I do more writing than is obvious here

Now that I've finished the dissertation and have graduated, I can think about writing about other things besides theory, method, and regulatory law. We've decided to take a break from home remodeling after living for almost 3 months in our guest bedroom. I find that my writing has been mostly in response to something else as of late. My most coherent pieces are emails I send to Boston Globe journalists/columnists. So, I've decided to start posting those here.

This is an email I sent today to Derrick Jackson. In his editorial A Welcome Shade of Gray, he writes that Obama has "persuaded Americans to see race in shades of gray." He goes on to discuss how Obama is trying to do the same with the issue of abortion and the American approach to the Middle East.

I am not disputing his overall claim that Obama is attempting to add nuance to our understandings of each other in the hopes that it might lead to more productive rhetoric and action where we do have common ground. My problem is that his thesis sees race relations entirely in terms of black and white. Indeed, the color gray is a shade of black. Or, if you prefer, a mix of black and white. This ignores the fact that "race relations" involves other groups, including Latinos, which I attempted to call to his attention with the following email:

Mr. Jackson,

If you only look at race relations as an issue between African Americans and White Americans, than your claim that race relations in the US are on their way to starting to improve may be accurate.

However, the recent acquittal of three white teenagers in the beating death of a Mexican migrant worker in Shenandoah, PA, the beating death by white teens of an Ecuadorian in Patchogue, Long Island, New York, and scores of socially (as well as legally) sanctioned attacks against Latinos belies your claim that race relations may be on the mend. FBI crime statistics show that between 1995 and 2007, the number of anti-black hate crime incidents and victims have been declining (by 11% and 13% respectively), the number of anti-Latino hate crimes incidents and victims have been increasing (by 15% and 19%). And these are only the reported crimes. We both know that many immigrant Latinos do not often go to the police when they have been victimized. The Southern Poverty Law Center recently published a report showing that low income Latinos living in the South are "routinely targeted" for abuse and discrimination.

Please remember that race relations is not simply a matter of shades of gray. There are also shades of brown too.

Personally, I am happy to see anti-Black hate crimes on the wane (although we're still waiting for the 2008 FBI report on Hate Crimes). However, if we continue to see race only in terms of black and white, when Latinos and Asians are the fastest growing non-white groups in the country and are increasingly targeted for racial animosity, we will only have taken one step forward and 2 steps back.