On "color-blindness," again.

[gaudior]

Another day, another column pointing out the inherent racism in a film (John Shore on 'Hop'), another idiot commenter saying:

I just feel these race issues have gone on too long. Why can we not see each other as humans? Affirmative action only furthers the idea that each race is different... I just don’t think we should be focusing so hard on this.

But it seems like a good chance to trot out a new way of explaining the problem with this argument.

Saying "we should all be color-blind and see each other as humans without thinking of race" is very much like if I go up to someone and say, "Bob-- I don't care that you're wearing a long-sleeved shirt today. When I see you, I don't even think to myself about what kind of shirt you're wearing-- it's like I can't see it at all. I just see you as a human being, like me-- why should it matter that your shirt has long sleeves?"

People of different races are, in fact, different. They have different cultural heritages and ways that people treat them and (sometimes) languages and traditions and skin tones. If you didn't think difference meant something bad about the person, there would be no reason not to mention it.

It's true that pretending there's no difference is better than, say, beating Bob up or refusing to hire him or serve him. It's definitely a step in the right direction. But it means that nobody will take Bob to the hospital after someone beat him up for wearing a long-sleeved shirt, because that would mean acknowledging that he was wearing a long-sleeved shirt, and that there were consequences to other people reacting to that.

And besides the more serious consequence of people ignoring the real results of racism-- claiming colorblindness is silly. There's nothing wrong with wearing a long-sleeved shirt, so there's no earthly reason not to mention it and acknowledge it when it comes up. There's nothing wrong with someone being a different race, so there's no earthly reason not to mention it and acknowledge it when it comes up. Doesn't that seem straightforward?

--R

Comments

[nightengalesknd.livejournal.com]

Plus the problem (not yours, a general problem) of using "color-blindness" when the term already has another, different meaning.

The argument I keep trying to make, which goes for a lot of isms including but not limited to race - Instead of focusing on treating all people the "same," why don't we focus on treating everyone with the same level of respect? In reality, this sometimes means identical treatment and sometimes means different treatment, and sometimes means adressing differences and sometimes means not adressing them.

[q10.livejournal.com]

on the other hand, ‘color-blindness’ is a tremendously misleading term for that other thing, and really as somebody with a ‘color blindness’ condition i'd be just as happy to see the term decommissioned in that use, which makes it hard to get too indignant about this other thing's use overlap. after all, the vast majority of ‘color blind’ people have trichromatic vision, while only a tiny minority are actually monochromatic (i.e. truly and totally unable to distinguish color independent of darkness/lightness).

[nightengalesknd.livejournal.com]

Also true. . . maybe we should decomission both of them in favor of "race non-discrimination" and "deuteranopia" etc. Of course, I'm also in favor of decommissioning both current uses of "diabetes" and collect medical terms which are either inaccurate or out-and-out contradictions, so I'm probably not the one to ask.

[q10.livejournal.com]

‘race non-discrimination’ is laden with all the baggage of the word ‘discrimination’, so probably not ideal for the kinds of conversations we're talking about (putting it that way gives unfair rhetorical advantage to the pro-‘color-blindness’ camp). maybe ‘formal race neutrality’?

as for color-blindness, i don't mind the idea of having a blanket term (there are certainly cases where we want to treat, say, Protanopia and Deutranomaly separately, but there are also a lot of cases where treating them as part of a more general category is pretty reasonable) - i'd just prefer something like ‘color vision abnormality’ one that didn't give quite so much of a false impression.

[nightengalesknd.livejournal.com]

I like both these suggestions.

[seishonagon.livejournal.com]

Also, different races have cultural differences, in many instances. To fail to acknowledge those is to do a grave disservice to those people.

I saw a great panel on this issue in education a while back. I wrote an LJ entry on it here. The speaker gave some really useful information about even real colorblindness (much less false claims to such) and how it is injurious to students in our school.

[navrins]

Hm... I think your shirt argument rather misses the point. I wouldn't comment on your wearing of a long-sleeved shirt. I'd be surprised if you commented on my doing so. I wouldn't expect it to be noticed. The point about race is that it's something we can't help but notice.

Regardless of how important I consider it, I always notice if the person I'm talking to is black, or white, or Asian, just as I notice if they are male or female, young or old, attractive-to-me or not. My perception of this may not be the same as their own, but I can't help but have one.

The question is, having formed such a judgement of a person's superficial characteristics, to what extent do I make extrapolations about more essential characteristics based on the superficial ones? Do I assume that a black man is dangerous? That an attractive woman is promiscuous? That an old person is senile? It's important for me to know what assumptions I'm making based on someone's race, if I'm to have any hope of correcting them when I'm wrong. But I can't answer that, let alone correct for it, if I'm pretending I haven't noticed the superficial characteristics.

I think it would be wonderful if we grew up in a world where we didn't learn these prejudices, and could reasonably expect that we judge each individual on the basis of what we know about that individual. I used to believe, like the commenter you quoted, that focusing on race the way we do just "furthers the idea that each race is different," and if we could just pretend to ignore the differences for long enough, they'd go away. But the prejudices are too deeply rooted to realistically expect that to work. Until then, we need to pay attention to them.

Also, culture isn't the same as race. It may be that people of different races always have different cultures, but it needn't be, and people within each race also have different cultures. Making assumptions about culture based on race seems just as unwise as making assumptions about anything else based on race.

[rustycoon.livejournal.com]

But it means that nobody will take Bob to the hospital after someone beat him up ... because that would mean acknowledging that [he was different], and that there were consequences to other people reacting to that.

This premise is problematic for me. I don't see how my accepting Bob as a human being precludes me from accepting that other people can be violent asshats. Being a violent asshat is not connected to difference, it's connected to being a human being. I disagree that you need to first accept that a crime or violent act is legitimate before you can move to aid the victim. Bob is hurt, I'm going to help him. All other information is functionally irrelevant to this process.

I have two other thoughts, which I will package into two other comments lest I run afoul of the char max. :)

Re: Color Blindness

[rustycoon.livejournal.com]

The concept of 'color blindness' is a buzzword-distortion of the inherent ethical philosophy behind the term.

There seems to be a lot of equivocation (and I suspect this is the trap that the troublesome premise I identified above fell into) around the distinct principles of personal ethical behavior, good governmental policy, and the raw processing of data that happens in the brain. (Only humans could cook up THAT confusion.)

On the one hand, the general instruction: We should see each other as humans, regardless of other conditions makes for an excellent personal ethic. Under our current socio-economic/political climate, it is agreed upon by the majority that it makes for shitty gov't policy, however. And as you point out, it's impossible without a lot of brainwashing at the cognitive level insofar as we receive different sensory information based upon these differences.

The ideal is that, at a personal level, race/nationality/gender/orientation/ThisSpaceForRent is functionally irrelevant data. We receive it, we process it, but it does not impact our judgment of the quality of the other - they are part of "we." What you identify in your last paragraph are 'nonfunctional differences' which do not violate the "we are all humans" philosophy.

But a lengthy discussion of the nuances of this philosophy requires people to spend energy thinking about it, and thus isn't a convenient sound bite. "We should be colorblind," thus, prevails in the marketplace of ideas as a consumer-friendly knock-off.

Re: The actual comment.

[rustycoon.livejournal.com]

The comment you are responding to has three components, all are short-hand (and I'm applying considerable philosophical charity to all three).

1) I just feel these race issues have gone on too long...I just don't think we should be focusing so hard on this.

This is issue fatigue, plain and simple. The individual is clearly from privilege, because they have the luxury of considering not talking about this stuff. Since they're not feeling the pain at issue, investigating it involves the self-infliction of pain, a thing we're all supposedly wired to avoid. Seeing people suffering from issue fatigue is very frustrating - especially when they're fatigued on an issue that is important to you.

2.) Why can we not see each other as humans?

Addressed above, this is the color-blindness argument you are addressing in your post.

3.) Affirmative action [is a bad policy].

This one may not be separate, I'd have to see the context in which the comment appeared, but if this is a separate point, it goes entirely unaddressed in your rebuttal. There's a whole host of arguments against affirmative action as executed in the USA. Personally, I find it problematic because I see it as an institutionalization of tokenism, but that's a separate issue. The presence of this comment, especially if it seems off-topic in context, suggests that this person is responding purely out of issue fatigue and has resorted to defensively parroting whatever they heard most recently on the subject that they agreed with.

As a practical matter, I don't think a different argument against color-blindness is the most effective approach. I think seeking to combat issue fatigue would be more effective.

I do salute your efforts to re-frame the discussion though, as I see this as indirectly doing the same thing.

And yes, it does seem very straightforward. :)

[zeret18.livejournal.com]

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