Race

In early autumn 1964 when we’d been living in Burlington, Vermont, for about 6 months, Wendy and I had to choose between two invitations. Should we accept my mentor Kerr White's invitation to accompany him when he moved from the University of Vermont to Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health in Baltimore, Maryland? Or should I accept the invitation from Stuart Morrison, to become senior lecturer in social medicine at the Usher Institute of Public Health in the University of Edinburgh, Scotland? The salary in Edinburgh was significantly lower and there were fewer benefits. Even so, the decision took barely a microsecond of thought and discussion. It was a no-brainer. We chose Edinburgh where we had five wonderful years, during which I consolidated my academic reputation and Rebecca, David and Jonathan acquired lovely soft Edinburgh Scottish accents, which sadly they lost long ago, to be replaced by Canadian, variant Ottawa Valley.

I set out the reasons for our decision in a post on this blog in 2012. The most important reason was our philosophical belief in the virtue of collectivism rather than individualism, which dominates all aspects of American life. Quite a long way down on the list of reasons for choosing life in Scotland rather than in the USA was the problem of racial prejudice. This is not so much a scar on the American body politic as a running sore that shows signs of being incurable. Of course racist attitudes and beliefs are far from unique to the USA and apartheid era South Africa. They are pervasive, at any rate among many people of 'white' or European ethnic origin, including my father - an intolerant racist bigot, for all his many talents. 

Wendy and I talked about this a few times, for example after parties we’d hosted or attended where remarks or behavior of others revealed their affliction with this terrible disorder. Wherever we lived we made friends, conducted ourselves with other people, regardless of their skin pigmentation, hair texture, facial cartilage and bone structure or other aspects of their appearance. Occasionally we ran into socially tricky situations. Once at a dinner party in Edinburgh our host asked all of us to toast the racist leader of what was then called Southern Rhodesia in his “struggle against the forces of darkness” or some such euphemism for the indigenous inhabitants who were taking power with British government support. Wendy and I remained seated, did not raise our glasses, and left that party without waiting for desert. Among our closest friends there are several whose appearance instantly identifies them as members of a racial group other than European. We discovered long ago that appearance is irrelevant. Attitudes are often revealed amid polite conversation, as at that dinner party in Edinburgh, and in the request of a beautiful, soft-speaking young woman who wanted me to alter the definition of ‘race’ in the Dictionary of Epidemiology to reflect her views.

In the USA, the running sore of racism festers and ulcerates, and summer often brings the inflammation to a head. This year it’s come to a head in a suburb of St Louis, Missouri. Years ago I had a friend in St Louis who belongs to what we call in Canada a ‘visible minority’ - not African American but Chinese American. He spoke of tiers in St Louis society in which he was below white but above black Americans. Thank goodness Canada doesn’t seem to have that kind of convoluted social structure, but we aren’t immune and ominously some traces of it seem to be sneaking into the social fabric even in mutlicultural, multiracial Canada.

When people speak on the radio, it’s often impossible to detect their racial background, unless accent or dialect reveal it.  There's a distinguished Scottish writer who speaks with the lovely Edinburgh lilt. She has a Scottish mother and a Nigerian father, and her pictures show her imposing and very darkly pigmented appearance. On the radio all you can hear is her musical Morningside voice. I wonder whether the tension in St Louis would be lowered if representatives of the opposing groups engaged in dialogue behind screens that concealed their outward appearance so only their words and their sentiments would be revealed. I doubt if this would work now that tension is so high, but it might be worth trying next time such tensions arise. The problems associated with race and racism in the USA and elsewhere are so deep rooted now, however, that facile suggestions like this one of mine don’t stand much chance. I’m just relieved that we evaded the problem (and other problems endemic in the USA) by turning our backs on the country.