Perhaps you've not heard, but I am not the most famous among our small writing staff at the Gabber. No. That dubious distinction currently goes to our own Cathy Salustri.
Cathy recently wrote a three-part series for our paper about Barlett Park - a nightmarishly underprivileged neighborhood on the south side of St. Pete, a place she ultimately credited for her "new found" racism.
Several years ago Cathy, for reasons I won't bore you with, found herself looking for a new home. The only neighborhood she decided that she could afford to buy into was Bartlett Park.
We, her friends and colleagues, begged her not to do it. (I will hardly drive through that neighborhood, and I am certain that the majority of St. Petersburg's citizens have never even seen it.) But Cathy - vowing that the neighborhood was simply misunderstood - found a cute, if ailing, bungalow on what we have now learned is one of the neighborhood's most notorious streets. So be it.
Now Cathy, I can attest to you, is probably one of the most open-minded people I know. Or, at least she was.
While some may call them petty crimes, hardly a month has gone by since Cathy's relocation that hasn't seen some sort of theft or otherwise degenerate action perpetrated on her household, culminating in the larceny of her scooter.
No, no one ever tried to get in the house (that we know of). No one assaulted Cathy personally. But plenty of innuendo and outright treats have been made in the two years that she has called Bartlett Park her home.
I say all of this not to defend Cathy's current position as a "racist." Cathy and I have gone round and round on the subject in the past few weeks - me trying to come to terms with her position, she trying to explain hers. But, regardless of its cause, you simply can not defend racism. However, it does seem - since the story first ran in the Gabber - that a whole lot of people have gotten this message wrong.
Had Cathy not said those inflammatory words - had she simply written a piece about the plight of Barlett Park - none of this would be up for discussion. Frankly - and sadly - no one would have cared. But, as it is, Cathy has been the center of a maelstrom of sorts, with attention from Creative Loafing, WMNF, the St. Petersburg Times, and the Tampa Bay Association of Black Journalists.
This latter organization criticized Cathy for even attempting to live in Bartlett Park. They told her that her issues were not race-related, but driven by an aversion to a certain economic class. The Tampa Bay Association of Black Journalists implored Cathy to "find a better class of black people."
But the point is not whether you trust your neighbors. The issue at hand - the issue that Cathy clearly did not succeed in bringing to the surface - is "institutionalized" racism.
We live in a society where "bad things" are not discussed - a society which seems content to believe that hearing no evil is tantamount to godliness. In short, we live in a society that confuses the discussion of ugliness with ugliness itself.
Cathy gets my vote for the best intentioned reporter of the year because she has enough respect for the truth to actually tell it. When she voluntarily publicised the fact that she was "becoming a racist," she was opening the door for a long-needed community dialogue, one that acknowledges the inherent issues of racism and bigotry stewing in us all, regardless of color.
Maybe we don't put it out there - we've learned that it's not to be discussed. But the problems facing minorities in our world - or any race you harbor a negative stereotype for - are not so easy to pinpoint as a burning cross and an epithet. The problem of racism lies in the myriad of responses Cathy has received - from both white and black members of the community - saying, without a hint of irony: Oh, you're not a racist...because I feel that way, too.
My point is simply this: who cares if Cathy Salustri is a racist? This issue was never supposed to be about the conversion of one woman, or even her relatively inconsequential decent into hatred. This story is simply a tell-tale sign that silence, that the era of "political correctness," has actually corrected nothing.
Do I think that proud racists should fly their flags and preach their own brand of cancerous hate? Certainly they've got the right, but no - I don't want to see it. But I do think that a real opportunity has been missed here.
We could have used Cathy's example as a way to open up a discussion about the latent racism which hides in even the most open of hearts. We could have used this experience as starting-point for a focus on what really frightens us - about ourselves and those who are different.
Instead, we told a brave voice to do what we have all learned to do - to make excuses and to simply sweep it under the rug.
I was recently at a birthday party where the issue of Cathy's articles - and the buzz that they have generated - came up for discussion. As a colleague and friend of Cathy's, I was invited to give my perspective. But, I did not get a minute into the background of the issue before a friend of mine rose abruptly and left the party.
Now, I do not know this woman well. I know that she is an artist: a vocalist, and a savvy political poet. But, I have never had the opportunity to talk with her about racism.
I am white - she is black. Some things are not discussed in a cordial society. It seems that I have been taught - commanded, actually - to forget that she is black. As if that's a dirty word.
But the truth is, she is black. And the truth is, I notice. In the same way that she notices that I am white.
The unfortunate thing is, she left the party before we could get down to the details. As uncomfortable as a dialogue about race might be for me, I can not pretend to understand how such a conversation - in a party of mostly white acquaintances - must make her feel.
The point here is that we've really got to stop pretending that being "colorblind" is somehow a virtue. That is simply an absurd notion. We have to start opening up - however uncomfortable it may be - to a conversation, a dialogue, about racism.
Worrying about having the "wrong answers," or being vilified, as Cathy has been, is a slippery slope to a deeper misunderstanding. Perhaps we in the media missed an opportunity, but these opportunities are missed everyday. As regular folks, we ignore - or run from - dialogue with a co-worker, a mail-carrier, a waiter, a boss - wherever you see a different color. We are conditioned to ignore an opportunity to simply offer - or even request - an honest perspective.
What if, instead of keeping a polite silence, we had all been learning to ask questions?
2 comments:
Very well said. I appreciate your comments and the ideas that you've shared. As a society have got to move away from the colorblind concept, as well as the idea that identifying racism is more important than actually discussing it and learning from it.
I was raised to be “liberal” and taught “we are all the same”.
I became a “racist” after being violently attacked 5 times by black men. These attacks were not even robberies, just unprovoked attacks. In one of these attacks I was stabbed 4 inches deep in my neck and almost died.
In every single unprovoked attack I was called, without fail, a “white motherfucker”.
Don’t try that tired old “you hate blacks for the color of their skin” BS.
I know many people from India who have skin much darker than most American blacks, yet these Indians are far more intelligent and civilized than just about every black I have ever had dealings with (which has been a lot).
Black men and their stupid violent behaviour were the only things that ever made me a “racist”. I too went through an agonizing period of transition from “tolerant liberal” to “racist”, and it is all because of BLACK MALE CRIME.
- Abe
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