Colorblindness and History-Denying Movements
Given the history of race in America, colorblindness has taken on the characteristics of "history-denying" movements like those that reject the Holocaust. The 6 million Jews who perished in the Holocaust are comparable to this. Ian Lopez offers a historical account of racism and citizenship. "Those who want to claim that racism is nothing more than a ghost from the past must ignore history," he says (Hian-Lopez 17). People are treated equally regardless of their cultures, races, and ethnicities when a colorblind approach is used. The author of White by Law, Ian Lopez, expands on this topic by describing how racism is construed legally. The book emphasizes on whiteness and how social institutions use race as an excuse for racial oppression of minority groups. It also emphasizes on racism in terms of ancestry and historical social practices (Lopez 16).
The Documentary: Deadly Perception
In the documentary, deadly perception, the government sponsored scientific research that involved the study of untreated syphilis by use of 400 Blacks from Macon County. "Blaming the victim" is evident throughout the documentary because they recruited poor black males and they manipulated them because of their condition. The subjects were made to believe that they were receiving treatment but instead, they were actually getting placebos. The experiment was carried out from 1932 to the 1970s and it provides a chronological account of social and racial upheavals sponsored by the U.S. Department of Health. Other than segregation, racism and whiteness, the study is a depiction of physical, psychological harm and deception by social institutions.
Understanding Color-Blind Racism
To further explore this topic, Bonilla-Silva 34 writes, "disparities for example, is in everyone's eyes and the mind and some of the noticeable ideology of abstract liberalism works as the little voice in our heads telling us of having equal opportunities." Therefore, white people presume that they deserve what they have and the people of color are responsible for what they haven't achieved (Bonila-Silva 12). The use of four cognitive frames of color-blind racism seeks to explain the above argument. The use of abstract liberalism has enabled my understanding on how powerful whites are in justifying racism and racial inequality. The second frame is naturalization that gives credit to whites to validate ethnic inequality. This frame explains how school segregation considered natural and funding in school is disproportionate in society of color. Also, cultural racism associated blacks with the culture of poverty; a marker of social, political, and economical imbalance (Bonila-Silva 33). The forth frame is minimization frame that allows whites to practice racism by silencing the voice of oppressed.
Works Cited
Bonilla-Silva, Eduardo. Racism Without Racists: Color-blind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in the United States. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2010. Print.
Haney-López, Ian. White by Law: The Legal Construction of Race. New York: New York University Press, 2006. Internet resource.
