Paranoia Still Colors Race Relations
When the O.J. Simpson trial is not farce, it is tragedy. Two people have lost their lives, and the trial has limned just how divided we are as a people.
It is truly dispiriting to see the diametrically opposed views of whites and blacks on the subject of Simpson’s guilt. According to a Harris poll conducted last month, 61 percent of whites believe Simpson to be guilty. But 68 percent of blacks believe him to be innocent.
In the face of the overwhelming evidence of Simpson’s guilt, why do so many African Americans want to believe in his innocence?
This is dangerous stuff on which to speculate. But it’s important to probe - especially for those who have not given up on the idea of a united United States.
According to The New York Times, Johnnie Cochran is viewed as a hero among many blacks. Earl Graves, the publisher of Black Enterprise magazine, recently toasted Cochran as “our new Joe Lewis,” adding that “he has made us proud.”
To many whites, those sentiments are jarring. Cochran is an extremely expensive attorney who has shamelessly and shamefully stoked fires of racial animosity in the attempt to get his client off (never mind willfully withholding evidence on two occasions). With no credible alibi, and a mountain of incriminating evidence about his client, Cochran has done far more than merely plant doubt in the minds of the jurors. He has sought, irresponsibly in my view, to plant suspicion of a vast police conspiracy to frame O.J. Simpson.
Such seeds have fertile soil in which to grow, alas. Long before Simpson found himself under arrest, shockingly large numbers of black Americans told pollsters that they believed in something called “The Plan,” a supposed effort by white doctors to spread AIDS in the black community. If white people are already attempting to commit genocide, it is a small matter to believe in a police conspiracy to falsely convict one very prominent black man of murder.
Los Angeles’ black police chief, Willie Williams, held a press conference to debunk and deplore the notion of a police conspiracy against O.J. - and, indeed, the evidence put forward in the trial so far seems to suggest that the police were, if anything, overly friendly toward O.J. Simpson. But that has had no effect on the vast majority of African Americans.
The New York Times quotes Laura Washington, the publisher of the Chicago Reporter, a magazine devoted to race relations and urban issues, as follows: “I talk to intelligent, successful black people all the time who sort of wink and say, ‘Well, even if he did it, he must have had a good reason,’ or ‘I don’t care if he’s innocent or guilty, let him go.”’ Similar sentiments are expressed frequently on black talk-radio programs.
That is not the way Americans should talk. That is Bosnia. He killed someone? Well, before we know whether to frown or smile, we need to know what color (religion, race) the victim was. If one of ours killed one of theirs, let him go.
That is not the language of civil society. It is the language of outright warfare. Is that really how a majority of African Americans see race relations in this country?
I would not be so foolish as to suggest that white racism has disappeared in America. But I am struck by the earnestness of many white Americans demonstrating their lack of it. Why is Colin Powell everybody’s favorite candidate for president? Sure, he is an extraordinary speaker, with a fine record of public service. He’s a patriot. But way up there on the list of qualities people want to reward is his skin color.
On the almost lily-white Republican primary campaign trail, Alan Keyes, the black former diplomat, is bringing audiences to their feet. With no money and no organization, he stands almost no chance of winning. But in straw polls, he does better by just showing up than some of the white candidates in the race.
Yet the black response to the Simpson trial makes it seem that efforts at goodwill by whites go unnoticed in the black community - while paranoia sells well.
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