Attorney General Eric Holder makes remarks commemorating African American History Month, Wednesday, February 18, 2009.By DEVLIN BARRETT,
Associated Press Writer
February 18, 2009
WASHINGTON – Attorney General Eric Holder described the United States Wednesday as a nation of cowards on matters of race, saying most Americans avoid discussing awkward racial issues.
In a speech to Justice Department employees marking Black History Month, Holder said the workplace is largely integrated but Americans still self-segregate on the weekends and in their private lives.
"Though this nation has proudly thought of itself as an ethnic melting pot, in things racial we have always been and I believe continue to be, in too many ways, essentially a nation of cowards," said Holder, nation's first black attorney general.
Race issues continue to be a topic of political discussion, Holder said, but "we, as average Americans, simply do not talk enough with each other about race."
He urged people of all races to use Black History Month as a chance for honest discussion of racial matters, including issues of health care, education, and economic disparities.
Race "is an issue we have never been at ease with and, given our nation's history, this is in some ways understandable," Holder said. "If we are to make progress in this area, we must feel comfortable enough with one another and tolerant enough of each other to have frank conversations about the racial matters that continue to divide us."
He told hundreds of Justice Department employees gathered for the event that they have a special responsibility to advance racial understanding.
Even when people mix at the workplace or afterwork social events, Holder argued, many Americans in their free time are still segregated inside what he called "race-protected cocoons."
"Saturdays and Sundays, America in the year 2009 does not in some ways differ significantly from the country that existed almost 50 years ago. This is truly sad," said Holder.
As a presidential candidate last year, Barack Obama gave a landmark speech on race relations during the hotly-contested Democratic primaries as he tried to separate himself from the angry rhetoric of his then-pastor. Holder cited that speech by Obama as part of the motivation for his words Wednesday, saying Americans need to overcome an ingrained inhibition against talking about race.
"If we're going to ever make progress, we're going to have to have the guts, we have to have the determination, to be honest with each other. It also means we have to be able to accept criticism where that is justified," Holder told reporters after the speech.
Holder is headed to Guantanamo Bay early next week to inspect the terrorist detention facility there. Obama has assigned Holder to lead a special task force aimed at closing the site within a year.
Holder's Justice Department will have to decide which suspects to bring to U.S. courts for trial, which to prosecute through the military justice system, and which to send back to their home countries.
Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.
If you have an opinion on his comments, please share it here, using the 'Anonymous' selection.
Kentke
Holder is really stuck in the 60's. To bad he is ttrying to make us feel as though we are. Sorry I am not buying into it!
ReplyDeleteI believe I understand where Mr. Holder is coming from, but race, religion and gender have been issues of seperation since antiquity. If people hope to effect change, then the change must first start with them. Nobody is always right, nobody is always wrong and nobody is without faults. We all have the right to agree and disagree about anything and with anyone, even though some shit is so blatantly stupid and wrong only a moron could accept. The fact remains that both racists and altruist are entitled to think as they do provided they don't try and impose their will on others. Throughout my life, the people who have done the most damage to me are the ones I cared for most. They also did me a lot of good.
ReplyDeleteStill, I love being a part of the human race and am willing to meet most people half way. However, there are still a few folk, black and white, that I want absolutely nothing to do with. They don't have to agree with or even like me, all I ask is that they put no stumbling block in my path. I stay away from them and they stay away from me. Live and let live is the mantra.
S. M.
Thanks for your comments S. M., but what about the fact that they way America was created and has evolved, people's attitudes and practices about race have become inbedded in the very Constitution and laws of this country.
ReplyDeleteThat's the problem. In my mind that is the problem, that one group, made it's values and ideas about other people ---that were racially based--- into law, practices and a way of being that still impacts the citizens of this nation.
So we as a nation 'raced' past that "Live and let live mantra", to a stranglehold imposed on everyone, by the consciousness of one group that says "what I think about you, is what determines how we all will live".
Unimportant is the truth of your Being, or evidence gained from life experience. Man has even chosen to follow and support, as you yourself mentioned, ridiculous theories and beliefs, rather than accept the latest knowledge science realizes about the human race.
I think Holder is speaking to his fatigue with the mindset that keeps everyone thinking and living from such a small and definately less intelligent realm of our human potential.
How racism has played out here, is that it requires White Supremacy to be just that. Supreme in All and Everything. So if you're a person of color, unless you feel that you're Being all you know you can Be...someones' racism could have been a part of keeping you in check. Keeping your genius and talent in service to their supremacy. So that person surely was not practicing Live and let Live.
I think Holder is saying Talk about these issues, feelings, assumptions, hidden motivations and fears, so that they can be dispelled, dismissed and done with.
Hi Kentke,
ReplyDeleteWhat a gracious reply! I feel continually impressed by the high quality of your replies, and also by the excellence of your blog. The top item in your current blog re Eric Holder's comments are not easy for me to understand. Perhaps it is because I grew up in so many places, always a stranger where I went, that everybody always looked "different" a bit, no surprise anywhere; and that schools I attended often had kids of many ethnicities and in adult years co-workers were often from other countries, that "race" seemed to be of little importance, it was the ways of the specific individual that were of possible significance to me. And I still have trouble empathizing with the "race" focus of some people. In fact, much of my life I have been able to be friends mostly with people who were not "WASP" like I am probably considered, possibly because I too never felt I belonged anywhere. I had mentioned to you before that when I was a youth living in an area where some people were required to sit in the back of the bus or trolley, that I would go sit in the back with them, to show that I considered us all equals. As we were. In fact, I was a bit irritated that they would be treated that way. I wonder if there is some significance to the term "race" since the deep literal part of the mind would likely interpret that word as something to do with competing to outdo each other by running faster, to win the race, a struggle against each other. Do you see what I mean? Competition to outdo others = race?
Cheers,Jim
I'd like to know specifically, what you did not understand. I wasn't sure was it some of the comments, or Holder's statement?
ReplyDeleteThe part I do not understand is why bring up the subject of "race" at all, instead of focusing on what kind of things an individual does. Maybe it is related to the need of many people to identify with a specific team that unites to assault other teams or individuals. (I know, my Aspie self is showing.)
ReplyDeleteJim
Did you read my Comment ? in the comment section? It explains why I agree we need to talk about race. Because certain folks have not been playing fair. And there's a lot of stuff that needs to get set straight
ReplyDeleteOops, I did not see the comment section for your explanation, sorry. As for folks playing fair ... i think that people rarely play fair, it is not the game. People seem to just crave conflict. It may be part of the ever-in-process of adjusting one's position in the vast social hierarchy framework. (Again my Aspie self is probably showing.)Yet to me there seems some usefulness in all that wasteful nonsense activity, because it seems to enable those folks to work together to accomplish things, by knowing who is boss and who is underling. This seems to somehow take the place of working together to accomplish mutual goals.And the color of one's t-shirt (or color of ones skin?) is a way to keep track of who is on what team in the conflict. And part of participation is to boo the other team.- Jim
ReplyDeleteHi again Kentke,
ReplyDeleteI just found this quote in my email this evening and thought you might enjoy it too. Was in Gary Craig's EFT newsletter. - Jim
Thought for the Day:
"As long as you don't forgive, who or whatever it is will occupy rent-free space in your mind".
Isabelle Holland, award winning author of 28 books.
It'd be equally nice, if those that offended, apologized.
ReplyDeleteI'm kindof speechless. Were you being fascitious or serious?Bosses...underlings...What a mind set.
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised that the work you do with the Museum doesn't give you some insight in to the way Life works....as opposed to the (sick/ toxic/unintelligent) way human societies do.
If you were serious, I couldn't disagree with you more.
The world of people often seems to me to be merely a big game of "who is better than whom."
ReplyDeleteFrom that, somehow the goodies of life is doled out among them.As an Aspie ever trying to figure out what makes it all tick, maybe I sometimes blindly tread on open sores. Sorry; not my intent. I hurt too.
Maybe I would do well to work on how to get people to agree with me. Seems an impossible task. They are all off doing their own thing, somewhere else.
Including no woman is choosing to be sharing my bed. Bottom line.
Jim
Well we've finally come around full circle to a point we can agree upon....the difficulty in today's world, of attracting that right person to share intimacy with.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much Jim, for your open sharing. It's greatly appreciated.
ReplyDelete