Class and Race Barriers in America: Can We Overcome?

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Class and Race Barriers
One-Step Forward and Two-Steps Backward
Awareness and Education
Conclusion
Works Cited

Introduction

Doug Glanville looks like an ordinary African-American shoveling snow. He was shoveling snow in front of a beautiful home, located in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in Connecticut. He was working a few hundred yards away from the mayor’s residence. The governor’s residence was a stone’s throw away from where he was standing. Two doors away from where he was clearing up snow, one can find the home of a state senator.

It was a pretty impressive neighborhood. It was therefore not a surprise when a police officer approached Doug, and without introduction asked him point-blank “So, you trying to make a few extra bucks, shoveling people’s driveways around here?” (Glanville 1). There was nothing inherently wrong with the question until the reader factors in the truth that Doug Glanville was the homeowner; a former Major League baseball player; and a baseball analyst for ESPN.

Class and Race Barriers

Glanville was offended because of several reasons. First, the police officer simply assumed that an African-American could not afford to live in an affluent neighborhood in Hartford Connecticut. Second, as a result of the false assumption, the police officer did not treat him with respect. Third, even after he introduced himself as the homeowner, there was still a certain level of disbelief in the mind of the officer, and this explains why he did not offer any apology on account of his actions. Fourth, Glanville realized that educational attainment, wealth, and social status are not enough to persuade a significant number of Americans to look beyond the issue of race.

The ambivalence towards racism in the United States is understandable. On one hand, great strides had been made in the struggle towards the creation of an egalitarian society. On the other hand, there are so many issues that are still unresolved. Furthermore, there are so many stories of inequality and racial profiling in the past few years that have prompted many to believe that Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream is far from reality.

One of the best ways to frame the issue is to revisit Barack Obama’s best-selling book entitled The Audacity of Hope. In this book, Obama recounted his experience when he attended the memorial service in honor of Rosa Parks. She was an icon of the Civil Rights movement. Through her courage and selfless determination, Rosa Parks paved the way for the eradication of racial segregation in the South. Before she rode defiantly on a racially segregated bus, the Southern territories of the United States were plagued by inhumane racial segregation policies.

These policies prevented blacks from interacting with white people in a meaningful way. African Americans have barred entry from certain restaurants and other public places. Buses were segregated too. But Rosa Park’s civil disobedience emboldened people to fight segregation, and it was an eye-opener for a significant number of white people to the injustice that was committed in their midst.

Obama’s book provided evidence that the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s produced extraordinary results. Obama wrote: “Former President Clinton rose to speak, and began to describe what it had been like for him as a white Southern boy to ride in segregated buses, how the Civil Rights movement liberated him and his white neighbors from their own bigotry. Clinton’s ease with his black audience, their almost giddy affection for him, spoke of reconciliation, of forgiveness, a partial mending of the past’s grievous wounds” (Obama 35). Obama also described the benefits of the movement in terms of improving the socio-economic status of African Americans. He described a room filled with doctors, lawyers, accountants, educators, and real estate brokers.

The former senator and incumbent president were one of the primary pieces of evidence that the struggle towards the creation of an egalitarian society was not a hopeless cause. Nevertheless, in the same breath, Obama described the plight of African Americans wallowing in poverty, and reeling from the side effects of ignorance.

One-Step Forward and Two-Steps Backward

There is a good reason why Glanville was humiliated by a white cop in front of his upper-middle-class home. Consider the following famous quote:

Almost everything we read and hear about young Black males focuses on the problems of crime, violence, drugs, teenage pregnancy, and poor academic achievement […] Millions of Americans daily see the faces of these young men on television and in newspapers, and to many these faces look angry or hopeless, communicating danger and intimidation (Cuyjet 24).

It is foolish to shift the blame on other people. Teenage pregnancies did not occur because somebody placed a gun on their heads. It is hard to believe that the African American man who robbed a 7-11 store was totally out of options. It is hard to believe that black teenagers caught stealing cars were so poor, that they had no other way to acquire basic necessities. Therefore, they desperately needed to carjack somebody else’s car. It is hard to believe these excuses because they are not living in a war-torn country in sub-Saharan Africa. They are citizens of one of the most powerful countries in the world.

It is easier to believe that they needed money to buy drugs. The amount of money they will need to buy drugs is not available if they work menial jobs. There is nothing wrong with menial jobs because it is oftentimes the pathway to riches. But juvenile delinquents and hardened criminals have no patience and no humility to go through the process of character building. It is common knowledge that in the U.S. penal systems, African American men dominate the inmate population. If African Americans are a minority, then, the fact that they outnumber Caucasians behind bars speaks volumes of the challenges faced by this particular minority group.

Awareness and Education

It is not prudent to shift blame. Nevertheless, part of the solution is to acknowledge that African Americans are haunted by their past and the current problems are merely by-products of a chain of events that stretches back to the time when they were freed from the bondage of slavery. After the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 and after the end of the U.S. Civil War, African Americans were assured that they would never again become the property of another human being (Crandall-Bear 20).

They were no longer slaves, but at the same time, they started from nothing. They had no savings and they did not own property. Many of them were better off when they were slaves because they were assured of food, clothing, and shelter. But after the Emancipation Proclamation, they had no steady employment. In the aftermath of the Civil War, the once prosperous farmers in the South were reduced to penury. The bleak socio-economic conditions in the South contributed to the creation of Jim Crow laws.

Awareness of the problems and solutions to the current racial problem begins with the acknowledgment of the problem. African Americans must face their worst fears. They must acknowledge the fact that a disproportionate number of husbands and fathers are locked up in prison.

After acknowledging the problem, African Americans must work hard to create awareness regarding the socio-economic factors that make it difficult for them to experience breakthroughs in their professional and private lives. They have to acknowledge the fact that they need to work hand-in-hand with other members of the community.

African Americans must acknowledge that education is the primary weapon against poverty and social inequality. Education is the stepping-stone that can help them to achieve their dreams. Education is the key to their future. Glanville and his wife are examples of highly educated African Americans (Arant and Mosley 45).

A study was made regarding African-American children and their proficiency in mathematics. The proponent of the study was an African American math major. At the end of the study, the said math major shared his experience and he wrote:

The reality of African-American under-representation in mathematics would become even more apparent in high school, where I was one of just three Black students enrolled in the accelerated math courses. This pattern continued through my years as an undergraduate student in mathematics and physics […] the more advanced the course, the smaller the proportion of African-American students (Maton 11).

The same math major made the following assertion: “many African-American students are enrolled in remedial or lower-level mathematics courses and few go on to take Precalculus, Calculus, or higher-level courses” (Maton 12). It is important to focus on math courses because it will serve as a good indicator that African-Americans are ready to change their perception with regards to the common pathways to success available to them. In the present time, successful African Americans are stereotyped as musicians, actors, and athletes (Harper and Stephen 15).

At first glance, it seems that the struggle towards equality is characterized by one-step forward and two steps backward. In other words, it seems like there is no hope. But nothing is further from the truth. The life story of Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr. are beacons of hope. They demonstrated that even in the sea of racism and segregation, the human spirit could triumph and transcend over seemingly insurmountable hurdles.

Although tremendous progress had been made since the eradication of Jim Crow laws, there is so much work that has to be done in order to experience social equality in America. Nevertheless, it must be made clear that Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King, Jr., Barack Obama, and Doug Glanville were able to overcome difficulties because of their educational background. The battle strategies must be redrawn on the basis of education.

Conclusion

There is hope for a better future. African Americans must believe in the message of Barack Obama primarily because he is a living example that an African American male can beat the odds. There is hope because of the example provided by Doug Glanville. He did not allow pride and his emotions to overrule his decision-making process. He had the option to humiliate the police officer. He had the power to strike back.

But he did not do that because he saw the big picture. He realized that in order to win the struggle against social inequality, he would need the assistance of white people. He demonstrated this willingness to work with them when he crafted a response to the profiling incident. It can be argued that Glanville was able to develop a levelheaded approach because he was an educated man. It does not mean that an uneducated African American cannot display grace and humility under pressure. However, education gave Glanville a clear advantage when he knew the things that he needed to do in order to rectify the error that was made that day.

Glanville was a graduate of an Ivy League school. His wife also demonstrated exemplary character when she sought the assistance of her powerful neighbor. She could have resorted to name-calling and other undiplomatic actions, but she never acted in a way that would justify the stereotypes against African Americans. There is hope because Glanville refused to see the sin committed against him. He focused instead on the potential for good that could come out of the incident.

In his mind, he can see the advantage of creating an ally in the police department. He knew that it would create a chain-reaction of events that would snowball into something significant. His wisdom and his character shone like a precious jewel, especially when he tried to shield other police officers from the impact of negative perception. In the end, his son did not lose hope. His son decided that despite the negative experience, he would still work hard to become a police officer. Obama was correct to say that in this struggle, one must rely on the audacity of hope.

Works Cited

Arant, Wendi and Ann Mosley. Library Outreach Partnerships, and Distance Education. New York: New York University Press, 2006. Print.

Crandall-Bear, Dale. Exploring the American Past. New York: Tillerman Press, 2007. Print.

Cuyjet, Michael. African American Men in College. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, 2006. Print.

Glanville, Doug. I was Racially Profiled in my own Driveway. 2014. Web.

Harper, Shaun and Quaye Stephen. Student Engagement in Higher education: Theoretical Perspectives. New York University Press, 2009. Print.

Obama, Barack. The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream. New York: Crown Publishers, 2006. Print.

Maton, Kenneth. Increasing the number of African American PhDs in the Sciences and Engineering. 2004. Web.

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