The New Democrat

“I have a dream that one day my children will be judged by the content of their character, not by the color of their skin.” Dr. Martin Luther King, the leader of the African-American civil and equal rights movement of the 1960s. Not the only leader, but the leader as far as his importance and what he accomplished for that community. And I’m just quoting what he said in his 1963 March on Washington in his I Have a Dream speech. Dr. King, at the very least wanted an America where his family and the African-American community, would no longer be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. Even if he didn’t mean that for America as a whole, lets apply it to the rest of the country anyway. Lets create an America where individuals are judged simply as that. As individuals and not members of this group or any other group. But simply as people and what they have to offer and where they come up short simply as individuals. That is what the vision of a color and race-blind country would be.

Whether someone is racist towards one race of American or another, they’re still racists. If you judge people simply by their race and decide they should be denied access in America simply because of their race, even if you’re attentions are good, you’re guilty of racism. No matter what race you’re a member of and what race or races you intend to benefit and what race or races you seek to deny. That is the opposite of a color and race-blind country. That is not Dr. King’s dream, but the exact opposite of it. How well and how better off would we be as a country if racism and other forms of bigotry, whether they’r targeted against people simply because of their ethnicity religion, gender, or sexuality. We’re not talking about levels of poverty that we are today if racism is simply not part of the picture. Because no one would be denied schools and employment, simply because of their race or any other characteristic that’s part of their DNA. And to say that this group of Americans has been denied access because of their race, now we have to benefit those people by denying other races, is also racism. But from a different direction.

Racism even if it’s used to benefit other groups at the expense of different groups, is still racism. And goes against Dr. King’s dream of a color and race-blind country. What we should do instead is make Dr. King’s dream a reality. And outlaw the use of racism when it’s used to deny any American access, simply because of their race, ethnicity, religion, gender, or sexuality. Whether it comes from the private sector or government. And instead don’t automatically notice one’s complexion when you first seem them and think they must be this way, because this is how they look. But instead see a person and someone you can either get along with and work with or not, because of how you individually relate with each other as people, but because of how you were born and how you look. That I believe is the America that Dr. King wanted. An America that worked for everybody based on what you did for it and what you did for yourself to make yourself the most productive and successful person you can be. But not because of how you were born and your racial characteristics.