I believe it is. I think that when people assume just because someone is white and they are critical of someone who happens to be black, or a group of people who happen to be black, that that person must be motivated by racism. I think this is in itself an insidious form of racism.

This is the question for the poll. Below are a couple of my thoughts, if you wish to keep reading.

**********************

Segregation ended 30 years before most of us at UMBC were even born. It's simply not in our memory. We haven't grown up receiving an institutionalized dislike for black people because of Jim Crow laws, Grandfather Clauses, Whites-Only areas, etc. On the contrary, all of us have had to participate in mandatory school recognition of "black history month" and to be repeatedly taught that all people are equal, and that this includes blacks. I'm not disagreeing with this. I'm saying that I find it difficult to imagine how someone can experience this and somehow form an opinion 180 degrees opposite to what has been taught.

I rarely see any white person say anything "racist," and in the few cases where I think I have seen this, I'm not entirely convinced that the persons saying such things weren't doing it out of sarcasm or just to be eccentric--along the same lines of people 'hating' the French.

What I have seen, and do see, is black people (and whites) ready to jump down the throat of whoever might be a) proud of their European heritage or b) critical of a black person or group of black people, and to accuse them of "racism." 

Is this not racism itself? Assuming that all whites think a certain way just because they're white? That's exactly what is being said. "All whites must be racist when they talk negatively about black people.....because that's what white people do."

Think long and hard about whether you're guilty of this.

Please vote in the poll. The question is, "does assuming that someone speaking negatively about black persons is racist, because that person is white, constitute racism on the part of the accuser?"

Thanks for voting.