Is Racism Part Of American Culture? Anti-Racism Banner Seen During Baseball Game

During a baseball game at Fenway Park in Boston on Wednesday night, a banner reading "Racism is as American as baseball" was seen hanging over Green Monster — a nickname for the high left field wall at Fenway Park.

Two women and one man were seen holding up the banner in the middle of the fourth inning of the game between the Boston Red Sox and Oakland Athletics, reports said. Referring to the banner, Red Sox said in a statement that four fans had unfurled a banner over the left field wall, which violated the club's policy of prohibiting signs of any kind to be hung or affixed to the ballpark.

Peter Abraham of The Boston Globe wrote on Facebook the crowd booed at the banner until security officers pulled the banner up and also ejected the banner holders from the field. In his Facebook post, he also wrote the game was not delayed.

Abraham also mentioned that one of the four protesters, who were ejected from the park for affixing the sign to the wall, told Sox security that they were inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement, which campaigns against systematic violence against African Americans.

In a statement to The Washington Post, the protesters identified themselves as a "group of white anti-racist protestors."

"We want to remind everyone that just as baseball is fundamental to American culture and history, so too is racism. White people need to wake up to this reality before white supremacy can truly be dismantled. We urge anyone who is interested in learning more or taking action to contact their local racial justice organization," the statement read.

One of the members of the group, who responded to The Post via email on condition of anonymity, said the group had five members. Some of them documented the happenings that took place that night across the stadium. The person also said the group was not a part of any particular organization even though they work as organizers in various Boston groups that fight against white supremacy and racism. However, the banner created confusion among observers it was a condemnation or an endorsement of racism, according to reports.

One of the group members said that the banner was a response to the racist comments made at the beginning of the game season at Fenway. In May, Baltimore Orioles center fielder Adam Jones said he had been called the "N-word" and also got peanuts thrown at him on multiple occasions, New York Daily News reported.

The group member said: "It has been for a long time, and that no white people can avoid the history of racism, essentially. So we did this banner as a gesture towards that, to have a conversation about that."

According to a study by Pew Research Center — conducted from Aug. 15 to Aug. 21 among 1,893 U.S. adults — more than half of the participants said racism was a “big problem in our society.” About 19 percent respondents said it was “somewhat of a problem” and just 12 percent said racism was a small problem or not a problem in the U.S.

Racism is still ingrained in the American society, it seems. A study published in 2009 in the journal "Science" stated: "Racism may persevere in part because people who anticipate feeling upset and believe that they will take action may actually respond with indifference when faced with an act of racism."

The findings showed that those in the U.S. who considered themselves non-racist demonstrated an attitude that prevented them from confronting overt racists or from being upset by other people's racist behavior. The authors said the results suggested that racist behaviors were so deeply ingrained among people that protective legislation and affirmative-action programs were required to overcome them, according to Time.

Even Google searches revealed the psyche of the population during the presidential campaign last year. Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, author of the book "Everybody Lies," and a former Google data scientist, revealed during an interview to Vox, that there was a spike in the search results pertaining to racist epithets and jokes during Donald Trump's primary run. He observed the spike in the searches not just in the South but in upstate New York, Western Pennsylvania, Eastern Ohio, rural Illinois, West Virginia, and industrial Michigan, Vox reported.