Color-based social distance creates understanding gaps between Americans

NEW YORK -- Color-based social distance has become a challenge for Americans to understand each other as darker skin color conjures in non-minority Americans' mind images of inferiority, criminality, and immorality, said a column on a US weekly newspaper.

The racist signs are collectible relics in the United States but the attitudes that created the signs are very much alive, said the column titled "The impact of social distance" at the website of the Wednesday Journal of Oak Park and River Forest.

Skin color "in America is equivalent to the Star of David patches that the Nazis forced Jewish people to wear. Skin color is a shortcut to thinking for too many people. Darker skin color conjures in their mind images of inferiority, criminality, and immorality," it said.

"Lack of social interaction leads to increased distance between minorities and non-minorities. As a result of socially encouraged social distance, knowledge of a minority person's day-to-day life experiences is scant or non-existent," it continued.

"Slights, verbal assaults, micro-aggressions, and physical attacks are realities a minority person must deal with daily. And, if the minority person reacts, resists, or complains about being unfairly treated s/he is viewed as the agitator," the column said.