Racism: Justice is more than the absence of brutality"Does race still matter?" The question itself is a strong indication of America's disillusioned attitude toward race. It's been just forty years since segregation – arbitrary laws that separated white children from all others because of the supposed superiority of whites – was abolished, and already Americans, especially white ones, have begun to complain that we are too focused on race. Why, they argue, can't we be a color-blind society? How could this happen if we don't first embrace color awareness: the fact that people are still treated differently based on the color of their skin. Racism today is not always the same as racism in the past. Horrible incidents of overt racism still occur and hate groups still exist, but today's racism is much more subtle than that of the past. As Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “The absence of brutality and unregenerate evil is not the presence of justice.” The racism that exists today silently benefits and privileges white people in terms of what they receive from the systems and institutions that already exist in America. If you are white, as you read this, take a moment to think about what you learned in grade school, about your teachers here at State U., about the shows you saw on TV last night. Do the people you interact with on a daily basis look like you or look different? Since I'm white, it hadn't occurred to me that most magazine covers had white models, that most ads featured white people, that most of the dolls in the toy store were blonde and white-eyed. blues, that most of the "heroes" I learned about in school were white and most of the authors I studied were white. I didn't notice because I wasn't from...... middle of paper......it's an institution and in society I don't support them." People of color have to think about race every day because it's impossible for them not to.American society still has a long way to go before we can become a colorblind society How can we be colorblind when this country has been around for 400 years and it's only been 40 years since people of color have been legally allowed. equal rights? How can we be colorblind when many high schools (and some universities) still ignore the contributions of people of color, as well as the history of racism in this country when the faces of the poorest areas of the poorest cities? are the darkest and the faces of those in the highest positions of power are the lightest If you believe that race does not matter in America, you are wearing a powerful and dangerous blindfold that only education can remove.