The Sum of Us: the cost of racism for everyone
As an adjunct professor teaching Social Enterprise at the Batten School of Leadership & Public Policy at the University of Virginia, I strive to find ways to challenge my students in every class. There are more things that we "don't know we don't know" than things we know. To expand our knowledge about life and the world we live in, we need to sit outside our comfort zone, break our routine, seek the unexpected, try the unknown; only then are we available to see more of the world. Guiding students to create a social enterprise, a business focused on addressing a social need or priority through applying profit-generating business models, is not an easy task. I challenge them to explore their chosen social inequity issue, to go beyond their personal experiences, implicit biases, and assumptions, to truly understand the problems they are passionate about solving from the perspective of those who overcome them daily. One cannot simply see a moment for someone else and attempt to improve their life. For what inequity we may observe, an entire ecosystem of life, decisions, influences, factors, and barriers at work create the moment we see. We have to reach beyond the veil of observation and build empathy for the person and their situation. This requires us to explore the context, causes, and reasons why racial and socioeconomic inequities continue to exist.
I was given a copy of Heather McGhee's "The Sum of Us: What racism costs everyone and how we can prosper together" in September by Mickey Quinones, Dean of the Robins School of Business at the University of Richmond. I decided then that this would be my first book to read in 2022. This account explores the underlying causes, and lasting impacts racism has on everyone in the most comprehensive way I have read. McGhee personally curates a collection of powerful stories to help us better understand why racial, social, cultural, and economic issues exist in our nation so that we may outline a path forward together. Her stories provide me a framework for engaging with the many facets of a world I do not know.
It weaves throughout its ten chapters an explanation of why racism persists, even through the Civil Rights movement, the racial integration policies that followed, and even electing an African-American president. The reality that racism is a zero-sum issue at first appeared overly simplified until Heather McGhee unravels the barrier it creates to addressing the issue. For one race to be superior over another, it has to take something away from the other. I have, and you do not. Its control. Its power. It's restricting. It's dehumanizing. Therefore, in the zero-sum rhetoric that racism requires, we are led to believe that creating racial equity requires a zero-sum solution. I have to give up something in order for us to be equal. The perception is that in order to achieve racial equity, I will lose my wealth, my job, my house, and access to the quality of life I enjoy, when in fact, it is the opposite. She outlines how the fallacy that becoming anti-racist means I have to give up something, which is ever-present in today's rhetoric. Truthfully, to be anti-racist is to be the same. It is to share equally. There is no true giving up, but instead sharing our livelihoods and happiness.
When white American’s claim to be colorblind and that they do not see race, they are really saying they are colorblind to the racist systems that are engrained in our reality today. That is where the ongoing problem of racism lives.
This quote by Heather McGhee made me revisit this video that I used in my UVA classes. It is a painful seven minutes to watch. You watch as these children embrace this social experiment with ease. Some challenged that it was controversial; however, the children begin by confirming their observed and learned superiority over other races. Probably from their parents, families, or neighborhoods. As you watch these children apply racist behaviors and actions based solely upon eye color, the name-calling, taunting, and outright disgusting superior actions they take are at first surprising. At the 3:00 minute mark, which is the start of day two is where it all comes full-circle. At this moment, you see the children have to switch roles. Now brown eyes are favorites, and blue eyes are inferior. The response is immediate. The blue-eyed students immediately felt the weight of their actions from the day before and how they would be done to them today. One boy's response of "Oh boy, here we go again" sums it up perfectly. Watch the joy of the brown-eyed girl jump up when asked to remove her collar to be placed on a blue-eyed boy. While this experiment lasted two days in 1968, its impact is profound.
Remember, these children didn't just figure out how to act in a racist manner because of the experiment; this was something they had been exposed to, observed, and learned. The systems of racism were fully operating in 1968, and many of the views expressed by the children in this video have appeared in recent rhetoric. Their application of these behaviors towards each other is the manifestation of the problem. Compound these two days to over 400 years of our history as a country founded on these exact principles of superiority, and you can understand why correcting this racial imbalance is so tricky. Power and control gained by a zero-sum formula must mean that racial equity is achieved in the same way. We observe this when the tables are turned between brown-eyes and blue-eyes.
In 1949 the Federal Courts forced St. Louis, Missouri, to integrate its famous Fairground Pool. During its peak in the 1930s and 1940s, the pool hosted between 10,000 and 12,000 swimmers per day. Within one year, pool use declined by 80%, an almost direct correlation to the decrease in white residents in St. Louis in the 1950s. In 1954, St. Louis emptied the pool and filled it with concrete. This response says everything about the problem racism has created and the obstacles to eliminating it. Rather than sharing a fantastic public pool, they would rather leave it, empty it, and fill it so no one can use it. We must acknowledge these responses have happened over decades since the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and impact life today.
"Who controls the past, controls the future. Who controls the present, controls the past." George Orwell 1984
I first heard this quote when screaming the words along with Zach de la Rocha in Rage Against the Machine's "Testify." These words came to mind in the ending chapters of "The Sum of Us," like a wake-up call. Perhaps the whitewashed history we currently find ourselves confronting and seeking to understand is the call to break this cycle. I was embarrassed to have to learn about the true horrors of the 1924 Tulsa Massacre by watching the opening scene of HBO's "Watchmen." My Virginia Public School education only gave this tragedy a couple of sentences in a textbook during my formative years of learning. We must understand that white supremacy and the leaders who have upheld it throughout our nation's history have also controlled how the past is told. Therefore, how we experience the future. It is time to sit in what might be an uncomfortable moment to listen to how racism and its zero-sum equation need to change, and we must do this together.
The Solidarity Dividend
Heather McGhee believes that 'racism got in the way of all of us having nice things,' and throughout the book, she provides evidence that supports her claim. Since the beginning of racial integration, we have seen the middle-class shrink significantly, an ever-increasing income divide, and a significant decrease in public investment in public assets like roads, bridges, parks, and other facilities. She contends that this decline is further evidence of the zero-sum mentality. She ends the book by providing examples of where the zero-sum has been replaced with a new formula for collective action across racial and socioeconomic differences. She calls this new formulate the Solidarity Dividend as a way to work together so that we can all benefit. Statistically, supporting an increase in the minimum wage to $15/hour, expanding healthcare coverage, making college more affordable, and even making our air and water cleaner would help more White people than minorities, yet the arguments against these priorities state the opposite. Most opposition points are founded on the zero-sum mindset. I am intrigued by the term Solidarity Dividend and the examples and statistics provided as they present a challenge to me to explore things I 'didn't know I didn't know.'
Here is an example not included in the book but explains this in practice. In 1990 Congress passed the Americans with Disabilities Act, and in 2010, the ADA Standards required curb ramps and access for sidewalks and buildings. These actions were designed to provide a minority population of individuals with movement restrictions with equitable access to all facilities, parks, and other public assets. However, these ADA-accessible ramps have also assisted parents with strollers, travelers with luggage, movers with furniture, and countless others to access these same buildings, businesses, parks, and other assets. Far beyond the intended impact, a solution designed to combat inequity created a benefit for all.
We can create similar solutions to our most pressing issues today—solutions designed to combat the racist systems whose impacts are still present today with solutions that benefit everyone. Acknowledging that there remains a divide in equal access for all that only needs a ramp for us all to benefit from. I not only believe this is possible, but it is our responsibility to unite across racial and ethnic lines to create an America that is truly for all.
My response to reading this book outlines the complexity we face today. While I remain focused on better understanding the world and the causes of our most challenging issues, this book will open your mind to challenge your response to the call for racial justice and equity today. It is time we join in the Solidarity Dividend, which replaces the zero-sum equation that racism has been instilled in many today, and write a new formula where the sum of us can accomplish more than some of us. I will continue on this journey to shed light on the things I do not know in pursuit of being a better person, a better human, a better leader, and I hope you will join me on this journey.
