The career counseling client who just left my office is a social worker who works for a government agency in a major city. She is half white and half Latina.
Tearfully, she claimed that she has, for years, been the persistent victim of racism by her Black clients, co-workers, and boss. She said that her black clients frequently call her racist when she, for example, informs them that she needs to make a home visit or denies their claim for benefits. She told of her Black boss letting the Black workers routinely take two-hour lunches and giving them fewer and easier cases to work on. She has complained to her boss and to human resources to no avail.
That reminds me of a number of white, Asian, or Latino clients who, over the years, claimed persistent, blatant racism from African-Americans, and felt miserable and/or felt forced to quit their jobs as a result. In contrast, while a small percentage of my African-American clients have mentioned that they perceive subtle racism in their workplace, not one has ever claimed such severe racism. Of course, it is possible they didn't mention it to me because they're uncomfortable making such an accusation to me, a white person.
The above provides merely skimpy anecdotal evidence that Black racism toward others is more prevalent and severe than others' racism toward Blacks. To obtain more solid evidence, I submitted to 10 publishers a book proposal on the topic of race in the workplace, in which I proposed to place ads in major newspapers and websites inviting readers of all races to email me their stories about race in the workplace. My book would tell their stories and conclude with summary findings and recommendations. In response, I received just one call of interest: from a Harper Collins acquisitions editor, an African-American woman. Her first question: "What's going to be the conclusion of your book?" I said, "I don't know. It depends on what I learn from doing the research for the book." She said, "You know that's a deal killer." I said, "I can't help it. I'm not going to promise the book's conclusion before I do the research." She said, "Oh well." And that was that.
I believe it would be of great value to society if someone attempted to write an even-handed, fully honest book on race in the workplace, based on fair-minded, quality research.
In any event, perhaps you'd like to post a comment here describing the extent to which you believe racism of whatever type(s) exist in your workplace.
A possibly relevant data point: A 2004
Pew Charitable Trust study found that only 65% of registered Black voters registered Democrat, yet according to
the latest CNN/Time poll, among Black voters, Obama leads McCain 95% to 4%. While some of the non-Democrats might favor Obama for non-racial reasons, those statistics suggest that significant numbers of Blacks let their desire to vote for a Black trump their political beliefs.
According to the U.S. Equal Opportunity Commission, job bias charges in 2008 hit an unprecedented 94,402, a 15 percent increase over the previous fiscal year.
