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The Colorblind Con
By Larry Yu
8/16/08
Benetton Nation
For many people in the USA, the idea of a colorblind society is a laudable and self-evident goal to achieve. The very phrase evokes iconic images from Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech at the Lincoln Memorial in 1963, in which famously he declared, "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."
Related to colorblindness, the idea of a "post-racial" society has increasingly gained currency in the media and public discourse. This concept suggests that the USA has reached such a state of development that race itself is no longer a significant social or political distinction--that is, a state of colorblindness.
After all, US culture is becoming more multiracial as we see celebrities, business people, and public figures of all different racial and ethnic backgrounds. Most media networks have their requisite dash of diversity with African American, Latino, and Asian American performers and media icons. Interracial couples are no longer taboo and increasing in number. And all sectors of American society from government to corporations to schools to civil society all claim to "celebrate diversity" as an institutional value. In politics, the country has the possibility of an African-American reaching the highest pinnacle of power and becoming the President of the USA.
America is like a Benetton ad in its rainbow diversity. Or so it appears.
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