.
They are as bad or worse than they were in the 60's.
Race relations are improving. The people who complain that they're getting wore and it's Obama's fault are juts angry because they surround themselves by the right wing echo chamber which fools them into thinking racist ideologies are commonplace and socially accepted, then they step out into the real world and have to face the consequences of offending people so they look for someone else to blame.
No racial tension at all where I live.
i think its bad the way some people are so racist
Me too pearl. Thank you for your reply! :)
I tend to agree with thee. Thank you for your reply CSV. Obama haters will never get over the fact that he was our prez for 8 years. Tsk tsk tsk. Too bad. How sad. :)
Were you around in the 60's?
I think "tribalism" is "natural" to a degree.
Paleolithic anthropology shows that there was literally no war or fighting until population pressures began to cause people to intrude on each other's hunting and gathering territories. Where ever people become rivals for resources they will tend to want more for those whom they identify as part of their own group. Groups quickly develop scar patterns, jewellery, clothing, and behaviours that mark their identity. Whatever aspect of external appearance signifies "not one of us" becomes potentially suspect and perhaps an enemy. This is at least in part because humans are the most dangerous and unpredictable animal on the planet.
There is something innate in humans as animals that enjoys feeling a sense of belonging. Even those who live alone usually need a sense of positive connection with others. And those who don't, the misanthropes, while they have learned to adjust and prefer being alone, often suffer from depression or sometimes character disintegration, unless they have good ways to prevent it. To belong is instinctive because as a species we are highly interdependent.
So when other appear who are different there are several challenges to be faced: discovering what the differences mean, the high possibility of misunderstandings and unintended offenses, perceived or imagined threats to security (work, safety, sexual competition or loss of familiar and preferred way of life.)
The more people work, cooperate and spend time together, the less threatening the differences become and the more understanding and acceptance grows.
An example is India before the time of the British Raj. It had, over many centuries, established a philosophy that accepted many faiths. Muslims, Hindus, Jains, Sikhs, Zoroastrians, Christians, Jews, and Buddhists lived relatively peacefully most of the time with mutual respect and tolerance.
When the British East India Company arrived, they deliberately practiced divide-and-rule to establish first economic hegemony and then military take-over. To this day, the effects of their strategies cause horrendous agonies on all sides.
It is difficult within one lifetime to tell if race relations are getting better or worse. I was only 4 in 1960, 13 in 1969. I saw some of what happened in America on TV (while my parents watched the news). But i have only vague memories of seeing the race riots - horrible, incomprehensible and shocking. In high school I learned some of the basics about it in Modern History, but over the years the details had faded. So in response to your question I did a quick study and discovered the following, with which I'm sure you are familiar - but since we have many younger people here, and many from other countries - I thought it was worth posting.
By 1960 there were 9 million Mexican Americans and Puerto Ricans the second largest ethnic minority after blacks. Many were becoming prominent and many demanded the right to equality in financial mattes, democratic opportunities, and culture. By this time, with the influence of Martin Luther King and others, blacks had also been demanding equal opportunities, and on the liberal end of the political spectrum, a voting majority of whites, especially in the North, began to favour equal rights.
In 1960, your Congress ensured aid to blacks to register for voting. By '62 Kennedy had to use soldiers to ensure that the University of Mississippi would accept the black student, James Meredith. He helped prepare the legislative precedents for making racial discrimination illegal.
Under Johnson in 1965, Congress enacted the Voting Rights Act, which removed the tests that limited the access to the right to vote to whites. Within a year, the number of blacks who registered to vote in the South rose from under 30% to above 53%.
But then, between 1964 and 68, race riots erupted in over a hundred cities, with explosions of dynamite, guerilla attacks, and massive demonstrations that included extreme violence. Blacks expressed both hopelessness and rage about low wages, too few jobs, and being excluded from social opportunity.
In reaction, a voting majority of whites in the North retreated from their reformist views on race. A white backlash began. In 1968, the right and Nixon came to power, removing aid from the underprivileged and asserting the necessity of individual effort.
Through the seventies there were contradictory changes, some causing greater suffering for blacks, while others advanced their causes and conditions.
Lack of work, especially in ghettos and among the young became much worse and remained high. Long term pressures from poverty increased. Where attempts at desegregation occurred, whites often moves away.
On the other hand, entrance to schools and colleges reduced unofficial discrimination preventing entry to schools and colleges, and universities sought out black students. Acceptance of blacks into a wider range jobs and the professions grew, and hence more inter racial mixing in work places. And the equal right to vote meant more blacks began to enter politics. Films, TV, and ads with black actors helped create the impression of a multiracial culture.
In the time since then it has looked as though race relations in America were slowly improving. Although it seems there have always been pockets of bullying and prejudice, some of it organized and deliberate.
The US has had an increasing rate of police brutality and unjustifiable murders of blacks and Hispanics over the last few years, and this has been exacerbated by less than equal treatment in the legal system. Without question, the evidence shows that those in authority are tending to mistreat black and Hispanics 50% more than they do whites. Sentences against convicted offenders are 15% more severe for blacks and Hispanics than whites. Since the statistics are showing a significant year by year increase in these events, we can say, yes, race relations are getting worse in the USA at present.
