Excellent article. Compelling and readable. It's worth remembering that we do not know the day-to-day experience of our neighbours. There's a good chance that it is not the same as ours -- particularly if they differ racially, by gender, or gender-preference. The response of the school authorities to the experience of the author's son is sad and pathetic: I was in a story-telling group once and I told a story I had heard about racial discrimination in a small Ontario town. it's a long story that I wrote about here. When I was done my story, a white man in the story-telling group said very loudly that he had been the high school principal in that small town at the time of my story and he knows for a fact that there was no discrimination in that town. He really believed it -- because he didn't see it, or experience it himself; and if there was a complaint, it would have been dismissed as a one-off and not acknowledged. 8bit - how did you feel when you read the article from the Washington Post?It also was a lesson for us to grasp that some white men may believe such acts are really no big deal. I called a dean at the boarding school, who seemed to justify the incident as something that “just happens” in a place where “town-and-gown relations” are strained, but he had little else to say. My son’s school adviser never contacted me about the incident, acting with the same indifference that so many black parents have come to expect. After I reached out to them, I never heard from either man again. Like so many whites who observe our experiences, these two privileged white males treated the incident like a “one-off” that demanded no follow-up and that quickly would be forgotten.
Hey lil, long day: I'll be back with an edited answer soon. This wasn't exactly soon, but: I find it interesting that he thought that an affluent upbringing would protect his kids, when the President of the United States had been followed around stores while shopping. The rules that he lists are interesting because I have mentally created that same list myself. The one that particularly got me was "smiling and saying hello/good morning". There's a cashier at the Safeway across the street from me during late evenings - he's very smiley with customers. All but me. Every day I shop there, I make sure to try and get in his line and give him the smile and "good evening." At first it was to confirm that he truly was surly only with me, but then it was just to fuck with him. YUP. It also sucks to see that the whole situation sort of crumbled around the family. I have been told that I "talk about race too much" or "make everything about race" by other students and my roommates - but when it happens to you the first time, you second guess yourself for the rest of your life. Also, just to make sure you got my response: lil. Sorry 'bout the long wait.Do not go for pleasure walks in any residential neighborhood after sundown, and never carry any dark-colored or metallic object that could be mistaken as a weapon, even a non-illuminated flashlight.
It's more work to feel comfortable in your own skin when others express discomfort around you.I have been told that I "talk about race too much" or "make everything about race" by other students and my roommates - but when it happens to you the first time, you second guess yourself for the rest of your life.
They don't know it, but it's those white folks who make everything about race, because if they didn't, you wouldn't.