I'm not reverse racist, but...

On a campus as diverse as Bloomington, it’s easy to forget that the world we live in is less tolerant than your average IU student.

This summer I encountered a concept that I’d heard argued here and there on the margins of my freshman year, but had never really experienced up close and personal.

It was whether or not “reverse racism,” meaning racism against the blanket of white people, was a thing.

Believers say it is the difference between people of color finding fault in the nature of white culture versus white people targeting other white people — for example, the British against the Irish, the Protestants against the Catholics, etc., which is a long discussion for another time.

I couldn’t help but think about the wide range of cultures present at IU and how each one seemed affected differently by the others.

I also had to admit to myself that I have never seen flat-out, textbook-definition racism against a white person. As a white girl, I’ve never experienced it.

The idea that reverse racism exists stems from the relatively recent crop-up of white stereotypes: white girls Instagram Starbucks and wear Uggs. If white boys aren’t completely socially awkward, then they all wear really big Nikes.

Here’s where I find fault with the argument for white racism.

It does not stem from cultural oppression, nor a history of harm against the oppressed. Stereotypes are never an intelligent way to profile a person, but the stereotype exists because some part of it is true.

Racism against people of color, on the other hand, stems from the desire to harm, to halt the progress of the culture and to place oneself and one’s own heritage over another person’s.

I’m not advocating the continuance of white stereotypes, as in their own way they harm the people they define, but they do not have the same impact or historical meaning.

The real harm with reverse racism is that its advocates use it as justification to continue furthering truly harmful thoughts and ideas about people of color.

“Well, they say white people are X, Y and Z, but they’re forgetting that they are ... (insert whatever racist stereotype you want),” followed by, “So don’t get angry with white people for being that way because then you’re being racist, too!”

It’s that kind of eye-for-an-eye mentality that doesn’t allow us to move forward. That’s the real issue I find with reverse racism, and why I find that its existence is frightening.

At the end of the day, the world will chug forward as it always has, and we might finally be able to say that everyone is equal. Until that day comes, we need to get out of our own way and allow ourselves to progress and develop past the pettiness of racism and stereotyping.

And white people, you need to grow a thicker skin.

­— ewenning@indiana.edu
Follow columnist Emma Wenninger on Twitter @emma_n_em.