Race is a reality

Most of us are in denial of what seems to be a pressing problem of our times. Racism is a powerful force, something deeply entrenched in institutions, mindsets and the culture. It is hard to not see it. Yet we choose to ignore it, shut our eyes and continue with our lives.
Something that is so blatant and out there is often overlooked. It is difficult to confront our own biases and our own prejudices towards others and so we consciously choose to ignore it. Nobody wants to be called a racist, even by themselves.
For the media, it is when the census releases some numbers, it is time to do a story and get done with it.
In one such case, I was assigned a story on diversity in the workforce. Simple enough. Call a few people, go out there interview "real" workers and then call experts. Get quotes. That's what journalism is limited to these days.
A tested formula for deadline writing. Because in shrinking newrooms where reporters are fast becoming an extinct species, you have a ton of other stuff to write. You can't chase one story. There is no "luxury" of working on one story as my editor once said to me. So real stories get buried in event coverage or usual town/school stuff.
But often one thing leads to another. In talking to people, in surfing the internet, in walking the streets, I stumbled upon the whys of the question of business ownership among minorities.
Of course, we had numbers. But nobody ever asked why these were so negligible in an area that claims to be so welcoming of diversity. There were only about 250 black-owned businesses in the region as the 2002 census data.
It wasn't difficult to understand why. This was a vicious cycle. With no start up capital, these individuals would have a tough time getting the loans. And then the discrimination is well too apparent.
Research has found that loan denial rates were high in such communities. Often, the members had encountered such racism in their interactions that it killed heir desire to be ambitious enough, discouraged them to open their own businesses.
This wasn't rocket science to figure out and I wonder why there wasn't anything on it earlier. Perhaps breaking news or town/city hall stuff took up most of the space in the newspapers along with advertisements.
Often it angers me ... this denial of such issues by those who can highlight it. But I guess journalism in today's world has come to mean breaking news and thousand stories related with one incident. Or maybe just looking for the usual scoops. In our bid to be the watchdog, we have shirked our responsibilty towards the larger community. Seems there are no takers for such stories because they make us feel ugly, tell us what a bad job we have done of making an equal society.