American society has included systemic racism from the beginning. Native Americans whom early explorers mistook for natives of India were systematically pushed aside, uprooted and confined to reservations on lands no one else wanted. At least this is what happened when they were not being exterminated.
Initially black people arrived on our shores destined mostly for slave markets after being “cured” in the Caribbean. Being cured meant being trained to be good slaves. Some were eventually able to gain freedom but the majority did not until the Emancipation Proclamation. Even though Lincoln enacted it in the 1860’s, black people in many places still had not been viewed as full citizens. They had to make do with substandard living conditions, limited health care, education and employment opportunities as well as less than respectful treatment by the police.
Immigrants from Europe also suffered marginalization, particularly waves of Irish and Italian peoples. For the most part, Europeans have been able to blend into the larger white society as have many Asians.
More recently Hispanic immigrants have been vilified as interlopers. They dared to imagine that they could find a better life here than they had in their own countries. Often their children ended up in cages.
In our struggle to keep America white, we tend to forget the many contributions to our culture, economy, and diversity which have helped make us who we are as a society. Of course not all white people have worked actively to denigrate black members of American society. Yet many people have stood by and watched it happen.
What should we do and why should we do it? Our main priority needs to be learning to see all American lives as equally valuable and entitled to the same benefits of living here that the privileged enjoy. This means that we need to make available adequate healthcare, decent housing, and education as well as job training and opportunity.
I have heard two objections to such a plan. One is that the disadvantaged would not appreciate having the privileges the rest of us enjoy. They would only strain our resources and make it harder for the rest of us to access them. The other objection is that it would be too expensive to share these resources with those we see as other than us. That would also make it harder for the rest of us to access them.
The disadvantaged have generally not had access to these basic rights. We have no basis for an opinion on what they would value when they have not experienced it.
Descendents of formerly less valued groups throughout our history have made good use of opportunities when offered to them.
As for expense, the more we make medical prevention and treatment available to those in need the less drain there would be on emergency services as well as on our regular health resources. The more educational and job training resources available to the disadvantaged, the more productive they will become. At the same time the newly empowered will become less a drain on our economy and more productive contributors to our overall societal wellbeing.
People feeling productive and adequately providing for their families will also result in less anger and frustration in poor communities. This change will reduce the need for police response to anger and frustration.
We can reshape our society and bring it out of the turmoil we now experience. The choice is ours. What are you ready to contribute?