First step: Honesty
By Ethan Smith
Published in News on November 7, 2014 1:46 PM
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News-Argus/CASEY MOZINGO
Shirley M. Edwards addresses the audience at a race relations forum held Thursday night at the Paramount Theatre. Mrs. Edwards, formerly the city of Goldsboro's community affairs director, challenged those present to deal with racial issues head-on to help break down barriers to a unified community.
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Race relations can be a difficult topic to discuss, but it must be addressed honestly and openly, the moderator at a community forum held Thursday night at the Paramount Theatre said.
Willie Ratchford is a certified trainer in mediation, diversity and communications. The executive director of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Community Relations Committee, he was invited by the city of Goldsboro to provide diversity training to city staff and to address the forum.
A place to start, he said, is to simply break bread with someone of a different race and build relationships. Once people do this, Ratchford said, faces that might have been one big blur beforehand come into focus and allow each side to see members of a different race as individuals instead of one big group.
"People come up to me sometimes and say, 'Willie, what are black people thinking?'" he said. "And I always say, 'Well, there are 40 million black people in this country, there is no way I can tell you what they're thinking -- but I can tell you what I'm thinking.'"
He asked the audience to define what race is. Answers varied from color to traditions. Ratchford countered them all by saying race isn't real.
"We made it up," Ratchford said. "There is actually no scientific or biological basis for race. There are no sub-species of humans. We are all 99.99 percent the same and choose to emphasize differences created by the one-tenth of 1 percent."
While slavery and Jim Crow laws have ended, he said, racism still exists. It has simply become more subtle, he said
Ratchford called it, "Have a nice day" racism.
Ratchford has worked extensively in equal housing. He says "Have a nice day" racism shows itself in this situation in a subtle way.
"A black man, with all the same credentials as a white man -- same income, same education, same credit references -- will go to rent an apartment," he said. "He'll be treated well, shown around, and even given milk and cookies. Then, at the end of the day, he will be told there are no apartment vacancies. A white man will go to the same apartment complex to rent an apartment on the very same day, and often cross paths with this black man as the black man is on his way out, and the white man will be given the exact same treatment. But at the end of the day, he is told 'Oh, we have four or five vacancies open immediately all ready for you to move in.'"
While racism has become more subtle, and increasingly uncomfortable to address, Ratchford said there are many ways it can be handled and fixed.
He said white people need to realize that the basic needs of blacks are no different from their own, and to recognize that people of color are just as worried as they are about high school dropout rates, poverty, gangs, drug abuse and the like.
He said whites also need to understand that due to implicit biases, everyday experiences for blacks are often different than they are for whites.
Ratchford urged people to put away stereotypes and to respect one another as individuals.
All blacks are not athletic and love fried chicken, he said. Then he turned the tables and said black people need to learn that not all whites are prejudiced.
"Do not be afraid to talk to the police, and understand that not every white person is racist," he said. "There is no sense for crime to go on because blacks don't want to be perceived as a snitch in their neighborhood if they talk to police. It hurts everybody."
Ratchford also had some strong words for black men and young black women.
"We need to tell black females that 'baby doll' syndrome is not cute," he said. "There is nothing cool about getting pregnant as a teenager. A baby isn't something you can play with and put away and come back to."
Black men, he said, need to step up and teach young black boys how to be men.
"There are a disproportionate number of single mothers in the black community," Ratchford said. "Females can't teach males how to be men. And men raised by single females see their mother working hard and think women are supposed to take care of men. Then you have black females becoming increasingly more educated, so these 20- to 30-year-old black men are impregnating 12- to 15-year-old black girls because at that age they don't know any better and these men are looking for someone to take care of them. These things are happening y'all. Let's be real."
Reparations begin by building relationships, Ratchford said, and education is the key to breaking the cycle and combating racism.
"Goldsboro is a reactionary community instead of a proactive community. You guys address problems after they happen," Ratchford said. "You have to put your foot to the pedal when things are good, before they go bad, in order to work on fixing these problems."