Some observations about our stories of racial discrimination

[Tom Rinaldo]

13. I think the only two examples I can think of whites being "systematically" "discriminatined" against

can offer some insights for whites to what blacks routinely have faced since slavery was abolished. And I used quotation marks in the subject line intentionally because it is NOT the same thing. They are, "forced busing" and Affirmative Action programs. I supported both of these governmental policies, whether court mandated or legislatively initiated. They both are/were mandated social remedies to partially counter the effects of horrific ingrained and often government sanctioned and/or mandated wholesale discrimination of whole races of people over multiple generations. But because individual whites sometimes experienced a loss of choice, varying degrees of inconvenience (at times significant) and in some cases a loss of individual opportunity as a result of those programs, they often triggered off massive instances of white "backlash".

Yet the vast majority of whites lived in passive acceptance (if not outright approval) of laws and practices that restricted for a century or longer which races could live in which neighborhoods (either through neighborhood association bylaws, redlining, or violent intimidation) which schools they could attend, and even which occupations they could pursue (through membership restrictions for Trade Guilds etc.). But when their own white child could no longer attend the nearest neighborhood school due to integration mandates (which only rarely forced whites to be bused away from their own neighborhoods), or when it was possible that a black child might win admission to some school before a white child with similar qualifications because of the color of his/her skin, THEN some whites were ready to be up in arms over "discrimination".