American blackness

Any population isolated and left to its own devices, no matter how homogeneous, will create a way to divide itself. Whether by height, ancestry, religion, or color of skin, divisions will emerge, cutting into the social fabric and creating a hierarchy of desert.

Americans are so diverse compared to most other countries' populations that divisions and differences readily rise to the surface. Interestingly though, one seems to capture more headlines than any other.

Many white Americans prefer to think that the Civil Rights era ended the tainted history that is only now receiving its due in public school textbooks. But for most black Americans, such a thought is foreign at best.

The Supreme Court is now facing a decision that could potentially determine the future of race relations, and the perception of the importance of race in America. The University of Michigan case demands that the highest court in America publicly decide whether or not "race" can be taken into consideration in terms of accepting applicants at educational institutions. If it overrules such a consideration, the Court will effectively rule that "race" has no impact on the lives of Americans, and this simply is not true.

Let us start from the very beginning of a college applicant's life. The average American child born to a black mother, regardless of social status, income, environmental factors, or any other variable that can be accounted for, will be more underweight and suffer a greater rate of morbidity than a child with an identical, but white mother. The black child will also have a one in two chance of being born into poverty.

As the black child, we will call him Paul, enters school he might notice that it is somewhat run down and missing basic essentials. Compared to his white counterpart, (we will name him Todd) Paul is more likely to be going to a school that receives less per pupil spending simply because he is black. Jonathan Kozol notes in Savage Inequalities that "If you're looking for a home . . . you can look at the charts for school expenditures and use them to determine if your neighbors will be white and wealthy or conversely, black or white but poor . . . children in one set of schools are educated to be governors; children in the other set of schools are trained for being governed." (Kozol's quote raises a very pertinent point about class and its relation to race and opportunity in America. Although significantly relevant, I will limit this discussion to the affect of race on the ability to compete for college admittance. The question of class deserves its own article.)

As Paul and Todd go through the school system and adolescence in general, one will be more likely to be tested for academic giftedness, and one will be more likely to be stopped on the highway by the police for no apparent reason. One will be more likely to receive medical care and one will be more likely to be followed every time he enters a store. One will be ten times more likely to use heroin and one will be ten times more likely to be arrested for it. One will be more likely to score well on the SAT and one will do poorer just because he was asked to identify himself as black. In fact, if Paul is lucky he can be one of the 1,000 black students in the United States who score above a 1200 on the SAT the year he takes it.

The previous paragraph was constructed from piles of statistical generalizations but that does not make it invalid. The fact is that for everything Paul does, Todd will most likely be three steps ahead. Does this mean that Paul is less qualified or dare I say less "deserving" of a competitive college education?

If in an admission essay an applicant to Princeton wrote of growing up without the ability to walk, or coming to America as an eight year old who could only speak Spanish, or maturing as a child who lost both parents to cancer at an early age, the admission committee would surely take this into account while judging the applicant's record. Yes, I am comparing blackness in America to a social handicap that limits the ability of an individual to justly realize their full potential due to the overwhelming biases of the majority that permeate society so deeply they are invisible to the average American. Yes, I am suggesting that a college applicant deserves additional consideration solely because he or she is black. Yes, I am saying that a black student who accomplishes the same amount as a white student should be preferred simply because he is black all other things being equal. This is because in America, as Paul can testify, things are not equal.

Robin Williams is a Wilson School major from Greensboro, N.C.