According to the “experts,” the kerfuffle between Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates and Cambridge Police Sgt. James Crowley provides America with a “teachable moment” regarding race. Spare me.

Question: who, exactly, is an “authority” on race relations? Answer: no one. There is no way to peer into the hearts of Americans of any race or ethnicity and discover how we truly feel about each other.

So here’s the next best thing. Here’s how this white American male views race–take it or leave it.

First, I believe most Americans on either side of the color line rarely think about race. That doesn’t mean there aren’t people who walk around with a permanent chip attached to their shoulder. It just means that most people are far too busy living their lives to contemplate abstract philosophy.

On the other hand, I believe the “grievance industry”–which I should say here includes not only race, but sexual preference, gender, and religion–is a real money-maker for some people. Articulating the idea that America is an inherently racist, homophobic, misogynist or religiously intolerant nation can literally provide one with a well-paying career. Thus, it becomes imperative that any progress made by this country towards better relations among Americans be minimized by such “authorities.”

A paycheck is a terrible thing to lose.

Back to race. Have black Americans gotten the short end of the stick? Again, as a white man, my answer is yes and no. Do I know white people who hate blacks simply for being black? You betcha. But I also know a lot of whites, usually liberals, who think racial “enlightenment” consists of giving preferential treatment to black Americans, who, absent such white “benevolence,” couldn’t possibly succeed on their own.

Most whites? Good-hearted folks who walk on eggshells, fearing that something they say or do in complete innocence will be considered racist. It is that fear which is exploited by the grievance-mongers.

Black Americans? I believe too many equally good-hearted blacks have been sold a self-defeating narrative, courtesy of those same grievance-mongers. It is a narrative which promotes the idea that every problem black Americans have can be blamed on white racism. It is the idea that the sad reality of higher crime rates, out-of-wedlock births, and lack of educational or economic progress among black Americans–relative to every other racial group in America–is always “someone else’s” fault.

Nonsense. Why? Because it because it’s easily refutable–by other non-white Americans who don’t buy into such a defeatist worldview.

For example, when I lived in New York City, Koreans were the newest immigrants trying to a get a grip on the American dream of prosperity and upward mobility. Ironically, many of them opened food stores in black neighborhoods mired in poverty and hopelessness. A “teachable moment” for local residents regarding the value of hard work and self-reliance?

More like an opportunity for the grievance-mongers who convinced large swaths of the neighborhood that these “invaders” were “encroaching” on their turf. They instituted a year-long boycott of two such stores in 1990. A Korean friend of mine, here less than a year, asked the damning question: “Please, I not understand. I do nothing wrong. Why black people hate me?”

Why indeed–unless it accrues to someone’s political or economic advantage.

Crowley and Gates? For this white man, a professional cop confronting a professional grievance-monger. A nothing story that exploded–due mostly to a president who hardly lived up to his “post-racial” reputation when he reflexively embraced the grievance narrative promoted by the hucksters.

Is there a “teachable moment” here? Yes, indeed: despite the best efforts of the grievance-mongers, Sgt. Crowley’s non-white colleagues went to bat for him. In other words, they transcended the racialism the hucksters insist is part of every interaction between blacks and whites, and focused on the essence of the case itself.

Most people would call that progress. But most people don’t have a vested interest in keeping us at each other’s throats.

When you cut through all the b.s., improving relationships among Americans of different persuasions can be reduced to one very simple–and ancient–”teachable” concept:

Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.

It’s never failed this white man, regarding my interactions with human beings of every race and ethnicity. I doubt it ever will.

atahlert@comcast.net

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