On Systemic Racism
Written by Darby Ford
Last week’s article provided a foundation for understanding the various forms of racism. As mentioned, individual racism is typically easier to spot and therefore easier to confront as a persistent issue. In this article, we move into understanding systemic racism, which is instead hidden in the systems that our country relies on: healthcare, education, employment, and more. Systemic racism is the cumulative effect of individual racism. At its core, these systems are created and run by individuals. These individuals each have their own biases surrounding Black people. As we discuss systemic racism today, pay attention to the ways in which small stereotypes about Black people found their way into our country’s infrastructure.
Our nation communicated the worth of a Black person during the Constitutional Convention, when they ruled that a Black individual counts as ⅗ of a person. From there, we saw white supremacy manifest in its most insidious forms. Less than 200 years ago, Black individuals were sold as property and abused without consequence. It took a civil war for us to abolish that abhorrent institution; even then, new forms of racism came along. Regardless of how it was displayed, at its core was the belief that Black individuals are less worthy of the American dream than other individuals. The media perpetuated racist stereotypes, showing Black people as animalistic and violent. This is exemplified in the feature film The Birth of a Nation, which shows Black people as a threat to the White establishment, to White women, and to society at large. As Black individuals gained more rights, the White establishment felt more threatened, and continuously reimagined racism.
Imagine you are finally freed from a system of enslavement, just to learn that you can only work blue-collar jobs, cannot live in “White neighborhoods,” and cannot receive any higher education. You are finally granted access to American life, but you cannot vote or participate in American democracy. This is the reality of Black America 100 years ago. From the Black Codes to Jim Crow laws, the White majority imposed harsh restrictions on the Black population in America. Even when “separate but equal” was the phrase of the times, reality was a far cry from equality.
These rights were denied to Black people solely because the White majority held prejudice against the Black population. As mentioned, systemic racism is the cumulative effect of individual racism. Thus, as systems were created by groups of racist individuals, the system itself contained evidence of their racism. Through the hard work of Civil Rights leaders, Black individuals have received greater access to equal opportunity. Yet as they say, the war isn’t over after a battle is won. Many of these systemic issues created in the past still persist today. Within this article, we will use the interconnected issues of housing and education to articulate how these past policies evolved into today’s racial disparities.
When FDR passed the new deal, he planned to boost the economy through increasing access to affordable, fixed, low-rate mortgage loans. The Home Owners Loan Corporation engaged in a process where they outlined which neighborhoods were most likely to pay back their loans, a process known as redlining. They were color-coded: those in green districts were the people with the most money and those in red were considered least likely to pay. The most consistent criteria for red-lined neighborhoods is the presence of Black and Brown people (NPR). Thus, you could not get a loan for a house in a red-lined district, barring the people in those communities from owning a home in their own neighborhood. As Black people were also banned from living in White neighborhoods, this left them with limited options for home ownership. In fact, the Federal Housing Administration would only give loan guarantees to those in suburban areas if they excluded African Americans from renting or buying the property. Read that one more time. People were barred from equal opportunity solely due to the racist individuals in power.
While this is an issue in its own regard, it also negatively impacted education. The public schools in the area relied on the property taxes of the nearby homes. As the value of the homes in these red-lined districts decreased, the property taxes decreased, and the schools received less funding. As the schools received less funding, the value of the houses continued to decrease. As these neighborhoods continued to decline in value, they saw less resources in terms of infrastructure and economic investment. The practice of redlining had a widespread effect on Black families, limiting their ability to access quality education, homeownership, and many other key ingredients to the “American Dream.”
You may be thinking -- “OK, but this was back in the early 20th century. With the Civil Rights movements, we saw many improvements, so why are we talking about this today?” Well, you’re right, we did see improvements. The Fair Housing Act of 1968 made it illegal to refuse to rent or sell a home to someone due to their race and the 1977 Community Reinvestment Act outlawed redlining (Forbes). However, this new legislation did not repair the damage that was already inflicted through these systems. Rather, we still see the effects of redlining today, with 44% of African American families owning homes compared to about 74% of white Americans (Forbes).
This is just one example of many. There are systems in this country that need to be scrutinized for racially-based roots and racially disparate outcomes. Our action items will give you a starting point to engage in further research surrounding systemic racism. Before we introduce those resources, we want to again emphasize the most important part of the learning process: listening. If you are in conversation and the issue of racial inequity arises, hold back your reaction to information and instead try to absorb it. This is especially true if you are learning it from someone that has been impacted first-hand. Listen, and then follow up with research. Through listening to those affected and through engaging with research, we can confront this issue and improve American lives.
Action Items:
Research into systemic racism. Choose one of the following resources to dive into (or dive into multiple, if you wish). This should serve as a starting point to your research.
Learn about the “school to prison pipeline,” which details how misbehaving students are funneled into the criminal justice system.
We challenge you to share what you have learned with one other non-Black person. In order to change the system, we must make others aware of why and how it falls short.