Racism In America
I am still receiving anti-black emails from people who are intelligent, well educated, and have a lot of life experience. Another one was waiting for me in my inbox when I got up this morning. Obama getting elected as President seems to have increased this.
The people that write these try to make them appear intelligent, subtle, and compassionate. But they are just the latest chapter in pure old good time ignorant American racism. If I were to answer these emails back with a similar “subtle and compassionate” critique showing the negative stereotypes of Jews or Mexicans or whatever their own background is, no doubt all communication would cease. And friendships would be destroyed.
The friends who forward me these emails apparently have no idea that other people are looking at them and thinking, “Wow, this jerk is not very bright. Living in the past. This is just a narrow-minded racist. And she/he forgets that his own parents were ethnic immigrants from ________.”
I guess it is time to summarize my own life experience in dealing with people who have a different skin color, or religion, or country of origin.
Over the course of my life and career I have really been very fortunate. I have had the pleasure of knowing closely a lot of people from Mexico. And many Jews, Muslims, and a few Hindus. Also lots of Blacks from the deep south. During the almost twenty years that I lived in Europe I got to know many Europeans from Germany, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Spain, Scandinavia, and Italy. I developed friendships with dark skinned people of the Muslim faith who had grown up in Afghanistan, Tunisia, Morocco, Senegal, Turkey, and Iraq. I could go on-and-on but it wouldn’t serve any real purpose.
What I have learned by interacting with all these people of different skin color, national origins, and faiths is that people are people. Everywhere. They are 99.9% the same. There are a few bad apples, but for the most part all people just want to lead decent lives with a certain amount of dignity and self respect. They want to raise children and provide for them well.
It really is no different among Blacks, Jews, Mexicans, Germans, Muslims, or Turks.
It is so sad to see these comfortable bigots forwarding on these racist emails. They seem to think that they are doing something positive for society by doing so. They are so out of touch that they don’t realize that this is exactly what the Nazi storm troopers thought. Just doing my job... The same with the KuKluxKlan guys in their white robes who were lynching Jews and Blacks. And the white apartheid guys in South Africa.
They have no idea how harmful it is to society to forward on this racist claptrap. Clueless.
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