Racial Anxiety and the Fear About Miscegenation

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AMST 200
INTRO TO CRITICAL RACE AND ETHNICITY STUDIES
AFFECTIVE FEAR IN GET OUT!
PT I: STRUCTURES OF FEAR/FEAR AND MISCEGENATION
The origins of racism can be traced to the ease with which people fear other people of different races or ethnic groups. Generally, when a person has a negative encounter with someone of a different race, it leaves a lasting impression that promotes prejudice and fear. In contrast, a similar bad encounter with a person of the same race is easily ignored and forgiven. Fear of people of color, especially black people, became prevalent during the slavery era. Despite black slaves being weak and unhealthy, white masters feared them and subsequently enacted laws that prohibited slaves from striking or defending themselves against assaults from white people (Hatman 24). Today, fear of black people is not expressed but rather implied through racial stereotyping that assigns negative qualities to dark-skinned individuals. For instance, regardless of their actual physical frame, black men are generally feared because they are perceived to be larger and more threatening than similarly sized white men.
In its purest form, fear refers to an unpleasant feeling caused by danger, harm, or pain. As a result, people respond to fear by only engaging in safe things. However, due to the complex relationship of fear and racism, white people and institutions address their fears by harming people of color through discrimination. The documentary The Birth of a Nation: A legacy, for example, documents how black men are feared because they are perceived to be always lusting after white women and being the root cause of all evil in America. As a result of this fear, the film suggests that some white people believe that black people are unworthy of voting and freedom rights. Likewise, during the slavery era, the laws enacted by white masters were not meant to protect them from the aggressiveness of black people but rather to enhance whiteness and grant whites dominion over blacks.
Fear is ingrained in many Americans, especially white people, to the extent that they notoriously associate situations with certain people. For instance, African Americans have been falsely connected to the Ebola outbreak, while Asian Americans have been extensively mentioned in discussions surrounding H1N1, Avian Influenza, and Mers. Currently, the coronavirus has been used to promote racism by some Americans who identify it as the "Chinese Virus," despite affecting people of all races. However, racial prejudice is biologically and socially ingrained because even individuals who profess not to be often racist harbor racist attitudes on an unconscious level. Interestingly, this phenomenon is prevalent in Black Americans and has been used to promote racism when it comes to interracial marriage. The very idea of interracial sex irritates blacks, and as white people, black communities view sex across the color line to be morally wrong and somehow sinful (Sexton 214). The fear of black people dating people from other races usually results in questions such as "Am I abandoning my blackness? Or am I turning my back on my black community? Although such questions seem to be solely related to love and romanc...