A new study from the Public Religion Research Institute has found that despite the fact that terrible white people continue to deploy the phrase “I have a ton of black friends!” to justify casual racism, it’s not actually true for three quarters of white Americans. Go figure!
The study, published by the Washington Post, found that for every 91 white friends a white American has, they have only one black friend, one Asian friend, one Latino friend, one mixed-race friend, and three friends of unknown race. Comparatively, the average black American has 8 white friends for every 83 black friends. As the Post writes:
To put it another way: Blacks have ten times as many black friends as white friends. But white Americans have an astonishing 91 times as manywhite friends as black friends.
The study also found that 75 percent of whites have “entirely white social networks without any minority presence.” This is apparently up from last year’s data collected in a poll by Reuters, which put that number at around 40 percent. 2014 is shaping up to be a great year, isn’t it?
