Repent! For Being White
That’s the message floating down from Canada, where the Albert Human Rights Commission (AHRC) recently unveiled its new taxpayer-funded “Racism Free Edmonton” campaign.
According to the group’s logic, the best way to solve the problem of racism is for white people to accuse themselves of being racists, acknowledge their “white privilege,” and maybe start displaying some Harlem Renaissance art in their living rooms, or something.
“The pictures and other visual representations in our homes should truly be multiracial,” the AHRC site instructs under a section on how parents can help stop racism. “Children learn a lot from what they see in their home environment.”
“White privilege,” the site informs, “refers to all the benefits we get just for being white. Most of us are aware of how racism hurts others, but we’re not aware of how it benefits us.”
The rhetoric continues:
Racial “whiteness” is many things, but one of its consistent qualities is power. As people granted unearned privileges by our own whiteness, and as people who have likely harmed non-white people with our own whiteness, it’s our moral and ethical duty to find ways to combat racism.
After a public backlash when the AHRC site was launched, the group scrubbed some of the language from its website, including the above passage, issuing a tepid apology that essentially blamed the rest of white Canada for not being smart enough to understand the tone and tenor of the original message.
With all the swirl surrounding Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, and the attendant accusations of racism being inherent in the decision to target certain schools for closure, tell me you can’t see Vilma Leake, Kojo Nantambu, and the rest of the local NAACP posse latching onto the AHRC message with gleeful fervor.
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