Whenever we discuss important historical and social events in American history, we must be prepared to confront the devastating impact of white supremacy , a term defined as the belief that white people are superior to non-white people. -white racial groups. As it has manifested itself, white supremacy has served as a catapult for white Americans to place themselves at the forefront of every major area of ​​society, and then to maintain that power by restricting the rights of minorities so that those minorities are sufficiently hampered in their ability to achieve the gains that would put them on an equal footing with whites. Countless historians, theorists, sociologists, and other scholars have written extensively about the damage caused by white supremacy, but too many textbooks still overlook white racism and falsely teach that minorities are as guilty of their low socioeconomic position as white people. This couldn't be further from the truth, but textbooks tend to limit the effects of white supremacy and blame minorities for their conditions, leading minorities to think that if only they worked harder they would would not be where they are. White people also adopt similar attitudes and begin to view minorities as lazy and unwilling to improve themselves or their community. Holding white people accountable for racism and historical injustice will help minority students understand the reasons for their socioeconomic conditions and help them understand that, despite the injustice of white supremacy, this injustice has not need to continue indefinitely. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get the original essay​White racism is not a topic that many textbooks are willing to tackle, perhaps because it is a topic that the majority of Americans, who happen to be white, are deeply uncomfortable with. “Textbooks have a hard time recognizing that there is anything wrong with white Americans, or with the United States as a whole,” says author James Loewen, continuing his analysis with the poignant comment that what What Americans learned from slavery was "the idea that it is appropriate, even 'natural,' for whites to be on top and blacks to be on the bottom." Few people who understand the intersection of racism and history would argue that slavery, as the greatest representation of racism, led to racial injustice for African Americans and other minority groups, but those who understand this intersection probably don't learn it from textbooks. Indeed, textbooks do not “connect history and racism,” leaving teachers to fill in the gaps; and when teachers show restraint and the connection is never made, students are left to make the connections themselves instead of analyzing the connections that are clear, obvious, and stated in every history textbook. More than dealing with white racism, textbook authors believe it is better to spend their energy trying to avoid embarrassing white people, thereby preventing all students from "intelligently analyzing racism" (Loewen 163) and bridging gaps rather than letting old ones fester. and maybe even create new ones. If textbooks do not make the change needed for students to analyze racism intelligently, racism can never truly be addressed and old issues will inevitably come to the surface.​History weighs on the present and it It is therefore necessary to contextualizehistorically white racism to understand how minority groups are affected by it today. In Kate Masur's essay, "Civil War and Reconstruction, 1860-1877," Masur writes about the carnage resulting from the Civil War and how, despite great efforts, Reconstruction failed to bring out the black community of servitude into which she had been placed. When President Johnson took office after Lincoln's assassination, he helped ratify the 13th Amendment, but also allowed state governments to adopt "black codes" which "were efforts by the Southern elite to restore control of a plantation “workforce once held in place by whips, chains, and slave patrols” (Globalyceum, Section 2). These black codes kept intact the strict racial hierarchy separating whites and blacks, so blacks could only go as far as whites allowed them – that is, not far at all. The repercussions of slavery, the Black Codes, and failed efforts at Reconstruction all worked against the advancement of Black people and the repercussions of these historical events are still felt today. Loewen shows this when he writes that “on average, African Americans have worse housing, lower IQ test scores, and a higher percentage of young men in prison. The sneaking suspicion [is] that African Americans might be inferior.” These sneaking suspicions go unchallenged, in part because textbooks failed to explain to students how white racism kept black people in an inferior position. These sneaking suspicions are not just the fault of white students, as black students have come to believe that their problems are solely their fault, leading them to distrust themselves and fulfill the cycle of being weak. expectations. When African Americans, Native Americans, Asian Americans, and other groups sought equal rights, they were often turned away from white social movements such as those that took shape during the Progressive Era. According to Professor Charles Postel of San Francisco State University, "too often, white reformers have rejected demands for equal rights for African Americans, Native Americans, Asian Americans, and others groups, who faced new waves of segregation, disenfranchisement, dispossession and exclusion” (Globalyceum, Introduction). Since whites controlled social institutions at the time – and to a large extent still do – it was impossible for minority groups to overcome this segregation, disenfranchisement, dispossession and exclusion unless in the rarest cases. Thus, minority groups did not see the social advances advocated by whites at the time, leading to another generation of oppressed men and women. Postel connects white supremacy to the lower socioeconomic classes of many minorities, particularly African Americans, when he writes how, in the late 20th century, "Democrats launched a violent 'campaign for white supremacy” demanding an end to white supremacy. vote…most populists have bowed to Democratic legislation regarding poll taxes, literacy tests, and black disenfranchisement.” Without the political rights necessary for self-determination and deprived of the monetary benefits of unionizing and fighting for fair wages, Black Americans and others inevitably found themselves confined to a lower socioeconomic position than,.