Racism: My Teen’s Takeaway from the Obama Campaign

This is an extremely beautiful story and well told. It makes me optimistic.

Thanks a lot for sharing with us. There have been many wonderful stories and epiphanies these Historic days.

I extracted two or three paragraphs and published them with a link to this present page.

Here it is in my site RACIALITY.COM or also :

http://raciality.blogspot.com/

Thanks again.

Vicente Duque

We also have a 15-year-old, who up until this election had paid little attention to politics, even though both his parents are obsessive observers and participators (I was one of the "blue dots in a red sea" as I gave out pamphlets at my polling place in VA in past elections).

But this election had him transfixed. He started out telling us he was a Republican, and he talked the talk pretty well. But then he started listening to the candidates in the debates. By the time the final debate aired, he was responding to their responses in real time. And he began to realize he supported Obama's views on almost all issues. He also watched the advertising in the very tight races in our new home state (Washington), and he got very good at sifting through the bluster and understanding the half truths inherent in negative campaigning. The light bulb clicked on, and he was the one who pulled the switch himself, instead of just accepting (or rebelling against) what his mom and dad said.

He may well end up a Republican in the end, but this election did teach him that our democracy thrives on ideas being openly discussed, citizens having the right to question and participate in government, and that we all have a responsibility to make our decisions based on thoughtful decisions, and not just reaction to party platitudes and stereotypes.

You sound surprised by the revelation of racism. I don't know why. Just because Obama won the election, that doesn't make racism disappear.

As an analogy: Benjamin DIsrael was born a Jew in England, who converted to Christianity when he was a very young teen. He eventually became Prime Minister. However, in those intervening years, he was still pelted with ethnic slurs. It may take a village to raise a child, but it takes generations for a village to 'get over it'.

I think it is wonderful that people other than white, Protestant men get elected to office. (although some of my best friends are white, or Protestant or men). This is democracy working. We'll never know really what part racicm had in the votes.

I think Obama will have zero impact on racism - that will will take more time than 2 4-year terms. (I'm hopeful).

Jeff, I wasn't surprised by the racism. I was surprised by the fact that my daughter's encounter with it seemed to overshadow her experience participating in a political campaign. Rather than come away heartened by the barriers that were broken, she had her first close up with decisions apparently made based on skin color. Of course, racism in the election certainly wasn't confined to the South, and some of the most disheartening post-election incidents have occurred in the North, like the Springfield (Mass.) church that burned on Nov. 7. http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2008/11/06/black_church_in_springfield_burns/

Racism isn't confined to whites. I had black schoolmates who refused to play with me in the 1970's just because I was white. There are people who voted for the first time in their lives just because the candidate was black. Dr. King was right - we should be voting for the best person, not the lightest color.

My daughters' observations give us all hope. They don't understand why color is even an issue although they see that gender is. With friends of every hue, they don't think in terms of black or white, but the full rainbow continuum. Remember that until 1978, there was a Klu Klux Klan billboard in suburban NC. Perhaps our NJ children are just a wee bit ahead of their southern counterparts in colorblindness. One can hope.

Did your daughter happen to comment on the 95% african american vote for Obama? Did she happen to speak with some blacks who were afraid to admit they voted for McCain?

You, evidently, regard considering voting for someone of your own race as a racist action, except when african americans use race as a factor.

Have you ever though that this double standard, that you so strongly seem to believe in, contributes to the separation of races in this country?
Have you ever thought that expecting less of african americans than other races smacks of "liberal" bigotry?

Anne, if you want to hold up Durham as a model of racial harmony and tolerance, well, you haven't been in town in a while.

LOL! Like nobody knew your political affiliations to begin with! I'm sure you're registered "independent."

My 15 y.o., on the other hand, who always said to me "Oh, Mom, you're such a Republican" prompted by her public school education, was energized by Sarah Palin's convention speech. I was so excited because Sarah spoke to her. That night, she said "When I can vote in 2012, I'll work for her campaign, I'll vote for her". Well, that fire was soon put out over time as she went back to school and the lesbian, liberal, marxist teachers shamed her into feeling bad about her values. She has not said a word about Sarah Palin, the fire is gone. Public schools are nefarious. They squelched her enthusiasm through intimidation.
I'm ready to give her up as a ward of the state. They won. I lost.

Hey Anne,
What do you think the takeaway message was for this 18 year old girl in Minnesota who was assaulted by 4 black girls just for wearing a McCain-Palin pin. http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.aspx?GUID=9C957DF6-624E-4A43-9839-29F8EB3E10C8
Evil exists on both sides. Spare us the holier-than-thou liberal pap.

Funny how quick the author was to spot racisim in a shopkeeper's use of the word "yep" and yet she is oblivious to the fact that for twenty years, Obama warmed the pews of, and contributed large sums of money to, a so-called church that spewed racism on a weekly basis to cheering crowds. She is right about one thing. Racism is alive and well in America.

I don't get it why these somewhat successful whites love disparaging their fellow poor whites as ignorant, racists and fools while completely forgetting or sometimes even accepting the same behaviors in other race groups? I am not a white nor black nor Hispanic. I am a brown skin new comer to this country. My experience has led me to believe that the college educated whites love nothing more than feeling superior to those so called white trash.

Your daughter might have gotten another perspective on racism had she been in Durham in 2006 as white Duke lacrosse players were railroaded on only an accusation with NO evidence to win the votes of its AA population in a contested election

Where are your musings on that? What might your daughter learn from that?

What might she think of 88 of Duke's faculty (mostly from the AA and Womens Studies programs) thanking protestors demanding castration for "not waiting." or of the NCNAAACP carrying an outrageous false and misleading "case desription" on its website for months after the boys were declared absolutely INNOCENT. This was a respected website where jurors MIGHT have hoped to find truth, not propaganda.

Those of you in the MSM are quick to write of one sort of racism...but quick to cover or condone the other.

All of these examples of skin hue trumping truth, justice, or intelligence need to be part of our national discussion..and healing.

Jeff:
Racism? You mean like 92+% of black voters voting for Barack Obama? When in the last two elections it was closer to 80%? Or a few more people who might want to express their southern heritage must be racist - racism? Just wondering!

Victoria:
If your child listened to Obama and decided that his plans were best for America, he will never be a Republican. He might be a RINO and he might vote for one (I doubt it), but never a Republican!

Oh my, how touch feely. But how can anyone even say there was/is racism in America, I mean, only 99.1% of Blacks voted for a Black, merely because he is Black. For thanks to the MSM, they sure as Hades don't know one bloody thing about him. But heck, it was historic and that is what matters, forget everything else. /sarcasm off

Get back to me in four years and it will be;

PALIN '12
Change you'll be begging for

You betcha

Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

Let's see "BusinessWeek's" ethics prevent Anne Newman from showing her 'political stripes', but then she turns around an writes about her daughters activities campaigning for Obama??? I won't call that 'unethical', but it's the kind of nod & wink reporting that I've come to expect from many reporters who claim that their political affiliations don't color their work-product.

With all due respect, Ms. Newman, how am I supposed to react the next time you write an article about Obama's policies? Should I take it at face value?

What surprises me most is this article appearing in a so called "business" magazine. The white middle class ultra-liberal will always want to level the playing field no matter what the circumstances. It seems impossible the BHO was elected President with so many people voting against him because he is black. Your article relies on hearsay and innuendo instead of statistical data, you should be ashamed of your journalistic shortcomings.

I worked hard in the Obama campaign here in Oregon, and also made many get out the vote phone calls to Florida and North Carolina where I have family. I was struck how our children were looking to us for hope, for their future had seemed lost in racist, sexist, ideological dogma.

Even in deeply "blue" Oregon, an effigy of Obama was hung from a tree by students at a Quaker/pacifist college campus.

I know race was an issue, but I believe it can truly be a transformational issue, and the younger generation knows this in their hearts. We have travelled light years to a place noone thought was possible. And our children just needed us lead the way.

As a child psychologist I have already seen how Obama's victory has given families a powerful sense of joy, hope, dignity, respect and faith. The sense of disgust, mistrust, and apathy that had permeated into every home has been lifted. Obama can lead us as individuals, families, and citizens to fulfill our highest ideals and achieve the American dream for all.

Our children need to know each and everyone of us can make a difference. For them we need to unite behind Obama, to end not only the racism, but the poverty and entrapment that keeps racism alive. Tolerance, acceptance, dialogue and deep respect for all, these are the civics lessons our children really need.

Ms Newman,

I would suggest that you give your daughter a copy of "Until Pr0ven Innocent" so that she may learn more about that "well-integrated Durham".

The biggest show of racism is that blacks voted for Obama even though he believes in infantside [sic] and he wants to make USA a socialist country with little opportunity for people to advance in jobs and income like it is in Euorpe. Also medical care will become equal oppertunitly bad like Canada And England. So you will get change.

The socialist want to steal your 401k and my IRA after causing it to became about 1/2 less than it was last year (FannieMae & Freddie Mac & no-down-payment mortgages to idiots who should never had been given loans).

The possibility of major war will increase with the extreme reduction of the military and the deep recession will cause dictatorships like China to start a war with a close country to get the subjects minds off of their empty stomachs.

Thanks for what you uninformed voters did to get us "CHANGE".

He may have won the election but I still say he will never be president. He should not even be a senator as he is not a natural born american. All you people that voted for him are going to be sorry. I hope the law is upheld and everyone responsibe for his election goes to jail. If he had been vetted properly this would never have happened. The law is the law and it must be upheld.

Follow Obama on Line Spout. http://www.linespout.com?q=Obama

Gin 789: Is Hawaii now not part of the USA? Just because one's race isn't the caucasion of Colonial days does not mean that one isn't an American.

Rick Dupais: Anne Newman may not necessarily have voted for Obama because she wanted to appear unbiased: She may have supported him because she believed that he has good policies and ideas.

I personally found Obama to be the best candidate for the position. However, that does not mean I would attack McCain supporters. A true American Ideal is freedom of opinion. I try to honor the opinions of others. I would hope that others would be able to return that courtesy.

Responding to some of the comments:

I grew up with parents who did not always vote the same ticket nor assumed that people living under the same roof would vote the same way. What counted was not so much their "political stripe," but the fact that they were active citizens and took every opportunity to exercise their freedoms. What I tried to convey with this blog was the excitement as a parent that another generation was taking on that obligation. The surprise--and disappointment--was that racism seemed to make more of an impression on my daughter than political activism. And I think she found that surprising because she saw Obama's campaign as a way to heal racial divides--divides, by the way, that can be easily found in our own backyard in metropolitan New York.

To the gentleman who assumed I was disparaging "poor whites" (and who apparently mistakenly equated "rural" with "poor"): Having spent 12 years of my childhood in a virtually all-white West Virginia town full of very smart people without Ivy League degrees, having chosen to work for small newspapers in West Virginia, Kentucky, and South Carolina because of the wisdom I found in the lives there, having been slammed as editor of the Duke student newspaper for suggesting there were more smarts to be found in the back streets of (a racially divided) Durham than in many of the volumes of Duke's main library, I've found it folly to make assumptions about people based on where they live (or their skin color).

As to the comments about Durham: My stupidest choice of words in the blog was the phrase "well-integrated" Durham. What I meant is that Durham was more fully integrated then with a larger black population than the largely white rural valleys where my daughter campaigned. I did not mean to imply that relations then were smooth, though many people worked hard to improve them.

To all the Republicans and Conservatives that have made vitrolic posts, listen up. You lost, the Republican party is in tatters and you have no one to blame but yourselves. The mean-spirited tirades posted here are examples why you lost. Continuing in this vein proves the bankruptcy of your ideas and damages the Republican party more. Keep it up...please.

I'd like to add that for your daughter to be truly educated (assuming Obama is running again in 2012) she should go to an all-black area in southside Chicago and knock on doors to campaign for the Republican candidate. Or perhaps she could stand outside Trinity United Church of Christ and hand out GOP flyers.

She might even live to tell the tale.

Here in Raleigh I have a black friend with whom I can have some very frank discussions. He once complained to me about walking through a "white" neighborhood and getting the evil eye. I had to remind him that for me, a white man, to walk through certain neighborhoods was taking my life in my hands.

I asked him and I ask you, which is the larger racism problem?

I love how all the conservative and republican trolls repeat the logical fallacy that Black People are racist for voting for obama.

Jesse Jackson ran for president twice and did not get through the primaries. Black people voted against him for the same reason white people did - He was not a viable candidate.

If anything - Black people are a monolithic democratic constituency. 88% of Blacks voted for John Kerry. They weren't being racist then were they.

Plus adding the new voters and the energized voters and you can see why Barack's percentage of the vote was as large as it was.

But then again, you are sore losers. You are upset and you want to cry racism. This from the party that originated the Southern Strategy and that whips up gay marriage angst every time.

I want your republicans to be afraid. Be very afraid. You have lost the educated, blacks, women and the rich. As demographics continue their march you will lose.

So keep up with the demonizing rhetoric about intellectuals, gays and women. While you're at, keep coming up with the same old strategies.... the young/the smart/the rich and women are leaving you all behind.

I can understand why 92% or whatever of people identifying as black voted for Obama and I don't see anything wrong with it. Racism is a national and cultural fact, shifting yet real. Why is it that, some two hundred and thirty years into our history as a nation, Obama is the first self-identified black candidate to receive a major party nomination to run for president? Assuming the current presence in the population of about 14% can be extrapolated across the years, we would have expected, on average, out of about 57 presidential races, to have had 57 election years x 2 candidates x 14% = 16 candidates of color to vote for.

That means that about 15 of our major presidential candidates in the past received a full 100% of the votes they got from all parts of the population on account of their skin color, and this without any particular hue and cry.

Now you want to whine about Obama, a talented, principled, intelligent man who won against the odds? Give me a break.

as a canadian, i need to be frank and say i couldn't live in your country. there's far too much hate, distrust and anger, and i don't know where you picked it up and how you're going to ever drop it.

i think you're a strong nation of intelligent, well-meaning people, all of whom want the best for their families and their country, but i could not bring myself to live amongst you, not when you don't seem to trust or even really like one another. not when so many people push their values on others, yet feel threatened when asked to compromise theirs.

so good luck guys. we'd like to see you come out of this, we really would.