Black/White

I confess that BTSF tends to discuss race relations between black and white people. Partially, that is because that is what I have had the most experience with in the past and where I have been the most educated. Partially, it is because the sins of the church in this area are most poignant for me.  It is also the one I experience the most on a day-to-day basis.


Many of the same discriminatory pressures that black people face are similar to those of other minorities, but many of them are not. The histories are different and the modern stereotypes take different forms. Recall the Japanese American interment after Pearl Harbor or the complete repeated disasters that have been the United States's policies with Native Americans. We know better than to have the Carolina 'Negros' playing against the Chicago Bears. But the Chiefs and the Indians still play on?

I once dated a guy who spoke of extreme pressure he felt people put him under to excel in music and math because he was 'Asian.' This references the idea of the "model minority" and it isn't necessarily a good thing (see post here).

It was actually an Indian American that first challenged the United States's policy of only allowing Caucasians to be citizens. Bhagat Singh Thind argued that as a Indian, which at the time were characterized as Caucasian by anthropologists, he should be granted citizenship, particularly after having served in the US military in WWI. He was in the end denied citizenship because he was not in fact white by the "common man's understanding of the term."

All this to say, like so many things the issue in not black and white. However, I recognize that I often write that way, and so am working on that in myself. Certainly much of what I have to say applies to different kinds of minority relations in the church and I will strive to encompass the many dynamic aspects of God's colorful kingdom in my discussions.