Call it a system, call it a cycle, call it anything that you want — racism is all around us. However, when most people think of racism, they think of racist or discriminatory acts that were done to them. They think about things they experienced or anonymous YouTube comments. Many people have this firm idea of what racism is; if you ask them about it, they can bring forth a multitude of specific examples. But, what happens when you ask people to think about racism abstractly?
I decided to explore the concept of abstract racism. I asked students at my school to tell me about racism, but not in a typical sense.
What does racism smell like? Here are some of the answers I received:
“F*cking sh*t.”
Would you care to elaborate?
“I’ll get mad if I do but, OK.
Like when my dog doesn’t get a bath. Like the smell at the bottom of the ocean (I bet it stinks down there). Like if you took the oldest body you could find and covered it with sh*t. But you can go with my first answer and say ‘f*cking sh*t’ if you want.”
-Shalondra, Class of 2019
This was the first answer that I got and I must say that it did a pretty good job of setting the tone for this survey. Many of the people that I asked described actual smells, none of which were particularly pleasant.
“Racism smells like rotting meat in all honesty.”
-Channy, Class of 2017
“Smells like garbage juice in that trash you’ve been meaning to take out.”
-Carolina, Class of 2016
Some of them took a fairly comical route.
“It smells like Haterade.”
-Ariel, Class of 2017
“Like a stale meme; I’m over it. Also, a country club.”
-Nicole, Class of 2019
Others ideas were more political.
“Probably Donald Trump’s breath considering all of the racist sh*t that falls out of his mouth.”
-Maggie, Class of 2019
But there was one thing that I noticed about the wide variety of answers that I received.
“Like chewing tobacco. Every racist person I know smells like chewing tobacco.”
-Julia, Class of 2019
In each answer that I received, there was some measure of gutting truth.
“Racism smells like any candle or incense with the word “Exotic” or “Oriental” in its name.”
-Jasmine, Class of 2016
Racism is all around us and permeates our lives in ways that we can barely even comprehend. When we begin to think about racism's less traditional manifestations we can see some of the impacts that it has on us: the judgments that we make, the political stances that make us cringe, the scents that permeated our childhoods.
“Something sweet burning. It stings your nostrils and makes your eyes water.”
-Leniece, Class of 2017
"Burnt plastic, unpleasant even when it is subtle."
-Megan, Class of 2017
Racism is more than action. It is more than hurtful words separated from their speaker by a computer screen. It's hard to fight something so immaterial.
“Polluted because racism is toxic.”
-Kendall T, Class of 2018
So toxic and yet we seem to breathe it.