Why Colorblindness Does Not Work

This column is written by white students and for white students. Each week, we will discuss topics or themes regarding race and, more specifically, the role of whiteness in race relations. If you would like to reach out to us personally to continue these conversations, please feel free to do so.

“Why does it always need to be about race?”

“Are we still talking about this?”

“I don’t see color, I just see people for who they are.”

We’ve all heard these things. Maybe we’ve even said these things. We remember saying these things. There is a term for this ideology, called colorblindness. To be colorblind is to claim that the best way to end racism and discrimination is to treat everyone equally without considering race or ethnicity. In a way, it is to say that we should ignore race and simply treat people as people. But are those really mutually exclusive?

A professor said in one of our classes last week: “I would love to not have affirmative action. That would be amazing. The problem is that we live in a world in which it’s necessary.” Treating people equally, without ‘seeing color,’ is to take a person out of an historical context. In the case of affirmative action, the policy accounts for the inequality that pervades academic institutions by promoting equity, a concept driven by needs and justice, not blanket equal shares. When we are in the majority group, which as white people on this campus, we are, we tend to think the world is fair because the world is fair to us. It is necessary to acknowledge from what our whiteness allows us to benefit. We definitely can, and do, face oppression, based on our gender, our sexuality, our socioeconomic background and our ability. But not racial oppression.

Racism and prejudice are not the same thing; racism = prejudice + power. Racism against white people does not exist. As a white person, you may have experienced prejudice in your direction from a person of color, but racial structures of power in this country systematically privilege white people and disenfranchise people of color, particularly black people. White people benefit from privilege and power when we are not immediately profiled (and murdered) as dangerous for holding a toy gun, as Tamir Rice was; when raising our voices to a police officer does not make that police officer answer immediately with force, as Sandra Bland did. Try to notice how many white students are in each of your classes. A White Student’s Union on Middlebury’s campus is unnecessary because the entire campus, along with this country, is essentially a White Student’s Union.

The colorblind argument is used now because of our country’s history of racism, segregation and systemic oppression. During the Civil Rights movement, it would be silly to even attempt to hide one’s racist habits. The mechanisms and laws that reproduce racial inequality are no longer overt with their racism because overt racism is now taboo, which wasn’t the case a mere 50 years ago. Systemic racism has obscured itself to those who are not victims to it, making it easier to believe that we no longer live in a racist society. It makes it easier to ignore how discriminatory housing laws and white flight (when white residents of a predominantly white neighborhood begin to move out as the space becomes more diverse) affects the demographics of a neighborhood, therefore affecting its schools. You put this together with over-policing of non-white neighborhoods and a racist cycle becomes apparent. See Ta-Nehisi Coates’ epic “The Case for Reparations” for more information on redlining, gentrification and other racist housing and urban planning policies.

Ask yourself: am I able to not see color because no one has made me aware of how out of place I was because of my color? Have I found myself in spaces in which I am the only white person for the majority of my days? When was the first time I realized I was white? When was the first time I realized how society sees my whiteness? How does the media portray my whiteness? Are there multiple portrayals of whiteness in each media instance? Have I ever worried that my whiteness could get me killed?

Saying that we don’t see color leaves us unable to acknowledge when someone has experienced racism, both interpersonally and institutionally. It creates an environment that denies that negative racial experiences exist and invalidates people who can’t help but see color because other people see color on them. Since we have not been subjected to racial oppression as white people, we must listen and learn when people of color share their experiences with us. We cannot suppose that our society is not racist. When we say to a person of color that we don’t see their color, that connotes that their skin color is a negative thing and that we are able to appreciate them in spite of their color. This says that whiteness is the norm and that we are able to treat them well even though they are outside of that norm.

*In this particular article, the term “colorblindness” is used. It is the common word for this ideology but we would like to note that the very use of this word is ableist and we encourage everyone to think about (and share!) possible other ways to reframe this ideology.*

What we are reading:

1. Beyond the Green: Collective of Middlebury Voices

2. The Case for Reparations (The Atlantic)

3. Equality is Not Enough: What the Classroom Has Taught Me About Justice (Everyday Feminism)