Brian Kopp
10/8/08
Expository Writing
Shelby Brenn
With and Against the Grain In Robert Jensen’s “Being Colorblind Does Not Offset Innate Advantages of White Privilege,” he says that despite “progression” of anti-racism in America, our society is still racist. He states that the very method, “colorblindness,” is racist. He argues that being colorblind is a privilege only whites can have. He states that whites are privileged because they do not have to worry about how they are judged by the people they encounter. Jensen explains more in depth this statement by showing how racism affects non-white people, but not white people. Jensen does, however, propose a solution. He suggests that instead of de-racing people, Americans need to acknowledge differences in cultures, and also understand the obstacles different people face due to racial and social norms. Jensen makes his final claim that despite the perception of America as being a level playing field, non-whites are still constrained by social barriers.
With the Grain For most of my life, I have lived in places with little diversity. I grew up in a small town called Smithville, which had very little diversity. There were only one or two black families who lived in Smithville. There were even less Asian and Hispanic families there. The vast majority of people were white. All the teachers in my elementary school and high school were white. I did not encounter much diversity in Smithville, but the lack of diversity there resulted in the existence of racism. There were some people in the town who were racist towards blacks and Hispanics. There was not a lot of colorblindness in Smithville. People saw color; some people were racist, but the majority of the town wasn’t. Unfortunately, due to the lack of diversity, not much was done to silence the people who were racist. The few minorities who lived