We're Not Racist in Panama, But...

"If you want to have a conversation about politics, talk to the taxi drivers of the world." 

                                        - Michelle Jackson (fellow Fulbright Researcher)

How true I have found this quote to be: taxi drivers, much like hairstylists, love to talk. And who can blame them? Especially when these poor folks have to spend so many hours in gridlocked traffic. But perhaps because the chances of seeing the same customer more than once is lower than with hair stylists, taxi drivers seem to have even less of a filter. The rules about never mentioning religion or politics fly right out the window that you had to manually lower with a makeshift handle made out of pliers.

Sometimes I am content to sit in silence, and taxi drivers here in Panama seem willing enough to replace conversation with talk radio. But I must say that I have enjoyed most every time that I have ventured to start a conversation with a taxi driver. The times that I have not enjoyed, have still been informative. For instance, the time I tried to haggle with a taxi driver. He lectured me for the next 20 minutes (the entirety of the ride) on his personal method of calculating exactly what the fare should be while displaying his clearly hurt feelings that I would insinuate he was trying to overcharge me for being a tourist. I apologized and calmly remarked that I understood, but that I had paid 1/5 less of his price to go the exact same distance with another cab driver. To this, he interestingly enough had less to say.

One of my favorite conversations happened the first week I was in Panama. While I will not pretend that cab drivers are the unofficial spokespersons of their country, nor can a sample size of one provide any statistical proof of a cultural mindset, I do find that the candid nature of many cab conversations can provide an enlightening starting point from which other interactions might be illuminated.

(The following conversation happened 2 weeks ago in Spanish so I will paraphrase):
Taxi driver: "Where are you from?"
Me: "The U.S., from the state of Kentucky"
T: "Ah with the fried chicken! Where is that?"
M: "It is in the southern part of the U.S."
T: "Ah yes, there is a lot of racism there"
M: "Yes...is that a problem here in Panama"
T: "No, not here. Everyone is such a mixture, there is no difference, except those blacks in Colon, but it is their fault they are so bad off, because they are lazy and don't want to work, only party.

About a year ago, in one of my classes on race at Beloit College, we read, "I'm Not a Racist, But..." This book was meant to reveal the problems with that statement, namely that it is always followed by a racist statement. (An interesting read, but ironically enough, I found the book to be actually pretty racist).

I asked the taxi driver if racism was a problem, not because I naively thought that maybe Panama had escaped years of colonialism and slavery followed by U.S. occupation unscathed, but because I have already witnessed and heard of the issues of race in Panama, and I wanted to see how he responded. Panama, like many countries, especially in the Americas, is a color-conscious society. Put simply, the lighter the skin and the more European the phenotypes the more well-off the person is. Of COURSE  there are exceptions to this, but it is no secret that indigenous persons and those of African descent are disproportionately represented in the lowest rungs of Panamanian society.

I chose to punctuate the run-on sentence of his the way I did because it truly seemed that in the same sentence, this taxi driver both denied the existence of racism and discrimination in his country, and made a racist assertion.

It is interesting to me, how quick I have heard people of other countries be to condemn the U.S. for its issues of race, while assuming perfect ignorance of any forms of discrimination within their own country. France frowns on any acknowledgement of separate races within its borders, while its banlieues rip at the seams with racialized tension. Ghana chastises us for our history of slavery while largely ignoring the internal tension between north and south rooted in the roles of slave capturer/trader and slave, respectively. Norway tries to rise above it all without acknowledging how homogenous their population has historically been, or the current tensions arising as the immigrant population rises. I am not saying that the U.S. is better than any of these countries. We have a horrific history of discrimination and racism and it is nowhere close to becoming a thing of the past. But these experiences I have with people from around the world have made me thankful of one thing at least the South of the U.S. has: acknowledgement that discrimination still exists. It's not pretty, and it doesn't mean we are better people, but it seems to reiterate the main point behind my college thesis, which is the necessity for acknowledgement in order to have dialogue, which I believe is the step towards action and eventually, improvement.