The post about Race and racism December 13, 2006
Posted by spacemom in : Nance , trackbackI visit a few blogs that make me feel, well, downright guilty about myself. I will admit this right here, right now.
I am racist. I am prejudiced.
No, I am not proud of these facts. But they are the facts. I grew up east of Buffalo New York. Cows were our friends. The County Jail was in my town because we were in BFN. That rural. When I was in High School, we had ONE person of color, Marcus. He was African-American and annoying as hell. Couldn’t stand him for who he was, not for his color. I thought I was a "good person" on the race thing.
But when I went to Long Island for college, I discovered all sorts of different people. Latinas, Jewish, Indian, Pakistani, Black, White, etc… It was pretty scary for me to be exposed to all of these different cultures. What was worse was when I realized that some of my friends were blatant racists. I first heard about Jews and horns out of their heads from my roommate. My friend across the hall was sick of those Damn Dominicans (she was Puerto Rican). It was a shock. I became friends with people of many different religions, nationalities, races. But when push came to shove, I remember being accused of racism. When a group of women on my floor left dirty dishes in the bathroom and I complained, I was told it was because I was against the blacks. huh? I didn’t get it.
As I got older, I moved to another part of the campus. I became much more tolerant and more accepting of people for who they are. I thought that racism was not a problem. Even when I started dating Dr. Jay and my mom went around telling everyone that I had found a nice boy, and he’s Jewish, she would whisper, I confronted her about it and told her that it didn’t matter to me, because it didn’t.
But when I look at my actions I see that I do carry prejudices. I see that I go out of my way to smile at minorities. If I run past a group of men, I do stiffen more if it is a group of men that are dressed in what I consider "scary clothes", those baggy pants, hats backwards… silly and stupid.
I have run into African-American families that are middle class and my brain says "wow, isn’t that great!" Which is so damn ignorant and stupid. But it is still there.
I run into a person of Asian descent and wonder if they have an accent, until they actually speak.
I am trying my hardest to make it clear to my kids that people need to be judged by who they ARE, not what they look like. But my core programming is to notice the differences between others and myself. And I don’t know how to change this, even after years of working on it.
So yes, when I read AmFam I sometimes cringe, because I know, deep down, I am still racist.
Comments»
Very brave and honest post…ditto here.
Julie
I appreciate and respect the honesty it took to post this…
and I think that all of us, no matter how PC we try to be, still harbor *some* prejudice in us….the best we can do is to try to work on it, actively, even if admitting it to ourselves is uncomfortable.
We’ve traded a bit offline on emails and I want you to know my thoughts. I think most people have such a hard time with their own internalization of things, more so their fear of looking within themselves, that when someone else does it, well, they just don’t know what to say or do.
YOu were raw and honest and wonderful in your post, never forget your capability to be honest with yourself, it’s an incredible characteristic. It’s something that is very difficult for most to do.