Turning Racism into a Major American export

For the more sensitive souls among us, the notion of monetizing and exporting racism is too obscene to think about, especially in today’s unceasingly polarized social and political environment. It is painful to acknowledge that some human beings have it in their character to behave with such callously predatory disregard. But it is every bit as much a growing trend as fake news and movies featuring characters from the Marvel Universe or DC Comics.

So what does that even mean? Very possibly that an already-volatile situation in #America and elsewhere in our otherwise magnificent Global Village is on its way to becoming worse before it gets better. 

I will contend that one of the benefits of having had an African-American president in the White House for the past eight years has been his calming influence upon other Blacks as #videos continued to accumulate showing one black man, woman, or child after another shot and killed by someone under highly-questionable (or painfully-obvious) circumstances.

Please consider this: how likely is our new president-elect to exert such a reassuring influence in incidents like that of the Trayvon Martin case, or that of: Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, Kajieme Powell, Eric Garner, Sandra Brown, Terence Crutcher, Senator Clementa Pinckney, and so many more that your head starts spinning and your bones feel like they are frying in your blood at the absolute insanity of it all?

Obviously, this is not to say that only an African American#president can help curb the impulse toward violent riots every time a racial #tragedy occurs. It is to say whoever occupies the presidency in any #society striving to maintain democracy’s relevance in the modern world must be willing to attempt to #cultivate a sense of empathy informed by cultural and #gender differences. That means doing so even if it does not come to him or her naturally. 

For more please click here: Positioning Racism to Make It a Major American Export

Aberjhani