for the past several centuries...

Before I attempt an explanation of why we unconsciously create this divide with our words, let me pose a few more questions for you to chew on. I’m sure you’ve heard derogatory speech before describing those of Asian descent as ‘yellow skinned’ or Native Americans as ‘redskins’. Why is it that it never became socially acceptable to call people of those races ‘Yellows’ or ‘Reds’, all the while there’s never been a blink of the eye in using ‘Black’ or ‘White’? Actually, there are reasons behind it all, though when you understand it and what its use demonstrates, you might not like the answer so much.

First, let’s take a quick peak at our propensity to divide the world around us into dichotomous definitions. To a degree, I guess you can say we can’t help but be a little bipolar by our nature. As we evolved from a more primate version of man into the beast we are today, we have always been impressed by extremes. There is day and there is night. There is hot and there is cold. There is happiness/love and there is anger/jealously. Granted, there is a plethora of levels between each of those opposites, but, again, our memories are most molded by the advent of extremes. Think back in your own life…I would venture to guess that the most vivid recollections you can most easily access are those of the good times and the bad and/or painful times. The everyday routine-filled hours don’t seem to stand out in the long term.

So, you might be able to say we had an early physical disposition to view our surroundings in terms of opposites. As the intelligence of man developed, our reliance of this view only expanded. There’s the yen and yang, Heaven and Hell, good and evil, ally and enemy, etc., etc. Sure, a rationalized approach to these topics would be to accept that very little exists in such isolated extremes, but that’s just not our inherent instinct.

Okay, with those tidbits consumed, let’s look at the origin of the word ‘Black’ to describe those of African descent. The term first came into play in the early 1700’s by slavers in the American colonies. Its use grew exponentially along with the slave trade and it stayed extremely popular all the way through the Civil Wars. After the Civil War, freed slaves attempted to discourage public use of that tag name (as it had bad connotations and associations to them), instead preferring ‘Negro’.

In turn, the name ‘Whites’ for Caucasians didn’t hit the language scene until the mid-1800’s and wasn’t in common use until the Civil War. But even then, it was used in a somewhat derisive fashion to label those who were either poor or uneducated. It pretty much remained that way until the early 1900’s when it softened a bit to encompass all Caucasians. Although the word ‘Whites’ never left the American lexicon, it didn’t hit common nationwide use until the 1960’s when the Civil Rights Movement brought about a resurgence of the word ‘Blacks’, as popularized by African Americans. Since then, the use of both words became so heavily used that any past negative associations with them dissipated for the majority of citizens.

So, why is this a problem, you might ask (if you haven’t yet dozed off)? If those words have become a culturally-condone manner of expression, why should we have any trepidation in using them? That’s the sad answer here…because there’s something in our sub-conscious that can’t seem to let go of the silly concept that our races should remain separate. You may think that’s a harsh assessment, but I ask you - why else would we intentionally talk about each other’s race on a daily basis with additional attributes that simply aren’t there? In terms that would make an outsider to our current society wonder why we purposefully placed each other at opposite ends of the spectrum? A sort of politically-correct way of still defining the members of our races as ‘us’ and ‘them’. 'You're on that side of the chasm and we're on this side'. What’s worse, I’m afraid we do so for the sheer reason that we just don’t ever pause long enough to consider why it is that we do the things we do day in and day out, much less why we say what falls so haphazardly from our mouths.

Now, what’s the lesson of this rambling sermon? Hmmm. Perhaps there isn’t one. Maybe this is just another historical dissertation that’s not nearly as entertaining as the latest reality show. Or perhaps there’s an sneaky message that we need to truly realize we live in a world where there are no blacks, no whites, no yellows and no reds. There are only people shaded with the various colors of the planet from which we rose. Personally, I try my best to never qualify such traits when describing people I know, meet or see. In my mind, we're all at our core human, so there's little need (and definitely no benefit) for adding those ancillary divisions. So, if it's possible, the next time you innocently say ‘black’ or ‘white’, take pause and look at the people around you for just a couple of seconds…I guarantee your eyes won’t find any of those colors in the people you see. Not now, not ever… Jage