Whites-only bathrooms. Whites-only hotels. Blacks unable to get jobs reserved for whites. Lynchings. These evils have occurred in American history.
In 1930s Germany, the Nazi government was committing even greater evils against Jews, black people, and many other “undesirables,” prohibiting them from buying homes, owning businesses, or getting jobs. Eventually, the state attempted to murder every last one of them.
After the American Civil War, racism against black people persisted. This hatred was systematized; oppressive, discriminatory “Jim Crow” laws were passed throughout the country, particularly in the South. Systemic racism—that is, racism codified or practiced de facto in law—did, in fact, exist back then.
In a sense, systemic racism does still exist, but not in the form or to the extent that we’re commonly told it does. On employment and college applications, for instance, minorities are often given preference over white applicants, and in some cases, such preferential treatment is mandated by law. The Wall Street Journal reported last week that the Department of Justice cited Yale University for discriminatory admissions standards. The report claims that black applicants are four to ten times more likely to be admitted than white or Asian students with comparable academic credentials.
Make no mistake: Such practices are racist. They are not instances of “reparations” or “reverse” racism, they are just plain racist. Even so, racism no longer exists in America on the scale or to the extent that it has throughout virtually all of human history. To claim otherwise is to flagrantly ignore both the past and the present.