@iXav:
Yeah. This whole concept has the scent of bull shirt surrounding it, doesn't it?
The thing is that when a rational group of individuals get together on a former JW forum and try to make sense of the idea of "systemic racism", the conversation starts by defining terms - a completely reasonable place to begin. And before we know it, rational definitions are proposed.
But when you corner, if you can, a true believer in "systemic racism", you can't seem to get a plain, coherent definition. They waffle around because they want to assert the most ridiculous idea, that when said out loud in a succinct way, makes them sound exactly racist. The country is steeped in "systemic" racism because they view the world through the lens of power struggles, like a good Marxist critical theorist. It is assumed, a-priori, that racism is baked into every level of society, from soup to nuts, to bolster the white dominant hold in this power struggle. This is where they start their entire view of the world. This is the foundation. It's not "systemic" because you can define the concept and prove it through evidence, it's "systemic" because it just is - as if it were a brute fact, as obvious as 2+2=4. To deny systemic racism is like denying math, and only shows your "fragility".
From that point on it is the job of the SJW anti-racist to find the racism hiding everywhere. That is, to be "critical" and show how "problematic" all aspects of society actually are - exposing the racism that's under the surface of every situation.
Hence you get the forked up logic of the 1619 project. You get the woke crowd from the Smithsonian declaring that fundamental virtues like being on time, hard work, delayed gratification are just signs of "whiteness".
Ironically, the anti-racist ideas are actually the most racist by definition. And now, as politicians back and promote legistion with these ideas, they are, in fact injecting racism into the system again, making the "systemic racism" real ... well, at least how rational people would define it.
