What About That White-Skin Privilege, Tho'?

During the Don Imus furor you all probably didn't catch Talib Kweli on the Today Show. I'll recap:

This, of course, was when the conversation somehow shifted from Imus being a racist fossil to what's wrong with hip hop. At least The Today Show had someone intelligent and thoughtful like Talib, who was joined by Tavis Smiley and Cornel West.

Talib uttered one sentence while West, Smiley and the host were discussing a myriad of issues related to hip hop, black folks and decency.

"What about that white-skin privilege, tho'?"

Yeah, nobody really wants to talk about that because it's a harder, layered, more difficult conversation. But one thing I've noticed about the '07 racism -- and you have to shout it out by year because it changes just that frequently -- is that racism these days is likely worse than it was when black folks had not a right to speak of.

Think I'm lying? Consider the following:

- Six white West Virginians decide it's rape, torture, and brutalize a black woman week. This is absolutely sick. The lowlight: A young, black woman is kidnapped and tortured for a week. She is forced to eat dog and rat feces and drink out of toilet.

- Jena, Louisiana, where the city motto is: We Have Never Heard Of The Emancipation Proclamation. In this small, retro-Jim Crow town, there has been a slew of disturbing racial incidents. The culmination of these events was when a group of black teenagers got into a fight with a white schoolmate. They were charged with ATTEMPTED MURDER and faced 100 years in prison. Because of pressure from the media, Al Sharpton and various other Civil Rights leader, the charges have been reduced. But they still carry a maximum penalty of 22 years. For. A. Fight. A fight, I might add, in which the white victim was well enough to go to a school function afterward.

- If you're white and legally stupid, a judge will deem it's OK for you to kill a young, black child. A 13-year-old black boy was killed outside Orlando in a hit-and-run accident. The driver, who is white, eluded police for several days and replaced the parts on his car, showing his guilt. But a punk-ass judge gave him one year in prison instead of the maximum of 25, saying he was too dumb to know what he was doing. The murderer has an IQ of 75, which might show he's a moron, but he's not legally retarded. And apparently, he was smart enough to know he would go to jail for what he did, WHICH IS WHY HE COVERED IT UP.

My overall point is, these incidents aren't exceptions. I wish they were. But attitudes toward black people are just as negative as they were during pre-Civil Rights. It seems as if we are regressing back to the time where racism was blatant.

Don't get me wrong, black folks need to get their shit together in a lot of ways. We are, in many ways, our own worst enemy. But it's amazing to see how black folks worldwide are still considered less than a person. A friend and I were talking recently about how negativity toward black folks crosses all cultures. Africans think African Americans are lazy, uncivilized dregs. Many Latinos believe they are better than us, more hard-working and honest. You go to Germany, Italy, etc., and dark skin is still considered very threatening.

It saddens me that my children, their children and their children won't see the end of racism. I wish I had the naivete of some white folks, who believe racism ended with the last verse of "We Shall Overcome." Unfortunately, racism seems to replenish, grow stronger with each generation. Now the '07 racism is blaming black folks for the institutional racism that existed for more than 400 years.

When will it end?