Job Openings: Philosophy and Prompts

Thought Experiment #9

^When you see a 'news' story on Facebook and the cringe is so real that you have to close the window and leave.

---

An increasing number and proportion of the U.S. population claims a mixed or multi-racial identity on Census forms and other identity documents every year. This trend is only now becoming apparent because the official Census forms didn't allow respondents to choose more than one racial/ethnic category until the 2010 Census, which goes to show that check boxes are never as simple as they seem.*'

Imagine having to choose between heritages that you're equally attached to and invested in. Imagine having to choose between these fragments of yourself. Imagine having to choose which parent or side of your family to identify with. Imagine worrying about what will happen if you put different answers on different government forms because you can't remember what you said last time.

People who identify with more than one racial category - especially those who are judged to be multiracial by others - experience categorization and discrimination in ways distinct from those experienced by people who identify (and are recognized) as a member of only one of those racial groups. It says a lot about the history of the U.S. that government officials are just now recognizing the importance of expanding racial and ethnic categories on government documents and creating more categories to choose from. Then again, from 1790 up until 1950, a stranger from the Census Bureau would come to your door and categorize you and your family however they saw fit without your input. Up until the creation of the one-drop rule (also known as the rule of hypodescent) in the Jim Crow era, they might have even stared into your face and try to determine what fraction of not-white you were.

In fact, in the late 1800s and early 1900s, Irish, Italian, Mediterranean, Jewish, and otherwise non-Nordic immigrants and their discernible relatives weren't considered 'white'. One hundred years ago, would you have been considered 'white'? I'm as pale as the paint on my wall, but I would have been considered non-white because I'm three-fourths Irish and have living relatives who still have accents. I would have had a difficult time getting a job (as if I have one now!) because I would have been considered an unstable, dim-witted bar slob with subhuman qualities. People like me weren't smart enough to have decent jobs - we couldn't handle money, we were draining the economy and abusing state resources, and we were taking jobs away from hard-working citizens. This sounds familiar, yeah?

This change naturally leads to the question of what will happen when the vast majority of the population claims mixed or multi-racial identities. How much meaning will they have if nearly everyone checks three or more boxes? How much does it mean today when I say that I'm Irish American? Will racial categorization still be important to self-identity, or will the near-universality make mixed identities and bodies 'normal,' the epitome of beauty, the template against which everyone else is judged?

Here is a question that seems to always be taken for granted in this discussion: will an ever-increasing proportion of multi-racial identification be the push for true, de facto and de jure racial equality, or is true, de facto and de jure racial equality necessary for this hypothetical country to exist? In other words, which comes first: equality or diversity?

This brings up the next issue: the future of white supremacy. There are currently armed white separatist communities scattered throughout the U.S., bunkered down in their rural camps hundreds of miles from other human settlements and preparing for the omnipresent race war that never seems to come.^ These people have been involved in horrifying racially-charged assaults and murders, and some white power groups take the form of churches or other religious centres, in which fallen and imprisoned group members are martyred and worshipped as saints. It may be safe to assume that these communities will remain segregated and exclusionary, and someday they may constitute a noticeable proportion of the 'white' demographic. Is this the only racially-segregated segment of the population?

Given current trends of interracial and interethnic marriage, 'white' as we know it today will likely be a racial minority by 2050, possibly sooner. How will having a minority majority population affect racial politics and immigration legislation in the U.S.? Given the historical concentration of wealth within certain social circles from the era of slavery onward, and the concentration of poverty and incarceration from the failed War on Drugs within certain racial and ethnic groups, how will the composition of those in power and those maintaining their voting rights affect people of color's lived experiences 30 years from now? Will there be more racial diversity at the top, or will those circles remain firmly locked and solidly white?

The big picture: the racial system we have right now doesn't seem sustainable. What will give way to pave the way for the future?

---

* Check out the Pew Research Center's series of articles on the history of race and the U.S. Census for more disturbing and strangely invisible issues the government has had (and still has) with categorizing race and ethnicity.

'It's even worse if they don't give you a check box and simply assume. When I had a pre-hysto appointment with a gynaecologist, all of the receptionists seemed to like staring at my crotch after I made a 'male' check box for myself when I saw they didn't ask for gender. They can't arrest me for being passive aggressive.

^ Pete Simi and Robert Futrell co-authored a fascinating book taken from in-person interviews with people who live in these spaces called American Swast1ka: Inside the White Power Movement's Hidden Spaces of Hate. If you need another reason to become a sociologist, read this book. Sociology is a real field. I swear.