Why Can't We Have An Open Conversation About Race?

By Lee Ivory

The charge by former President Jimmy Carter that some of the opposition to President Barack Obama is driven by racism is causing a firestorm this morning, and rightfully so.

But the real story, to me, is the reaction of the TV talking heads who don't want to believe him ... who can't fathom, even for a second, that Carter could be right.

From Glenn Beck to Rush Limbaugh to Joe Wilson, the "Obama's a Nazi" comments, the monkey cartoon, and the watermelon patch-at-the-White House jokes ... is it so hard to believe that a former president who has as steep an education in racial politics as anybody alive is on the money here?

So here's the question, America: What is it about the topic of race that makes us go running for the closet and away from any useful conversation? Why can't we face this like we do terrorism or the swine flu or the crashing of the stock market?

Granted, it's a wonderful day in America when a biracial man can be elected president of this great country. But to suggest that we now live in a post-racial society is, at best, naive and, at worst, disingenuous.

Sure, the rhetoric about former President Clinton was at times vitriolic ... folks even calling him a murderer and even worse at its peak. Hell, most Democratic presidents have taken some pretty major punches in the mouth. All morning, the Republican TV pundits have gone out of their way to point this out to say that Carter's off base.

But what we’re seeing and hearing is something else. Something more insidious.

This is about the crazies out there who want to take this country back to a much uglier time when one race ruled another. This is about the disrespect shown the leader of the free world during a major policy address in the chamber when Republicans booed, hissed, yelled, walked out and played with their Blackberries for all the world to see.

This is about a movement out there that claims the president doesn't qualify for office because he's not an American citizen. And this is about the unprecedented death threats against the new president as he grapples with a mess that none of us would want to touch.

Racism and its byproducts in this society have always been hard to "prove." And for many people, it's not real unless there is hard evidence that lays it out like a term paper. Well, racism isn't built that way, isn't felt that way. Like a jealous friend or colleague, racism lurks in that nether zone between real and perceived slights.

But here's something that's sure to roll a few eyes, but that black and brown and female and gay and disenfranchised people everywhere possess: the sixth sense.

It's the feeling you get in your gut or when the hair stands up on the back of your neck when the top executive in a meeting won't address you directly during a conversation about your pet project. Or when you're standing at a store counter, first, and the clerk's eyes and attention go to the white person behind you.

Or the nauseous feeling you get when you walk into a bar or restaurant and sense that maybe you're in a place where you're not exactly welcome.

This is what many of us are feeling these days in the attacks on our president.

Look, I’ll be the first to say that this country is a much better place than it was when I grew up in the Deep South. So-called minorities enjoy opportunities now that we could only dream of 40 years ago. OK, we get that.

But we also get that this country wouldn’t be the great oasis of democracy, opportunity and excess that it is without our contributions.

The sacrifices and hard work that women contributed to wars and to the civil rights movement was critical to our evolution. The infrastructure work of the Chinese and the farm labor by migrants also was key in helping build America.

And the generations of free labor from the slave trade is the No. 1 reason that many “old money” families in this country are wealthy beyond belief.

So to the racists out there – veiled and not so veiled – we get all that. But so should you. Enough is enough.

Perhaps both sides of this debate are guilty of oversimplifying what’s at hand. There’s more than just hate in the festering opposition to the White House and its policies right now. And we can’t forget the fact that millions of white people went to the polls and voted for the president in this historic election.

But it’s time for us to finally talk about the elephant in the room. It’s time to get our deepest, darkest and whitest biases on the table to try to understand each other.

We all should thank Jimmy Carter for having the courage to put it out there. It’s time for us to step up as Americans and have the conversation once and for all.