by Jeff Hitchcock

This summer's US Supreme Court decision to strike down voluntary and popularly supported programs of public school integration in Louisville and Seattle has wounded our right to integrate.

Now, talking "integrate" means talking race and so I need to be clear who the "our" in "our right" is. We are the community of people, members of all races, US residents and citizens, who believe integration is a positive lifestyle, to be sought when absent, and treasured when present. This includes multiracial people, interracial marriages and families, trans-racially adoptive families, extended families with interracial relationships, and people who live in integrated neighborhoods, work in integrated work settings, attend integrated places of worship, who send their children to integrated schools, and/or people who simply love, hang out with, befriend, and hold close someone of another race. Including even people who have done none of this but who wish to do so, or wish their children one day will do so. That might be a majority of the country by now. It includes 553 social scientists who placed their reputations on the line by stating emphatically to the Supreme Court that integration is better than what we have now, hands down.

Now I'm not speaking against people who want to participate in their own cultural surround. If you want to associate with people primarily of your own race and culture, I have no problem with it. People who have suffered oppression in US society often cluster, as do the bearers of racial privilege, white people.

Nor do I have quarrel with any individual who feels his or her rights are being violated who then presses for justice in the courts. The recently decided cases weighed this factor. One complaint was made on behalf of a child who traveled 3 hours a day on a bus, having been twice denied access to the local school. No child should have to do that. But Supreme Court decisions impact our entire society. In such decisions, rights of one kind are often weighted against those of another.

Funny thing, rights. The ones we see and have are the ones we fought for, historically speaking. Those fights often were more for the recognition and "seeing" of those rights. People had to see that they had a right, before they fought and won the right in practice.

In the wake of that decision we have seen White Plains, NY and Tuscaloosa, AL, one an example of a successful program now threatened, and the other a rezoning plan where virtually all the burden of "rezoning" is forced upon black people. What the hell is going on? We have a Supreme Court decision -- in which the chief justice says "the way to end discrimination is to stop discriminating" - giving legal cover to a resurgent re-segregation. Justice Roberts must be a learned and, by most accounts, an ethical person, but a simple-headed statement like his makes me picture him seated at the bench wearing a clown's hat with a long straw stuck up each nostril, holding a banana in each ear.

As white anti-racists, we "follow the leadership of people of color." Certainly Patricia J. Williams, legal scholar and African American critic of whiteness, has always been an important source of direction. About this very situation she writes,

"..the ruling I find most grievous in its implications is the holding in Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District and Meredith v. Jefferson County Board of Education. I have discussed...the absurdity of a rule that equates voluntary integration programs with legalized segregation so I won't repeat myself now, much as I want to. What concerns me at the moment is the general lack of outcry that has met the decision that public school districts cannot take voluntary action to overcome racial inequality.

We can expect only more disrespect and harm (see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) so long as we leave public policy in the hands of people who have no experience living in a multiracial, integrated world. These are people who, espousing universal knowledge and proclaiming universal rules of morality, have barely ventured beyond their own cultural pond.

We have the right to integrate. It should be done in a respectful way, allowing for individual hardships and giving space to those who prefer a segregated setting. We have the right to integrate, and that right should be central to US society. The fact that it was little more than a passing concern to the Supreme Court speaks to how much that right is being disrespected.

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A white anti-racist who joined the Jena protest asks why you weren't there. Another school, this time in Pennsylvania, experiences problems. Across the US noose incidents multiply. Racial profiling continues apace in California.

Lynchburg, VA, begins a dialogue program on race and racism, while the province of Nova Scotia ponders how welcoming it really is. Richmond, British Columbia negotiates a crash integration program for firefighters. In the workplace, white people are not held to as high a dress standard as African Americans. In the meantime the US government has been out to lunch on its duty to prosecute employment discrimination.

Good news about racial disparities in diagnosing diabetes. Article about breast cancer compares black and white women. Did you ever wonder how ethnic groups are affected differently by medical risks? Check this.

Anti-racist protestors in Switzerland raise barricades in the street. Poor white people in South Africa feel safe. Middle class and professionals in South Africa experience high crime and an ambiguous future. Skin-lightening creams are being hawked in Britain by Bollywood star.

Southern Poverty Law Center declares Michigan State University student group a hate group. Cornel University sets up a social justice program. At McGill, an Anti-Racist Coalition forms as student club. A white University of Maryland student feels and rejects the taint of racism white bigots brought to campus. At the University of Illinois, STOP (Students Transforming Oppression and Privilege) is criticized for being exclusive. A University of North Carolina student has the blues about the (white) blues. U.S. News & World Report ranks HBCUs unfairly claims Walter Kimbrough. The Ohio State University at Marion uses the book, Honky, for its freshman discussion. Black activist students at Yale critique notion of white privilege. A University of Washington article examines how white humanitarianism toward Africa can do harm.

Utah racist charged in officer's murder. Reputed white supremacist convicted in 1964 case. California white supremacist gets life for murder. White supremacist leader gets probation for protest charges. A victim of white supremacists speaks out. On the web, a white supremacist alternative to MySpace emerges. In Calgary, protestors show for a white supremacist rally. Portland, OR is visited by the Hammerskin Nation.

Slideshow of Denver, CO, Columbus Day Parade direct action protest. More than 80 arrests.

Video of the same event, with heavy rap soundtrack laid in.

Intriguing video. A young woman describes "Racism and the (white) class system."

Video. The YWCA does a spot on white privilege.

"Complicity Has Its Cost: An Open Letter to Mayor Murphy McMillin of Jena, Lousiana," by Tim Wise. October 8, 2007.

"The Reality of Race: Is the Problem That White People Don't Know or Don't Care?," by Robert Jensen. July 2007.

"The Great Race De-Bait (Part 2)," by Fatimah Ali. October 9, 2007

"Blinded by the White: OJ Simpson vs. the Jena Six," by Sally Kohn. September 20, 2007

"Don't Forget Travesties Against Black People," by Leonard Pitts. October 1, 2007

"The Fantasy of L.A.'s 'race war'," by Gregory Rodriguez. October 1, 2007

"We Don't Need White People," by Geveryl Robinson. October 6, 2007

"'Passing for White' Phrase Reflects Typical White Racism," by Art Van Allen. September 20, 2007

"Here a Jena, There a Jena, Everywhere a Jena, Jena," James Clingman. October 8, 2007