Trying to define racism in the 21st Century is very difficult.  I tend to agree with Danielle S. Allen in her book “Talking to Strangers.”  She wrote:

“A great deal of interracial distrust now is a product more of retrospection than of immediate personal experience and prevails along fossilized boundaries of difference.”

It is not that we don’t have policies, systems and people that harbor racist ideologies and stereotypes explicit or implicit; it is rather that identifying the motive as racism when people clash at the color line is more a default position

than absolute fact.

A review of the historical nature of racial conflict between people of color and police departments has raised the consciousness of America about the deeper nature of race in profiles of power.  The recent shootings of unarmed black males by white police officers have brought a nation-wide resurgence of the race question and the question of equal justice for people of color.

Hopefully, a meaningful dialogue about race will bring back a healthier level of trust.  Systems of justice, however, must be challenged to reflect greater accountability and transparency.  The current system of internal police investigations, close association with local prosecutors and private grand jury hearings leaves too much room for malfeasance and the miscarriage of justice. 

Better training, racial balance among officers, body cameras and community policing programs should help reduce poor judgment and the need to use deadly force.  The use of an independent prosecutor and the establishment of a community review board with subpoena power will enhance accountability and create a higher level of trust.

Finally, as a theologian, allow me the privilege of sharing a biblical truth.  There is no partiality with God (Romans 2:11). Racism is a social construction intended to marginalize and subjugate people as “the other” under systems of power and attitudes of oppression. It dehumanizes in order to support a sense of privilege, a supremacist view of life and the desensitization of a person’s worth and value.  However, when you peel back the skin, that’s all it is –skin.  It covers the body but it doesn’t define character.  What a wondrous point of human diversity that skin comes in a variety of beautiful colors!

Reverend Dr. Melvin T. Jones is the Pastor of the Union Missionary Baptist Church, President of the Greater Lansing Clergy Forum and Co President of Action of Greater Lansing.