The Impact of Racism at Albany High School

Accountable, by Dasha Slater described a controversial incident about racism posted on an Instagram account. In 2017, at a school in the Bay Area called Albany High School, there was a conflict that made national headlines of a group of teenage boys using an Instagram account to post racist things about Black students at their school. Albany is a town where almost half of the residents are White, with Black people being about 4 percent of the population. It started when the boys decided to make an account to store all their racist jokes, and for followers to see. Albany High School’s systemic racism extremely contributed to this incident because of encouragement and normalization of already racist instances happening in the school. This incident shows how systemic racism greatly regularized racism, causing implicit bias which created a negative feel for Black students at the school by everyone there.

Racism at Albany High School was already very common, making it feel normalized for everyone to keep doing it. Most of the school was white with few people of color. So, most students saw the others as outsiders, and therefore treated them differently, usually with racist jokes. For instance, “people made Asian jokes all the time” at the school, so Charles felt that “it was easy to assume that other people felt the same” when he joked about other ethnicities (Slater 46). Students don’t realize they’re being racist because systems like schools almost encourage racism, which is why it can become such a huge problem like this incident before they realize what they did was wrong. Kids were judging others for their race without noticing, so following or creating a racist account wasn’t much of a big deal to them. Also, whenever class assignments or lectures were about Black history, teachers usually targeted Black students, as if encouraging everyone else to do so as well. For instance, in the point of view of a Black student, the “teacher asks you–the only Black kid in the class–if you have any thoughts” during a discussion about slavery (20). “Everyone looks over at you” which “makes you feel uncomfortable.” This shows that way before the account was even thought out interpersonal racism like targeting Black students was very common among students and staff. It’s probably why the racist post got so much attention in the first place. If racism wasn’t so common, the account would have been reported as soon as possible. But, people enjoyed it, attracting others to follow the account. So, because targeting ethnicities wasn’t rare at Albany High School, it’s what moved Charles to start the account and for others to follow it and not report it.

Implicit bias created a negative environment for Black students who were always subject to racist or annoying remarks by other students or institutions like staff. This was common since the school was mainly white, and people simply felt the need to act differently among other races without realizing. Implicit bias is when someone is creating assumptions or being racist, even though they didn’t intend it. For instance, when Greg, one of the account followers, barked at Andrea, one of the victims to “‘Get your nappy hair out of my face,’” it caused her to take the extreme decision to cut a large amount of her hair (18-19). Greg didn’t intend for her to cut off her hair by telling her to move, but Andrea heard it that way from his tone when describing her hair. Even if Greg maybe didn’t mean that her hair was nappy because she’s Black, Andrea had experienced other instances of implicit bias about her hair, so she thought it was. For example, a teacher “asks you to tell the class what your hair does when you go underwater” (20). This is another example of being ignorant even though it wasn’t the teachers intention.It made Andrea feel uncomfortable with her hair almost all her life, and she probably wasn’t the only one. Black students therefore felt like everything they did was being watched by others and were going to be subject to judgement, creating a negative environment for them. And a racist account caused by the implicit bias mentality from normalization of racism, made things worse for them, showing how implicit bias contributed to the incident.

Students and staff at Albany High School encouraged and normalized racism, which is what moved people to create and follow the account without thinking it was bad. Implicit bias caused students to be subject to racism by people all around the school even though they didn’t mean it. Many incidents at the school happened when students and staff, who were mainly white, would encourage racism by making racist remarks, which is what also encouraged Charles to make the @yungcavage account. It would have been reported or not been made at all if people were more mindful of what they said about other races. And, the negative environment caused by that normalization, made the lives of people miserable and always subject to judgement. Using these events, San Rafael High School would react differently by making sure kids and staff were immediately punished for being racist so that it wouldn’t be normalized. This would prevent implicit bias that would make students of color feel bad about themselves. San Rafael High School could learn the lesson to be mindful of what is said when making small remarks or on social media, where everyone can see and be affected.