the thing is, there is a very strong awareness of race in us society, and it factors into a host of conscious and unconscious decisions. the net effect is that

the thing is, there is a very strong awareness of race in us society, and it factors into a host of conscious and unconscious decisions. the net effect is that the "tilt" of the field you play on is sharply affected by your race. also, since society is in many ways fairly segregated along racial lines, your background and environment are often a factor of your race too. officially ignoring that fact does not level the field; it just lets the people favoured by the inequities in the current setup continue to have the luxury of ignorance, while everyone else struggles along with no help from the system. tl;dr: calling it an "obsession with race" does the people actually trying to help by compiling this data a signal disservice