Is America Really a Post-Racial Society? by Kellan Turner

Since this year's election of President Barack Obama it's been much media speculation about a "post-racial America", however society and its behavior as of now seems to suggest just the opposite. To decificer whether or not a America has reached this alleged "post-racial" status, one must first grasp its definition and what all it entails. The most common definition seems to be "...a society in which race is no longer important or significant", as Adrienne Christina Miles from suite101.com so eloquently stated (http://racism-politics.suite101.com/article.cfm/postracialism_in_america). Okay, eloquent is probably not be the best way to describe her definition, but there arent many eloquent ways to describe such a new and perhaps premature and underdeveloped concept. One who suggests the existence of a post-racial America does not necessarily deny the existence racism but rather ignores the significance of racial issues and their impact on society. The asininity of that statement should shed some light on the reason for all of the confusion concerning a post-racial America. Uzodinma Iweala put it perfectly in her article on latimes.com. She said "It's as if we think that not speaking about race is the equivalent of making progress on race issues" (http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jan/23/opinion/oe-iweala23). She's right, however the "we" that she's describing should know that they're promoting ignorance by disguising the non-discussion of racial issues as the insignificance and even nonexistence of racial issues. That ignorance, if nothing else, will be the one major obstacle in the way of America truly reaching its post-racial status as a society. An example of that ignorance could be Michael Steele, the Chairman of the Republican Committee's visit to Howard University's Blackburn Center for a townhall meeting concerning health care on September 1st. According to the article about his visit in Howard's daily Hilltop publication, Steele reception was a warm one despite political beliefs he owns that may have conflicted with those of the audience, but it seemed as if he did not reciprocate the warmth. He approached the town hall meeting with the stereotypical arrogance that's synonomous with most Republican's of stature and subconciously offended much of his audience with the content of his speech. Professor Nenanji Jackson of Howard University who attended the townhall meeting commented in The Hilltop, "...He did not know his audience at all. This is Howard University, the most affluent educated black population in the country... He had the nerve to come here with a theme of defying the odds. These students defied the odds before even came to Howard. Was this the same speech he gave to Harvard students? He obviously does not see Howard students as future leaders of America because he did not talk to them as if they were on the level of leadership and I was offended by that." Michael Steele, who graduated from the Johns Hopkins University, never took the time to realize the significance of his audience that Professor Jackson was referring to; probably because his ignorance of racial issues did not permit it. The resolve of this blog is that currently there is no such thing as a post-racial America. This is not because a post-racial America is preposterous. It can be be achieved, but if it keeps being proclaimed prematurely society will become more and more clouded. That ignorance-induced confusion causes racial tension and creates racial issues that will further prolong the arrival of the true post-racial American society that the media constantly alleges.