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The great Michelle Obama has spoken about the toll consistently living with racism takes upon black people by detailing her battle with low-grade depression. On August 6, 2020, the governor of Michigan declared racism as a public health issue by executive order. This is an important development. The Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice and Health defines Public Health as “the collective efforts of a society to create the conditions in which people can be healthy.” The World Health Organization defines it as “a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” These definitions when applied to racism place it on the list of public health issues. As such, a comprehensive and holistic program or policy must be implemented to address the healthcare needs of individuals facing racism.
Racism is part of the fabric of life for African Americans and is among the causes of enduring negative health outcomes. There is really nothing new or startling in the assertion that social circumstances encountered as part of day-to-day experience influence physical health. At the turn of the last century, W. E. B. Du Bois (1906) and Kelly Miller (1897) proposed in separate manuscripts that oppressive social conditions encroaching on the lives of African Americans contributed to poor health and premature death. Fifty years later, Frantz Fanon’s classic studies (1967, 1968) examined the effects of oppression and included a recognition of “psychosomatic”—that is physical—consequences. Currently, social epidemiologists, health psychologists, and medical sociologists have extended the insights of these important early scholars by showing how racism generates systems and practices that contribute to persistent disparities in health outcomes (Paradies 2006a; Pascoe and Richman, 2009; Williams 1997). Estimates indicate that the failure to erase these disparities costs tens of thousands of African American lives each year (Levine et al., 2001; Williams and Mohammed, 2009). As long as the rates of the leading causes of death differ along racial lines (Centers For Disease Control and Prevention, 2008), the specter of racism will haunt the United States. The persistence of racial health disparities and of racism in any form calls scholars, therapists, activists, and political leaders to vigorous action.
Camara Jules P. Harrell, Tanisha I. Burford, Brandi N. Cage, Travette McNair Nelson, Sheronda Shearon, Adrian Thompson, and Steven Green
Racism causes chronic stress. Understanding this has serious implications for health outcomes in the black community. While I am not a doctor, what I have read by medical professionals explains how constant stress will create unhealthy outcomes. The continuing racism blacks face keeps blacks stressed out and creates chemical imbalances within our bodies causing a wide variety of health problems. There is increasing evidence supported by research that shows racism shortens lives. On June 3, 2020, SAMHSA’s Office of Behavioral Health Equity published a report titled, “Trauma, Racism, Chronic Stress and the Health of Black Americans.” It was published due to a request for help addressing trauma created by racism. In summary of what they found was that racism contributed to mental health and chronic health problems.
“Racism and associated trauma and violence contribute to mental health disorders, particularly depression, anxiety and PTSD, and chronic health conditions such as cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes, maternal mortality/infant mortality and morbidity in African Americans. Racism is considered a fundamental cause of adverse health outcomes for racial/ethnic minorities and racial/ethnic inequities in health. The primary domains of racism - structural/institutional racism, cultural racism, and individual-level discrimination— are linked to mental and physical health outcomes. Racism and violence targeting a specific community is increasingly associated with complex trauma and intergenerational trauma, all of which have physical and behavioral health consequences.”
Racism is a stressor that triggers the body into allostasis or better understood, racism forces the body to adapt to stress. Allostasis is the process that helps us adapt to stressors. “Exposure to stressors activates the sympathetic-adrenal-medullary axis (SAM) and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. SAM releases the catecholamines epinephrine and norepinephrine from the adrenal glands. Meanwhile, the HPA releases glucocorticoids, like cortisol, which are steroid hormones.” Allostatic load is compiled damage to the body as an individual is exposed to constant stress. For example, allostatic processes lead to increases in blood pressure, which is a defined health risk. Constant stress leads to allostatic overload, which is the point when the cumulative amount of stress causes health problems or death.
Studies show that allostatic overload created by stress caused due to constant exposure to racism increases the occurrences of myocardial infarction in blacks. Simply put, a myocardial infarction is a heart attack. In 2014, “Structural racism and myocardial infarction in the United States”, a study by Alicia Lukachko, Mark Hatzenbuehler, & Katherine Keyes was published in Social Science and Medicine Journal. What they found as a result of their study was not only that racism increased the occurrence of myocardial infarction for blacks, but instances of myocardial infarction were reduced for whites.
“This study demonstrates adverse effects of structural racism—specifically state-level racial disparities disadvantaging Blacks in political representation, employment, and incarceration —on past 12-month myocardial infarction. These adverse effects, however, were specific to Blacks, and among Whites, indicators of structural racism appear to have a benign or even beneficial effect on cardiac health. It is important to note that individual-level risk factors including age, sex, education, income, and medical insurance do not account for these findings. Furthermore, lending support to the construct validity of our measures of structural racism, the effects persist above and beyond those of state-level racial disparities in poverty.
Measures of structural racism pertaining to job status did not follow the expected pattern of association, and were inversely associated with myocardial infarction among Blacks. While this finding was unexpected, it is in line with results from previous studies that have documented that Black Americans in high status positions report greater exposure to interpersonal discrimination (Paradies, 2006). This increased exposure, coupled with potential pressures to assimilate and to defy negative racist stereotypes, may in turn place high status Blacks at greater risk for adverse health outcomes. Our results similarly suggest that Black Americans in states with greater representation of Blacks in high status positions are at higher risk for heart attack.”
Alicia Lukachko, Mark Hatzenbuehler, & Katherine Keyes -“Structural racism and myocardial infarction in the United States”
Racism is more than just a slur. It is abusive behavior that causes lifelong harm to the victims of racial abuse. Racial abuse can lead to self-destructive and societally destructive violent behavior. Racist whites led by former President Donald Trump, ran their mouths loud and long about the looting and rioting they falsely blamed solely on Black Lives Matter during the summer of 2020. Those blacks that did commit such acts are prime examples of what happens when people are continually racially abused or see instances of such abuse. The murders of George Floyd, Brianna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and others triggered a reminder to people of color of their bad experiences in America due to racism. Now is the time to understand the damage 400 years of racism has upon blacks and the United States of America.
Now is the accepted time, not tomorrow, not some more convenient season. It is today that our best work can be done and not some future day or future year. It is today that we fit ourselves for the greater usefulness of tomorrow. Today is the seed time, now are the hours of work, and tomorrow comes the harvest and the playtime.
W. E. B. Du Bois
Ryan C.T. DeLapp, MA, and Monnica T. Williams, Ph.D., “Proactively Coping With Racism, Getting back to our lives in the aftermath of racial violence in the media.”, July 18, 2016, www.psychologytoday,com
Paradies Y, Ben J, Denson N, Elias A, Priest N, Pieterse A, et al. (2015) Racism as a Determinant of Health: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. PLoS ONE 10(9): e0138511. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0138511
Weiten, W. & Lloyd, M.A. (2008) Psychology Applied to Modern Life (9th ed.). Wadsworth Cengage Learning.
Lazarus, R.S., & Folkman, S. (1984). Stress, Appraisal and Coping. New York: Springer.
Comas-Diaz, L., and Jacobsen, F. M. (1991). Clinical Ethnocultural Transference and Countertransference in the Therapeutic Dyad. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 61(3), 392-402.
Fryberg, S. M. (2010). When the World Is Colorblind, American Indians Are Invisible: A Diversity Science Approach. Psychological Inquiry, 21(2), 115-119.
Natasha Tracy, Types of Abuse: What are the Different Forms of Abuse?
www.healthyplace.com
Charles S. Carver and Jennifer Connor Smith,“Personality and Coping"(2010), The Annual Review of Psychology
Is Racism a Public Health Issue? Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice & Health, October 9, 2017, Is Racism a Public Health Issue? — Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice & Health
Dennis R. Upkins, Denying Racism And Other Forms Of Gaslighting, Aug 24, 2016, Mental Health Matters, derived from: https://mental-health-matters.com/denying-racism-and-other-forms-of-gaslighting/
Pike, Karen D, “What is Internalized Racial Oppression and Why Don't We Study It? Acknowledging Racism's Hidden Injuries”, December 1, 2010, Sociological Perspectives, Vol. 53, Issue 4, pp. 551–572 Internalized Racism Among Asians Internalized Racism Among Asians
Angelique M. Davis & Rose Ernst (2019) Racial gaslighting, Politics, Groups, and Identities, 7:4, 761-774, DOI: 10.1080/21565503.2017.1403934
Mayo Clinic-Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) - Symptoms and causes
Camara Jules P. Harrell, Tanisha I. Burford, Brandi N. Cage, Travette McNair Nelson, Sheronda Shearon, Adrian Thompson, and Steven Green, Multiple Pathways Linking Racism to Health Outcomes, US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health
Williams, D. R., Lawrence, J. A., & Davis, B. A. (2019). Racism and Health: Evidence and Needed Research. Annual Review of Public Health, 40(1), 105-125. doi:10.1146/annurev-publhealth-040218-043750
Facemire, V. (2018). Understanding the Insidious Trauma of Racism: An Exploration of the Impact of Racial Socialization, Gender, and Type of Racist Experiences. (Electronic Thesis or Dissertation). Retrieved from ETD Home
Ponds, K. T. (2013). The Trauma of Racism: America's Original Sin. Reclaiming Children and Youth, pg. 22-24 http://reclaimingjournal.com/sites/default/files/journal-article-pdfs/22_2_Ponds.pdf
Gross, E., Efetevbia, V., & Wilkins, A. (2019, April 18). Racism and sexism against Black women may contribute to high rates of Black infant mortality. Child Trends. https://www.childtrends.org/racism-...y-contribute-highrates-black-infant-mortality
B.S. McEwen, J.C. Wingfield, Allostasis and Allostatic Load, Encyclopedia of Stress (Second Edition), 2007, Allostasis and Allostatic Load
B.S. McEwen, Stress: Homeostasis, Rheostasis, Allostasis and Allostatic Load, Encyclopedia of Neuroscience, 2009, Stress: Homeostasis, Rheostasis, Reactive Scope, Allostasis and Allostatic Load
Lukachko, Alicia & Hatzenbuehler, Mark & Keyes, Katherine. (2014). Structural racism and myocardial infarction in the United States. Social science & medicine (1982). 103. 42-50. 10.1016/j.socscimed.2013.07.021.
These are legitimate peer reviewed studies and assessments of the effects of racism. They aren't somebodys unstudied opinion or belief. I have spent many years studying these things and this kind of information is what I base my conclusions on. And for those telling me I am a racist and lecturing me about hating whites or assume some that I have some anti white bias, most of this information comes from white people. Therefore to assume I think all whites are racists is wrong. And to assume I believe that no one white is qualified to speak about black issues is wrong. The fact is there are non racist white people working to erase racism and they are not the ones complaining when blacks address the topic or actually call out racism when they see it.
Racism is part of the fabric of life for African Americans and is among the causes of enduring negative health outcomes. There is really nothing new or startling in the assertion that social circumstances encountered as part of day-to-day experience influence physical health. At the turn of the last century, W. E. B. Du Bois (1906) and Kelly Miller (1897) proposed in separate manuscripts that oppressive social conditions encroaching on the lives of African Americans contributed to poor health and premature death. Fifty years later, Frantz Fanon’s classic studies (1967, 1968) examined the effects of oppression and included a recognition of “psychosomatic”—that is physical—consequences. Currently, social epidemiologists, health psychologists, and medical sociologists have extended the insights of these important early scholars by showing how racism generates systems and practices that contribute to persistent disparities in health outcomes (Paradies 2006a; Pascoe and Richman, 2009; Williams 1997). Estimates indicate that the failure to erase these disparities costs tens of thousands of African American lives each year (Levine et al., 2001; Williams and Mohammed, 2009). As long as the rates of the leading causes of death differ along racial lines (Centers For Disease Control and Prevention, 2008), the specter of racism will haunt the United States. The persistence of racial health disparities and of racism in any form calls scholars, therapists, activists, and political leaders to vigorous action.
Camara Jules P. Harrell, Tanisha I. Burford, Brandi N. Cage, Travette McNair Nelson, Sheronda Shearon, Adrian Thompson, and Steven Green
Racism causes chronic stress. Understanding this has serious implications for health outcomes in the black community. While I am not a doctor, what I have read by medical professionals explains how constant stress will create unhealthy outcomes. The continuing racism blacks face keeps blacks stressed out and creates chemical imbalances within our bodies causing a wide variety of health problems. There is increasing evidence supported by research that shows racism shortens lives. On June 3, 2020, SAMHSA’s Office of Behavioral Health Equity published a report titled, “Trauma, Racism, Chronic Stress and the Health of Black Americans.” It was published due to a request for help addressing trauma created by racism. In summary of what they found was that racism contributed to mental health and chronic health problems.
“Racism and associated trauma and violence contribute to mental health disorders, particularly depression, anxiety and PTSD, and chronic health conditions such as cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes, maternal mortality/infant mortality and morbidity in African Americans. Racism is considered a fundamental cause of adverse health outcomes for racial/ethnic minorities and racial/ethnic inequities in health. The primary domains of racism - structural/institutional racism, cultural racism, and individual-level discrimination— are linked to mental and physical health outcomes. Racism and violence targeting a specific community is increasingly associated with complex trauma and intergenerational trauma, all of which have physical and behavioral health consequences.”
Racism is a stressor that triggers the body into allostasis or better understood, racism forces the body to adapt to stress. Allostasis is the process that helps us adapt to stressors. “Exposure to stressors activates the sympathetic-adrenal-medullary axis (SAM) and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. SAM releases the catecholamines epinephrine and norepinephrine from the adrenal glands. Meanwhile, the HPA releases glucocorticoids, like cortisol, which are steroid hormones.” Allostatic load is compiled damage to the body as an individual is exposed to constant stress. For example, allostatic processes lead to increases in blood pressure, which is a defined health risk. Constant stress leads to allostatic overload, which is the point when the cumulative amount of stress causes health problems or death.
Studies show that allostatic overload created by stress caused due to constant exposure to racism increases the occurrences of myocardial infarction in blacks. Simply put, a myocardial infarction is a heart attack. In 2014, “Structural racism and myocardial infarction in the United States”, a study by Alicia Lukachko, Mark Hatzenbuehler, & Katherine Keyes was published in Social Science and Medicine Journal. What they found as a result of their study was not only that racism increased the occurrence of myocardial infarction for blacks, but instances of myocardial infarction were reduced for whites.
“This study demonstrates adverse effects of structural racism—specifically state-level racial disparities disadvantaging Blacks in political representation, employment, and incarceration —on past 12-month myocardial infarction. These adverse effects, however, were specific to Blacks, and among Whites, indicators of structural racism appear to have a benign or even beneficial effect on cardiac health. It is important to note that individual-level risk factors including age, sex, education, income, and medical insurance do not account for these findings. Furthermore, lending support to the construct validity of our measures of structural racism, the effects persist above and beyond those of state-level racial disparities in poverty.
Measures of structural racism pertaining to job status did not follow the expected pattern of association, and were inversely associated with myocardial infarction among Blacks. While this finding was unexpected, it is in line with results from previous studies that have documented that Black Americans in high status positions report greater exposure to interpersonal discrimination (Paradies, 2006). This increased exposure, coupled with potential pressures to assimilate and to defy negative racist stereotypes, may in turn place high status Blacks at greater risk for adverse health outcomes. Our results similarly suggest that Black Americans in states with greater representation of Blacks in high status positions are at higher risk for heart attack.”
Alicia Lukachko, Mark Hatzenbuehler, & Katherine Keyes -“Structural racism and myocardial infarction in the United States”
Racism is more than just a slur. It is abusive behavior that causes lifelong harm to the victims of racial abuse. Racial abuse can lead to self-destructive and societally destructive violent behavior. Racist whites led by former President Donald Trump, ran their mouths loud and long about the looting and rioting they falsely blamed solely on Black Lives Matter during the summer of 2020. Those blacks that did commit such acts are prime examples of what happens when people are continually racially abused or see instances of such abuse. The murders of George Floyd, Brianna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and others triggered a reminder to people of color of their bad experiences in America due to racism. Now is the time to understand the damage 400 years of racism has upon blacks and the United States of America.
Now is the accepted time, not tomorrow, not some more convenient season. It is today that our best work can be done and not some future day or future year. It is today that we fit ourselves for the greater usefulness of tomorrow. Today is the seed time, now are the hours of work, and tomorrow comes the harvest and the playtime.
W. E. B. Du Bois
Ryan C.T. DeLapp, MA, and Monnica T. Williams, Ph.D., “Proactively Coping With Racism, Getting back to our lives in the aftermath of racial violence in the media.”, July 18, 2016, www.psychologytoday,com
Paradies Y, Ben J, Denson N, Elias A, Priest N, Pieterse A, et al. (2015) Racism as a Determinant of Health: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. PLoS ONE 10(9): e0138511. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0138511
Weiten, W. & Lloyd, M.A. (2008) Psychology Applied to Modern Life (9th ed.). Wadsworth Cengage Learning.
Lazarus, R.S., & Folkman, S. (1984). Stress, Appraisal and Coping. New York: Springer.
Comas-Diaz, L., and Jacobsen, F. M. (1991). Clinical Ethnocultural Transference and Countertransference in the Therapeutic Dyad. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 61(3), 392-402.
Fryberg, S. M. (2010). When the World Is Colorblind, American Indians Are Invisible: A Diversity Science Approach. Psychological Inquiry, 21(2), 115-119.
Natasha Tracy, Types of Abuse: What are the Different Forms of Abuse?
Types of Abuse: What are the Different Forms of Abuse? | HealthyPlace
Many types of abuse exist beyond physical and sexual abuse. Learn to spot the different forms of abuse so you can stop the abuse.
Charles S. Carver and Jennifer Connor Smith,“Personality and Coping"(2010), The Annual Review of Psychology
Is Racism a Public Health Issue? Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice & Health, October 9, 2017, Is Racism a Public Health Issue? — Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice & Health
Dennis R. Upkins, Denying Racism And Other Forms Of Gaslighting, Aug 24, 2016, Mental Health Matters, derived from: https://mental-health-matters.com/denying-racism-and-other-forms-of-gaslighting/
Pike, Karen D, “What is Internalized Racial Oppression and Why Don't We Study It? Acknowledging Racism's Hidden Injuries”, December 1, 2010, Sociological Perspectives, Vol. 53, Issue 4, pp. 551–572 Internalized Racism Among Asians Internalized Racism Among Asians
Angelique M. Davis & Rose Ernst (2019) Racial gaslighting, Politics, Groups, and Identities, 7:4, 761-774, DOI: 10.1080/21565503.2017.1403934
Mayo Clinic-Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) - Symptoms and causes
Camara Jules P. Harrell, Tanisha I. Burford, Brandi N. Cage, Travette McNair Nelson, Sheronda Shearon, Adrian Thompson, and Steven Green, Multiple Pathways Linking Racism to Health Outcomes, US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health
Williams, D. R., Lawrence, J. A., & Davis, B. A. (2019). Racism and Health: Evidence and Needed Research. Annual Review of Public Health, 40(1), 105-125. doi:10.1146/annurev-publhealth-040218-043750
Facemire, V. (2018). Understanding the Insidious Trauma of Racism: An Exploration of the Impact of Racial Socialization, Gender, and Type of Racist Experiences. (Electronic Thesis or Dissertation). Retrieved from ETD Home
Ponds, K. T. (2013). The Trauma of Racism: America's Original Sin. Reclaiming Children and Youth, pg. 22-24 http://reclaimingjournal.com/sites/default/files/journal-article-pdfs/22_2_Ponds.pdf
Gross, E., Efetevbia, V., & Wilkins, A. (2019, April 18). Racism and sexism against Black women may contribute to high rates of Black infant mortality. Child Trends. https://www.childtrends.org/racism-...y-contribute-highrates-black-infant-mortality
B.S. McEwen, J.C. Wingfield, Allostasis and Allostatic Load, Encyclopedia of Stress (Second Edition), 2007, Allostasis and Allostatic Load
B.S. McEwen, Stress: Homeostasis, Rheostasis, Allostasis and Allostatic Load, Encyclopedia of Neuroscience, 2009, Stress: Homeostasis, Rheostasis, Reactive Scope, Allostasis and Allostatic Load
Lukachko, Alicia & Hatzenbuehler, Mark & Keyes, Katherine. (2014). Structural racism and myocardial infarction in the United States. Social science & medicine (1982). 103. 42-50. 10.1016/j.socscimed.2013.07.021.
These are legitimate peer reviewed studies and assessments of the effects of racism. They aren't somebodys unstudied opinion or belief. I have spent many years studying these things and this kind of information is what I base my conclusions on. And for those telling me I am a racist and lecturing me about hating whites or assume some that I have some anti white bias, most of this information comes from white people. Therefore to assume I think all whites are racists is wrong. And to assume I believe that no one white is qualified to speak about black issues is wrong. The fact is there are non racist white people working to erase racism and they are not the ones complaining when blacks address the topic or actually call out racism when they see it.
