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- Are all white people racist?
- What is the difference between institutional/systemic racism and personal racism?
- What are some ways we can work through our own racism?
- What are some children book recommendations regarding Black people?
- What are some book recommendations for adults to read regarding racism?
- What are some good movies to watch regarding the lives of black people?
All these questions and more are discussed on this episode of Racism 101 with Dr. Darron Smith.
To donate to Rational Faiths’ money drive for the Liahona Children’s Foundation, click here:
Email Dr. Smith a question or two:
Links to movies, books, documentaries and events discussed in this podcast
Movies Discussed on Podcast:
Oscar Documentary (feature) Nominee, I’m Not Your Negro:
Dope:
Oscar Nominee for Best Picture, Moonlight:
Dear White People:
Children’s Books Discussed on the Podcast:
- Serafina’s Promise
- Dear America: With the Might of Angels
- Sugar
- Ruth and the Green Book
- I Hadn’t Meant to Tell You This
- Minty: A Story of Young Harriet Tubman (Picture Puffin)
- I Thought My Soul Would Rise and Fly: The Diary of Patsy, a Freed Girl, Mars Bluff, South Carolina 1865 (Dear America Series)
- Zora and Me
Books For Adults Discussed on the Podcast:
- Religion of a Different Color: Race and the Mormon Struggle for Whiteness
- When Race, Religion, and Sport Collide: Black Athletes at BYU and Beyond (Perspectives on a Multiracial America)
- White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America
- Some of My Best Friends Are Black: The Strange Story of Integration in America
- This Bridge Called My Back, Fourth Edition: Writings by Radical Women of Color
- Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza
- Reflections on the Revolution In Europe: Immigration, Islam, and the West
Dr. Darron Smith’s Book Signing
The King’s English Book Shop
1511 S. 1500 E., Salt Lake City, Utah
Wednesday February 22, 2017
Dr. Darron Smith’s Appearance on CBS Sports Documentary, February 11:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5b5z7m_the-black-14-wyoming-football-1969_sport
Dr. Darron Smith
Dr. Darron T. Smith is a faculty member at the University of Memphis in the Department of Sociology. He is frequent political and cultural contributor for Huffington Post on various issues of inequality in the form of racism, classism and other systems of U.S. based oppression. He has also contributed to various forums from Religion Dispatches and ESPN's Outside the Lines to The New York Times and Chicago Tribune op-ed sections. Dr. Smith’s research spans a wide myriad of topics on including healthcare disparities, Religious Studies, Race & Sports, Stress & Mindfulness, Transracial Adoption and the Black Family. His current research focuses on healthcare workforce discrimination involving African American physician assistants. His is the author of, When Race, Religion & Sports Collide: Blacks Athletes at BYU and Beyond, was recently released to critical praise in November 2016.
All posts by Dr. Darron Smith
Thanks for answering my question from last week asking if Dr. Smith if he was stating that, “All whites are racists” because of how he defines the word or if he is just trying to be a bit provocative to slap some folks out of their ignorance (my words not his :-). I do know that some people (many or almost all?) do need to be jarred to get their attention.
I do have a followup comment/question. I do still feel it is hard to swallow the statement of “all whites are racist.” Part of me wants to push back because I fear that so many will just dismiss what you are saying and ignore it all. But this world probably needs a variety of voices to make progress, so I won’t push back in any way saying you are wrong. It just isn’t how I would move the mark along.
But I do still struggle in another way. I get that as a white male I bathe in white privilege and male privilege. I can try to see it and I should make the effort, but even with effort I am going to be blind to some or most of it. I get that I didn’t earn either privilege. I just get them. I can use them both for good or for bad.
I have seen racism as a scale. There are those that are willing to kill. There are those that are willing dole out violence, but not kill. There are those that are willing to make threats of violence, but won’t carry it out. There are those that would never verbalize violence, but would insult. And I think we both agree as you go along this scale you can get to where a person individually holds no ill feelings towards another race and views them truly as equals in every way. I get that such a person might still have institutional/structural benefits not given to another race. I think I can almost swallow that this person that “does no harm” is still racists. This person is doing nothing to “level the playing field” for systemic/institutionalized racism.
But if we take that analogy even further and take a white man that devotes himself, even makes his profession the improvement of every black person he can by removing the inequalities, gives every bit of money above what he needs to subsist to helping the cause of black people, adopts destitute black orphans not as a white savior but to keep them from a situation where death was probable. To me this is quite a bit different than the “do no harm on an individual basis.” This person is doing everything they can to break break down inequalities and benefits. I just have a hard time saying “this person by virtue of their skin color is racist.” It sounds like you are born into a caste system and NOTHING you can do will EVER make you not a racist.
My gut tells me we are probably still at the core talking about the definition of racists. I just feel that labeling someone as “racists” is an insult. Some are absolutely deserving of the insult. If a close friend told me they thought I was a racist male chauvinistic pig, I would be DEEPLY hurt as I feel I have really tried in my life to be neither of those.
This probably would be better served by a conversation, but I appreciate this podcast. I am sure Dr. Smith tires of explaining his reality to others like me. I appreciate the energy it is probably requiring of him to answer questions like mine (probably many times over). I am only pushing back to help me understand a bit better. I hope I don’t come across as someone just saying, “You don’t know what your talking about” and it is clear I am trying. And I hear Dr. Smith trying also. Thanks!
I completely agree with you. Although I agree with much of what is being said on these podcasts, I think that saying all people are racist by virtue of their being born white will come off as an insult to most people. It feels shaming, and shaming people is a very ineffective way to persuade people to your viewpoint. I would suggest reading Brene Brown’s book Daring Greatly. She is a shame and vulnerability researcher, and she talks about public shaming in her book. Labeling all whites as racist (no matter how you’re trying to define it) feels too much like public shaming to me.