by Wayne Leon Learmond

Created on: March 11, 2010   Last Updated: February 28, 2011

The fact that there is now a black President of the United States of America is proof that the country is slowly, and at long last, changing her views on the whole race problem. Indeed many people, black as well as white, never thought that they would see the day when a black man would reach the very highest echelons of power within the United States. 

Yes, he may be in power for only one term, but the barriers have been broken, at last, and President Obama will certainly not be the last black President that the country will see.  Indeed, there will come a time, when America will appoint her first female President too - which will be another barrier broken.

But it is to race that we concentrate on here. Maybe more than any other country {barring South Africa} race has played a pivotal role in the shaping, and the history, of a whole nation. Institutionalised racism has been the one defining factor in America that has shaped her very infrastructure. It has shaped her infrastructure in such a way that, psychologically, it has affected every single aspect of a person's life - be they black or white.

Deep-rooted racism has held the country in an iron grip of fear, hatred, bigotry and dread for generations. Something so ingrained and so seeped into the psychology of the nation is, as one would expect, very hard to shift.  Yet there have been many millions of people who have enjoyed their positions of power - to the detriment of others. They have allowed this system of apartheid to fester and breed, in all walks of life in America.. 

They have become blase to the chronic suffering of others [contributed by them]  while they have lived the good life, full of opportunities. Indeed, to be born with white skin in America one has already a head start in life, with all that entails. And this can never be denied, as history has proved time and again. 

To be born with black skin in America would mean, in the past, that that person would be already condemned to a life of misery and racial abuse. They would be put in the worst schools,the worst housing, and would be looked down upon as lower than second class citizens. That was what it meant to be born black in the 'democracy' of America.

The racial stereotypes would be seen everywhere one looked in the States, from the Jim Crow laws of the Deep South {which actually even separated people on the basis of color by the washrooms they used, and by the fountains they drank

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