The Democratic Primaries: Race & Gender in Politics

In the past couple of weeks, Barack Obama has been under pressure to provide a response to what he calls "inflammatory" comments made by his pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr. He made a 45 minute long speech named "A More Perfect Union", which differs greatly from his usual stump speech, and addresses explicitly and directly the issue of race in both his run for Presidency and in America in general. The speech seems to be the first time that the Senator directly took on the issue of race in his campaign for president.

The issue of race in our country is not something that people like to talk about. Many of us have been raised under the ideal that race should not be a factor in determining another person’s character. We are told not to see race, yet its apparentness inevitably leads to a sense of guilt when race is recognized. As with its recognition comes the haunting reality of the history of race relations and exploitation in the United States. We like to think that race is not a problem, but one look at exit polls and county by county election results mark with striking clarity the reality of racial prejudice in 21st century America. Thus, it is very important to realize that while we have come a long way, the 1960's were only 50 years ago, and the issue of race is by no means behind us.

The question, in relation to politics however, is how much does race have to do with Senator Barack Obama's presidential run. As the senator notes in his speech, some people say his presidential run is based simply on support by whites trying to somehow redeem themselves from the guilt of the history of race in our country. It is interesting to note however that the issue of race does not perhaps have as much of an impact on the nomination process as does gender. A recent CNN Poll found that while 78% of those polled said that the country was ready for a black president, only 63% thought that the country was ready for a female president. Why is it that we have heard relatively little gender commentary in comparison to the topic of race in the Democratic bid for the presidential nomination?

These numbers provide perhaps a too optimistic impression of race relations in America. A poll on Race and Ethnicity from PollingReport.com finds that while 43% of African Americans think that racial discrimination is a "Very Serious" problem in our country, only 11% of white respondents agree that racial discrimination is this serious of an issue.

While it was apparent at the beginning of the run for the Democratic nomination that there would be issues of race and gender, I did not think that it would ever be voiced this explicitly by anyone campaigning for president, mostly because race is something that our country no longer talks about. It is refreshing however for uncomfortable issues like this to be discussed in an open and honest format. The United States has come a long way in the past 50 years, but if 22% of people think we aren’t ready for a black president and 37% think that we are not ready for a female president, there is clearly a long way to go. It is not enough to say that the issues of race and gender are non-issues, or that these sentiments are from the far extremist wing of society and they do not affect the decision making processes of people in higher education institutions. The issue is not just about sentiment towards people who vote against a candidate because of their race, but sentiment towards voting for someone of the same race as yourself. Is it okay to vote for Hillary Clinton because she is a woman or for Barack Obama because he is black, because you believe that their election has the potential to bring about profound social change in our country? Or is this just another version of racial / gender bias? Most importantly however is for us to examine how race has become a taboo subject in a country where it is of the utmost importance to talk about it. Please log on to www.mini-polis.com and navigate to The Forum to discuss this and other political topics.