This article tells the story of Reynaldo E. Lopez who became the first black Firefighter at station 46 in Los Angeles in February 1950. He was harassed for years with racial slurs as well as physical abuse. Despite that he stuck it out for more than 20 years to prove he could be a great fire fighter. He was recently honored for his courage by the Los Angeles-based association of African-American firefighters.
In Virginia a state correctional officer was fired for violation of the states grooming guideline, although she claims the incident racist. The guidelines are open to some interpretation by the supervisors. The guidelines state "Extreme or eccentric or trendy haircuts or hairstyles are not authorized." She was fired for having cornrow braids, which are hardly extreme, eccentric. Read More
More about the institutionalized racism of breast cancer.
1 comment:
The article about funding allocation + racism, is very interesting. Especially because there are so many folks in the world who say that racism is dead, and affirmative action is no longer needed (I would assume that most of those with this argument are sitting in the priviledged seat); but clearly this shows that if better efforts are not made at the ground level, entire races and classes of people can not move up the ladder. In some cases, the money may be allocated, but the person has to be hired first by someone in charge. And this may or may not happen, depending on whether or not the power in charge is racist/classist. And while this happens on an individual level, it is not hard to see how a few specific cases here and there, quickly lead to a pack of people discriminating.
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