Fire in the Heart: White Activists for Racial Justice

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Harvard sociologist Mark Warren uncovers the dynamic processes through which some white Americans become activists for racial justice in his new book Fire in the Heart.  Warren finds that the motivation to take and sustain action for racial justice is profoundly moral and relational.  What paths have white activists taken to embrace activism?  What challenges have they faced?

recorded March 2011

 

2 thoughts on “Fire in the Heart: White Activists for Racial Justice”

  1. I hope Mr Warren will discuss some of the activism with Cantabrigian roots. In particular I think of “Peoples’ Theatre”, started by Ruth Elder in 1964. Ms Elder started PT as a way of bringing together people with different racial backgrounds to share common interests, to work side by side in community theater, and in doing so to get to know each other on a person-to-person basis, which, she calculated, just might challenge racial stereotypes.

    All the work of PT, including casting of roles, was done independently of race. The race-blind casting provided an educating challenge to some members of the audience (eg two black parents with a white child, or the judge in Salem in “The Crucible” who was played by a black man (who happened also to use crutches — stereotypes of another artificial division), or a southern slave played by a white woman).

    Had I known PT’s purpose beforehand, I might (with my rural midwest prejudices) have avoided joining, but a friend introduced me and I was offered a role — this flattery got my devotion for the first production, then I stayed for several years because I had made friends (admittedly not so much across racial lines at first). PT provided me my first real opportunity to begin breaking down my own racism.

    David Peterson

  2. I heard a re-broadcast of Mr. Warren’s piece today on my local NPR affiliate and I felt compelled to express my discontent. His entire postulation seems to based on the premise that racism is the unequal treatment of blacks by whites. This is preposterous, insulting and typifies the kind of skewed bent which so often comes from liberal Harvard academia.

    To be sure, the racial divisions between blacks and whites in America run long and deep. No one can justify the immorality of kidnapping and slavery which brought to our shores a legacy of racism. That being said, the institutions of “racial justice” and “racial equality” are built on very slippery slopes. To bring to justice the crimes of the past would mean holding to account the current descendants of slave traders who themselves have had no had no hand in their perpetration.
    And as concerns equality, the only true equality is that of opportunity. The false pursuit is that of egalitarianism, or equality of outcome. The truth is that, despite our issues about race, nowhere else in the world does there exist the opportunity which Americans enjoy. This is not, of course to say, that we should not strive to improve our relations with one another. However, to do so requires not the activism of shame, but a new education of the citizenry as a whole about the kinds of values that are not culturally specific, but are universal to humanity.

    Furthermore, to gather anecdotes from whites who have witnessed racial crimes and been inspired to work towards harmony seems on its surface to be innocuous enough, but the undertones present are of white guilt and that those who are not “of color” should somehow feel responsible for the plight of all the disadvantaged and disenfranchised. I for one refuse to be guilted into a sense of shame simply for being of the color of my skin.

    Lastly, I would address culture. To achieve this diverse, multi-ethnic, color-blind society which is so pined after by the left, we should have to lose all sense of individualism and heritage. When we advocate this melting pot where all peoples can come to join in a melding and sharing of all views, all customs, all values, then the ensuing relativism only devalues all of these in the interest of harmonious existence. The reality of multi-culturalism is a brave new world of conformity for all and condemnation of the free-thinking individual.

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