Proposition 54 on today
’s ballot is the latest effort of Ward Connerly to change the
practices of the State of California on the issues of race and
ethnicity.
Proposition 54 on today’s ballot is the latest effort of Ward Connerly to change the practices of the State of California on the issues of race and ethnicity.
It is not the first action of this nature that Connerly has championed. He was the spokesman for the effort to remove race and ethnicity from the selection process for California state colleges and universities. s a member of the Board of Regents of the University of California, he was not able to get this done, but as the spokesman for an initiative campaign, he succeeded.
Whatever you believe on this issue, do not believe the advertisements featuring Cruz Bustamante who claim that this issue is “greater than politics.” These television advertisements show Bustamante exhorting a cheering audience to vote against Proposition 54 because it will prohibit collecting medical data. He makes specific references to heart disease, stroke and diabetes as diseases in which race appears to play a role.
These advertisements appeal to our basic fears and are designed to generate race- and ethnic-based opposition to Proposition 54. These advertisements are also blatantly dishonest. Even a cursory reading of the text of the proposed changes or the Legislative Analysis of the bill published in the Official Voter Information Guide will show that Bustamante is not telling the truth.
Proposition 54 explicitly exempts medical information from the provisions of the bill. It says “Otherwise lawful of medical research subjects and patients will be exempt from this section.”
Bustamante’s television advertisements are a clear attempt to circumvent the legal restraints on campaign funding. When Bustamante accepted multi-million dollar contributions from Native American gaming interests, he attempted to launder those contributions by transferring them to a special fund for fighting against Proposition 54. That fund exists only to produce the television ads which show Bustamante as the champion of ethnic health. As such, they are more about getting Bustamante elected governor than they are about defeating Proposition 54, which it appears that Bustamante has never even read.
The fact that Bustamante and other opponents of Proposition 54 are using a false issue to fight it indicates that they are not willing to address the real issues that do exist.
Most will give lip service to the words of Dr. King’s most famous speech. His dream was of a society where a person “will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” What we are talking about now is the strategies by which this dream should be realized.
How close are we to realizing that dream? What are the actions that need be taken to bring us closer to that day? In fact, I believe that there are also a significant number of post-modern intelligentsia who do not share that dream, but rather would see this nation as a vibrant tapestry of many groups and membership on one of the groups determining your identity.
While this non-debate is going on, identity politics has become a major source of power for some and a source of public funds for others. It is these facts that Bustamante and those like him will not address. It appears that they are afraid of the backlash that such a debate might stir up and turn to false issue instead.
Not everyone even agrees on where we are right now. Some leaders of the African American community, such as the Rev. Cecil Williams of Glide Memorial Church, focus on how far we have come. Others focus on how far we have yet to go.
The basic question raised by Proposition 54 is one of whether we can ever reach the goal of a colorblind society when the state uses race and ethnicity as a factor in distributing jobs, contracts and other funds. How can this be viewed as colorblind? How can it bring us together when its forms force individuals to define themselves as belonging to one group or another? The current system does not now include the ability to define ones self as “mixed”. So, the daughters of a European man and and Asian woman would have to choose to be one or the other because the State of California does not allow them to be both.
History will teach us that this United States, founded on the proposition that all men are created equal, has rarely lived up to that promise. There are many debts yet to be paid. Personal experience will tell someone whether or not there is a “level playing field” for all. Green Party candidate Peter Miguel Camejo says that there is a time for the ideas of Proposition 54, but not yet.
I personally do not have an answer to these questions. I do know that the real issues are not being debated and that those who oppose Proposition 54 are hiding these real issues behind a campaign for innuendo and fear. Whatever decision you make on this question, do not let the false issue of health scare determine how you will vote.
“I find I have a great lot to learn – or unlearn. I seem to know far too much and this knowledge obscures the really significant facts, but I am getting on.” – Charles Rennie Mackintosh
Wes Rolley is an artist and concerned citizen. The Board of Contributors is comprised of local writers whose views appear on Tuesdays and Fridays.
