Reverse racism is described as “discrimination on the basis of race directed against a member of a dominant or privileged racial group.”, in most cases when this is brought up we question if Black people be racist to white people.
However, reverse racism is not real, for a variety of reasons. The hard truth is that white people will never be at a systematic disadvantage because of the color of their skin. Yes, white people can face prejudice. White people can go through hard times, experience poverty, police brutality, unfairness in the justice system, etc. but it is on a MUCH lower scale than Black Americans.
The question that usually follows the argument of reverse racism is, “Well what about the white people who were slaves?”
The difference between this narrative is that white people were indentured servants, which is not the same as being a slave or slavery as a whole. Also, the Irish were not discriminated against due to their skin color, and when coming into the US were not treated as poorly as Black Americans due to the instilled racism the country already had. The ‘slavery’ of white Europeans is not to be compared to the 400+ years of slavery endured by black people.
There is a difference between the idea of racism and prejudice. Racism is based on a systematic oppression, it is a type of system that allows the racial majority to enforce authority, power and privilege over another race. Unfortunately, it is a system that benefits off the oppression of another race. Institutionalized racism doesn’t necessarily match the idea of ‘reverse racism’. For example, politics wise, you can look at the disproportionate number of POC to white people in the three branches of the US Government. In both the Legislative and the Judicial branch there is more white men and women than people of color. Currently, in the Executive branch not only are the president and Vice President white, but 13/15 of the members in the current cabinet are as well. Or, economically we can look at the average income of a Black American vs a White American and see the unfair, unequal and unbalanced pay. Not to mention the top fifteen billionaires in the US consist of one white woman and fourteen white men (in which 44% of them have inherited wealth). By institutional means we can address the much lower percentage of Black Americans to White Americans which shows how much of a minority we really are.
Racism creates a hierarchy, POC do not have the systematic power to be racist because the discrimination against a white person doesn’t assist the same type inequality of white people to a person of color.