Scott Morizot

There are certainly many examples of that sort of racism in white nationalist groups and white terrorist groups like the KKK.

I do not want to gloss over the existence of active, virulent hate since it continues to thrive in a large minority of the population.

But that is not the only or even most common expression and experience of racism. That's just the proverbial tip of the iceberg.

Racism encompasses all the unconscious prejudice, implicit biases, and systemic structures that support white Americans.

And it's hard to even point them all out because it's the air we breathe. It's the beliefs and assumptions that form each conscious thought.

And those beliefs and assumptions are so deeply ingrained you believe your thoughts are "natural" or "obvious" when they are anything but.

That reality does not automatically turn people into swastika or hood wearing active racists, but make no mistake. It's a very small step.

Nazi Germany was mostly filled with normal "good" people who allowed racism and hate to become the norm.

Lynch mobs in the South were occasions for Sunday picnics with the children. The KKK in the past were "fine, upstanding citizens".

In my lifetime, we had managed to at least make active racism socially unacceptable in mixed company, at least.

Though I still heard plenty of it in what people assumed was a safe setting with only fellow whites around.

That small, but critical step is seriously at risk. We already see active displays of hate being normalized again around us.

That precipice of hate has always been just the smallest of steps away. Evil is not done by monsters. It's done by "normal" people.

Even the true "monsters" are mostly only seen as such in retrospect. Dwell on that for a while.

I'm not somehow magically free of all those biases and assumptions, though I seem to have absorbed fewer than many. I guard against the rest

So when you see someone and make assumptions based on their race and appearance, that does mean you are racist.

When you are angered because you feel someone has gotten an advantage in a system that's supposed to favor you, you are racist.

When you set aside or discount racist opinions or views expressed by another, you are also racist.

And when you support and vote for candidates who have openly expressed racist opinions and espoused racist policies, you are racist.

If, in your own self-image, you would like to be something better than a racist, the first step is to acknowledge where you are.