Institutional racism must end before the racism in hearts will end

“It may be true that the law cannot change the heart, but it can restrain the heartless” Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. uttered those words in December 1963 in an address at Western Michigan University shortly after the assignation of President Kennedy. The Civil Rights icon added “It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me and I think that is pretty important also.”

Our nation is hurting and angry at the same time. Protests are happening a scale not seen since the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. In fact, they are surpassing those protests in size and persistence. Americans are taking to the streets to protest police brutality and social injustice. They are demanding change, not talk. They are demanding legislation to correct the inequities in our society that have existed for 400 years. Yet, as the protests go on, so do the killings of black men and women.

There are some who say you can not end the hatred in someone’s heart by laws. That is certainly true. But the hatred and racism in hearts will never go away so long as it is reinforced and nourished by institutionalized and quasi legal racism.

Light is shining on our government

Evil thrives in darkness, but it shrivels up in the sunshine. The death of George Floyd has ripped open the shades and torn down the shutters. The light is now shining on our society our government, and our hearts like it never has before. As one of the anthems of the Civil Rights Movement proclaimed, "It's been a long time coming, but I know a change is gonna come." It has been a long time coming, but this time, change might actually come.

The thing that is different this time is that the protests are not just happening in African American neighborhoods or large cities. They are happening across the nation in red states and blue, cities and small towns. In fact, protests are occurring across the globe. It is not just African Americans marching but also whites, Latinos, Asians, Muslims, Christians, Atheists, and agnostics. Young people, white and black, are omnipresent. In fact, in many cities, whites outnumber blacks carrying “Black Lives Matter” posters.

As someone who marched in the 1960s for Civil Rights and against the Vietnam War, I never witnessed the rainbow coalition that the current protests have attracted. Any politician not named Trump has to take notice. No matter their persuasion or what is in their hearts, their eyes and ears are telling them this is not going to end until something is done.

It was easier for politicians to ignore the young people who marched against the Vietnam War, and the minorities who marched for Civil Rights because those groups represented a small percentage of actual voters at the time. Young people did not vote due to apathy; minorities could not vote due to Jim Crow. It is impossible to ignore what is taking place today because social media brings it to every phone and computer in the world.

White Privilege

Polls show that a majority of Americans agree that laws need to be changed regarding police brutality. On the surface, most Americans say they approve of changes to end the disparity between whites and persons of color in society. Not everyone, however, is on board. Some politicians and police chiefs would have the full force of our military set lose to squash the protests and kill or injure the protestors with gas, clubs, and vicious dogs just like in the South in the 1960s. A sense of superiority and privilege resides in their hearts. It will reside in those hearts until legal, institutional racism ends.

Change in hearts will not happen so long as our children see people of color killed by police officers, denying them the right of a trial by their peers. Or when they see people of color go to prison for offenses that whites are not arrested for or are given probation. Change will not happen when our children see that schools in black and brown neighborhoods are older, lack good textbooks, lack nurses and counselors compared to white schools. What message is sent when police officers outnumber nurses and counselors in many black schools?

Hearts will not change when it is acceptable in America for blacks with a college degree to earn less on average than a white high school dropout? What signal do we send our children when the pandemic disproportionately kills people of color?

In the words of Dr. King, “We must all learn to live together as brothers, or we will perish together as fools.” Until we as a people are willing to say “no more” to social injustice, change will not come. Hearts unaware of their racism will not change until we say, “no more”. We must end the system of white privilege under the law and in execution of the law. We must end white privilege in hiring, pay, education, and opportunities. All we lack is the willingness. Perhaps now, the time has come.