• Latest
  • Trending
  • All
  • News
  • Politics
  • Lifestyle
end systemic racism protest sign

Will Anti-Black Police Violence Push Whites to Support Systemic Change Now?

August 24, 2020
Civil Rights March 1963

The Women Who Stood With Martin Luther King Jr. and Sustained a Movement for Social Change

March 16, 2023
creed III

‘Creed 3’ Is a Great Movie That Centers Family, Friendship and Forgiveness

March 3, 2023
Roz Ryan, Andrea Lewis, and Pooch Hall are seen in this still from A Nashville Legacy

‘A Nashville Legacy’ Is a Feel-Good Hallmark Mahogany Movie Celebrating Black Music History

February 22, 2023
pile of books

In New Jersey, School Segregation Didn’t End; It Evolved

February 18, 2023
Karen Abercrombie

After Award-Winning Role in Top-Grossing Christian Movie, Karen Abercrombie Is Leading Change From Within

February 14, 2023
black women group

‘Righteous and Ratchet’ Black Women of Faith Embraced on Jemele Hill’s ‘Sanctified’ Podcast

January 23, 2023
Martin Luther King Jr. Photo

How the Distortion of MLK’s Words Enables More, Not Less, Racial Division Within American Society

January 14, 2023
Shirley Chisholm book

Historian Connects Shirley Chisholm’s Life and Politics in New Biography

January 14, 2023
red apple fruit on four pyle books

Is White Supremacy a Bug or a Feature of Classical Christian Education?

January 14, 2023
bible gun Brazil

God and Guns Often Go Together In US History — This Course Examines Why

January 14, 2023
black news site

Kansas City Police Dismissed a Black News Site’s Reports of Missing Women. Then One Showed Up.

January 14, 2023
text

‘Thank You’ and a Look Back as We Look Forward to the New Year

December 31, 2022
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact
Saturday, April 1, 2023
  • Login
  • Register
Faithfully Magazine
  • About
    • Staff and Advisors
    • Write for Us
    • Advertise
    • Give Via PayPal
  • Exclusives
  • Q&As
  • Inspiration
  • Subscribe
  • Shop Faithfully
No Result
View All Result
Faithfully Magazine
No Result
View All Result
Home Features

Will Anti-Black Police Violence Push Whites to Support Systemic Change Now?

by FM Editors
August 24, 2020
Reading Time: 8 mins read
end systemic racism protest sign
ShareTweetPin It

By Candis Watts Smith

The first wave of the Black Lives Matter movement, which crested after the 2014 police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, had the support of less than half of White Americans.

Given that Americans tend to have a very narrow definition of racism, many at that time were likely confused by the juxtaposition of Black-led protests, implying that racism was persistent, alongside the presence of a Black family in the White House. Barack Obama’s presidency was seen as evidence that racism was in decline.

The current, second wave of the movement feels different, in part because the past months of protests have been multiracial. The media and scholars have noted that Whites’ sensibilities have become more attuned to issues of anti-Black police violence and discrimination.

RELATED POSTS

The Women Who Stood With Martin Luther King Jr. and Sustained a Movement for Social Change

In New Jersey, School Segregation Didn’t End; It Evolved

After Award-Winning Role in Top-Grossing Christian Movie, Karen Abercrombie Is Leading Change From Within

After the first wave of the movement in 2014, there was little systemic change in response to demands by Black Lives Matter activists. Does the fact that Whites are participating in the current protests in greater numbers mean that the outcome of these protests will be different? Will Whites go beyond participating in marches and actually support fundamental policy changes to fight anti-Black violence and discrimination?

As a scholar of political science and African American studies, I believe there are lessons from the civil rights movement 60 years ago that can help answer those questions.

President Johnson enacting the Civil Rights Act of 1964 before a large audience.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 being enacted by President Lyndon Johnson.
Universal History Archive/Getty

Principles didn’t turn into policy

The challenges that Black Americans face today do not precisely mimic those of the 1960s, but the history is still relevant.

During the civil rights movement of the mid-20th century, there was a concerted effort among Black freedom fighters to show White Americans the kinds of racial terrorism the average Black American lived under.

Through the power of television, Whites were able to see with their own eyes how respectable, nonviolent Black youth were treated by police as they sought to push the U.S. to live up to its creed of liberty and equality for all of its citizens.

Monumental legislation like the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 passed, purportedly guaranteeing protection from racial discrimination in many public spaces and equal opportunity to register to vote and cast a ballot.

Additionally, Whites were increasingly likely to report attitudes that many would now view as nonracist over the following several decades. For example, White Americans were more willing to have a nonwhite neighbor. They were less likely to support ideas of biological racism or the idea that Whites should always have access to better jobs over Blacks.

But these changed values and attitudes among Whites never fully translated into support for government policies that would bring racial equality to fruition for Blacks.

White Americans remained uncommitted to integrating public schools, which has been shown to drastically reduce the so-called racial achievement gap. Whites never gave more than a modicum of support for affirmative action policies aimed to level the playing field for jobs and higher education.

This phenomenon – the distance between what people say they value and what they are willing to do to live up to their ideals – is so common that social scientists have given it a name: the principle-policy gap.

White Americans’ direct witness of police brutality led to a shift in racial attitudes and the passage of significant legislation. But even these combined changes did not radically change the face of racial inequality in American society.

Going backward

By the 1970s and 1980s, political leaders would capitalize on Whites’ sentiments that efforts for racial equality had gone too far.

That created an environment that allowed the retrenchment of civil rights-era gains. The Republican Party’s so-called “Southern Strategy,” which aimed to turn White Southern Democrats into Republican voters, was successful in consolidating the support of White Southerners through the use of racial dog whistles. And the War on Drugs would serve to disproportionately target and police already segregated Black communities.

By the 1990s, racial disparities in incarceration rates had skyrocketed, schools began to resegregate, and federal and state policies that created residential segregation and the existing racial wealth gap were never adequately addressed.

From understanding to action?

Scholars have made efforts to reveal the intricate and structural nature of racism in the U.S. Their analyses range from showing how racial disparities across various domains of American life are intricately connected rather than coincidental; to highlighting the ways in which race-neutral policies like the GI Bill helped to set the stage for today’s racial wealth gap; to explaining that America’s racial hierarchy is a caste system.

But my research shows that White Americans, including White millennials, have largely become accustomed to thinking about racism in terms of overt racial prejudice, discrimination and bigotry. They don’t see the deeper, more intractable problems that scholars – and Black activists – have laid out.

racism patriotism

Consequently, it has taken a filmed incident of incendiary racism to awaken Whites to the problems clearly identified by Black activists, just as it did for previous generations.

My research also shows that individuals’ understanding of the problem influences their willingness to support various policies. A big issue that our society faces, then, is that White Americans’ understanding of racism is too superficial to prompt them to support policies that have the potential to lead to greater justice for Black Americans.

Attitudes and policies don’t match

Some have suggested that this second wave of the Black Lives Matter movement is the largest social movement in American history. These protests have led local representatives to publicly proclaim that Black Lives Matter; policymakers, government officials and corporations to decry and remove Confederate symbols and racist images; and congressional as well as local attempts to address police accountability.

But, as after the civil rights era, the principle-policy gap seems to be reappearing. Attitudes among Whites are changing, but the policies that people are willing to support do not necessarily address the more complex issue of structural racism.

For example, polling reveals that people support both these protests and also the way that police are handling them, despite evidence of ongoing brutality.

The polling also shows that the majority of Americans believe that police are more likely to use deadly force against Black Americans than against Whites. But only one-quarter of those polled are willing to support efforts to reduce funding to police – a policy aimed to redistribute funds to support community equity.

More Whites are willing to acknowledge White racial privilege, but only about one in eight support reparations to Blacks.

Americans may choose to dig deeper this time around. Some state legislators, for example, are attempting to leverage this moment to create more systemic changes beyond policing – in schools, judicial systems and health matters.

But ultimately, Americans will have to overcome two intertwined challenges. First, they will have to learn to detect forms of racism that don’t lend themselves to a mobile-phone filming. And they will have to recognize that dismantling centuries of oppression takes more than acknowledgment, understanding and well-meaning sentiment. It takes sacrifice and action.The Conversation

Editor’s note: This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license.


Candis Watts Smith, Associate Professor of Political Science & African American Studies, Pennsylvania State University


Help Keep Christian Media Diverse

In addition to partnering with advertisers, maintaining a subscription program, and exploring paid live events, we rely on the generosity of readers who see value in our work and in our mission. We invite you to join us, and keep walking with us, in our mission. Every amount, big or small, empowers us to stay the course. Here are a few ways you can join us:
  • Give via PayPal
  • Place an Ad
We are grateful for your support. Thank you!

Share This Post

Share via

Share This Post

  • Digg
  • Tumblr
  • Flipboard
  • SMS
More
  • Report
ShareTweetPin It
Tags: Black Live MatterCivil Rights MovementProtestsThe Conversation
FM Editors

FM Editors

Faithfully Magazine is a fresh, bold and exciting news and culture publication that covers issues, conversations and events impacting Christian communities of color.

Related Posts

Civil Rights March 1963

The Women Who Stood With Martin Luther King Jr. and Sustained a Movement for Social Change

by FM Editors
March 16, 2023
0

...

pile of books

In New Jersey, School Segregation Didn’t End; It Evolved

by FM Editors
February 18, 2023
0

...

Karen Abercrombie

After Award-Winning Role in Top-Grossing Christian Movie, Karen Abercrombie Is Leading Change From Within

by Nicola A. Menzie
February 14, 2023
0

...

black women group

‘Righteous and Ratchet’ Black Women of Faith Embraced on Jemele Hill’s ‘Sanctified’ Podcast

by Brandi Hunter
January 23, 2023
0

...

  • Trending
  • Comments
  • Latest
stream movies laptop

Free Christian Movies: How and Where to Watch Free Christian Movies Online

March 15, 2021
Jesus and John the Baptist

Are Jesus and John the Baptist Cousins or Related in Anyway?

June 2, 2019
paige and christopher hilken family

Paige Hilken, Wife of North Coast Church Pastor Christopher Hilken, Dies by Suicide

August 2, 2021
White Christian Dean and Faculty Pose as Gangsters in Controversial Photo

White Christian Dean and Faculty Pose as Gangsters in Controversial Photo

16
study on evangelical churches finds some apply race tests on people of color seeking to belong

White Evangelical Churches Use ‘Race Tests’ on People of Color, Study Claims

3
depression

Why African Christians Should Rethink Depression

3
Civil Rights March 1963

The Women Who Stood With Martin Luther King Jr. and Sustained a Movement for Social Change

March 16, 2023
creed III

‘Creed 3’ Is a Great Movie That Centers Family, Friendship and Forgiveness

March 3, 2023
Roz Ryan, Andrea Lewis, and Pooch Hall are seen in this still from A Nashville Legacy

‘A Nashville Legacy’ Is a Feel-Good Hallmark Mahogany Movie Celebrating Black Music History

February 22, 2023

Get the Newsletter

Loading

Listen to Exclusive Q&As on Faithfully Podcast

Faithfully Podcast · Faithfully Podcast Select
Advertisement
Advertisement
Mosaic Coffee
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact
Do Good. Obey God. Stay Woke.

Copyright © 2023 Faithfully Media, LLC. This website participates in affiliate programs.

No Result
View All Result
  • About
    • Staff and Advisors
    • Write for Us
    • Advertise
    • Give Via PayPal
  • Exclusives
  • Q&As
  • Inspiration
  • Subscribe
  • Shop Faithfully

Copyright © 2023 Faithfully Media, LLC. This website participates in affiliate programs.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password? Sign Up

Create New Account!

Fill the forms below to register

All fields are required. Log In

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
Share via

Share This Post

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Reddit
  • Email
  • WhatsApp
  • Copy Link
  • Tumblr
  • Digg
  • Flipboard
  • SMS

Add New Playlist

Add to Collection

  • Public collection title

  • Private collection title

No Collections

Here you'll find all collections you've created before.

Send this to a friend