Again, that is really interesting you see this as a possibility. That's kind of a pessimistic take from a person that has been know to have a rose-colored view in general.
It's not a pessimistic point of view. It's just a reflection of what has happened in the US (where legal segregation help infuse the current rocky black/white attitudes there) and what has happened in Latin America (where the average person don't discriminate based on race, despite a few here and there).
The reason for the US racial problems is due to its reconstruction after the civil war with the implementation of segregated public places based on the color of a person's skin.
Such thing has never officially existed in the DR and has never been widespread in the majority of cases in the private sector either.
First, no one is asking to take on a US point of view of anything.
Looking at the world in black/white terms. That is an American view point and that is what people want for the DR.
If DR is sooo embracing why do you think that DR would ever have white supremist groups? The white should just embrace the blacks and mulattos. People who found these kinds of organization must feel they have something to lose. What would a white supremist Dominican have to lose?
Because if darker Dominicans and mulatto Dominicans begin to see any light skin person (dominican or not) as "evil", well evil is what will come out of it.
Look at our relations with Haiti. Dominicans have a rocky relations with Haitians and Haitians with Dominicans because each look at each other as evils.
Intentional segregation breeds these types of thing in all societies, even societies that are very embracing as the DR.
The Black Panthers only came into being after 400 years of oppression. It was a natural extension of the spectrum of protest. The Young Lords, the Latino version of the BP, also had similar roots. If you notice all the surviving activist that participated in both of those organizations have gone on to do AMAZING work and contribute greatly to society. The latter would not have been the case, had their been no value in their debate.
I have noticed and that is good for them, but their beginnings were not meant for such "niceness".
I mean, I can always point to the fact that the DR started as a country of masters and slaves and today it become an embracing society.
If you truly believe that those organizations have become better despite their rocky start (and I do agree with you here), then the same can be said of the DR as a whole.
Afterall, not many countries become a mulatto majority if there are tensions between the races, don't you think. Look at Cuba, only after Fidel Castro imposed his vision of a colorblind society (though all his economic policies are short of being suicide for Cuba), but only after his colorblind agenda did Cuba became more Mulatto and today Cuba and the DR are the only two countries in this hemisphere with mulatto majorities.
The US should have been largely mulatto by now if it was as "embracing" as is often claimed. Yet, the US is 3/4 white with whites still largely marrying whites and blacks marrying blacks and those who are mixed being looked with suspicious eyes from both blacks and whites.
The question is what does DR or the few who control this debate have to be afraid of? Just food for thought.
There is nothing to be afraid of, except the country becoming so embroiled into this race thing of looking at everything in black/white terms (in a country so mixed like ours) that it could weaken our national unity to the point of being at risk of political and national decay.
The only thing that keeps countries together is the different types of unities. One of our most cherished features is our relative relaxed attitude towards race (thus our mulatto majority), and causing tension among attitudes that have traditionally been relaxed could spell some rather stormy years for the country as a whole.
Look, the US went through hell in the 1960s for being so tensed when it came to race relations and today everybody over there still has a bit of salt in their mouth when it comes to race relations. The same can't be said of the DR today or ever and that is something we should be proud of.
In short, race doesn't matter as long as people identify as that which they are. In other words, Dominicans should just identify as Dominicans, period.
Focusing tension into race issues that we just don't have to the extent of other countries is stupid, especially for a country like the DR that is at a point that the US wish it would have become, a colorblind society.
That doesn't mean a 100% racist free country, just a country that is much more colorblind than most as such, we might as well consider ourselves a colorblind country.
Here is the other side of the American view.... My point is this, blacks and whites are in adverse situations in the US, much more so than in the DR, that's why I don't understand why people want to impose American views on our country when we have gone way beyond the point where America stands today in terms of race.
(This link was sent to me by a friend of mine)
http://faculty.ncwc.edu/toconnor/soc/355lect11.htm
