Are You a Closet Racist?
I truly want to begin this blog by saying that until I moved to Chicago I did not know what racist meant. I was after all 11 years old and was raised in a small suburb of Ohio. Next door to me there lived a Pentecostal family, down the street my friend who was African American would come by my house to pick me up to walk to school. Across the street I could hear my friend's dad speaking Polish with a bit of an angry tone when his son got home too late or his daughter drove into the driveway and nicked his car. My Polish friend had to sneak me into the back yard because his dad was so negative he preferred I not come into contact with him, but I never equated that with his skin color or race. Down the street lived a Black family who owned the largest house and car in the area. I recall thinking them quite glamorous and pretty. On the corner across the street from this family lived a Cuban American family. I had a terrible crush on the one and only son I must add. My best friend came from a poor family of 15 children and to me she was as rich in assets as anyone else. She held her head up all the time and was one of the most compassionate people I knew. My entire existence up to the age of 11 was never about my coloration or my race. People knew I was Hispanic and I knew they were who they were. There were no denials nor did there need to be. I was seen and I saw others clearly. Today I have had more expediences with people who hate based on color and people who deny others who they are by pretending they are colorless, but the truth is that they do notice and that their declarations are false and indirectly if not directly racist.
Are you racist?
You are a racist or equal to one if you:
1. Say that you don't see color and pretend that there are no differences between you and others. Unfortunately "whites" have a tendency to excuse themselves from the group called racist by saying thing like "I don't see any differences" or "I don't see color". It is more often than not the people who say they don't see color that do see color and that are attempting to negate those of us who are of color. They think that by ignoring the differences and not bothering to ask us about our culture that this makes them "liberal". Not at all true and in fact the furthest thing from the truth.
2. You say things like "you live in America speak English" and you disrespect others languages by mocking them.
3. You are sexually attracted to people of color but you don't respect them. You involve yourself with people of color or other ethnicity other than your own because it was something taboo and you are doing it to satisfy your own ego. You spend years with someone who speaks another language and you never bother to construct one sentence in their language. In fact you don't learn their dances and you ignore the fact that they are of a culture they love. You not only don't construct a sentence in their language you literally ignore this fact.
4. You go after men or women of color because you are playing out a slave master ego inside of you that is simly being played out and has been needing to be released. You use a person of color to validate your belief that you are superior by manipulating and making them feel beholding to you in a relationship or friendship. I love the group that has the one Black friend who is especially articulate and educated and who happens to be self loathing. I absolutely can see how bigoted this group that hangs with that one self loathing Hispanic boy are. Another way to validate how "multicultural" they are. I won't ever forget bringing my culture up on chat lines and how violent guys would react telling me things like "who cares if you are Hispanic" or "Why are you talking in Spanish" and much worse. It was astonishing to me yet I would later experience first hand for years. The indirect abuse was unacceptable yet the wisdom I derived from it was invaluable.
I think that people still believe that if you invite a Latino to the dinner table we should feel honored. In fact I was once told that I should feel lucky to be a part of a family and be invited to the parties by a white gay male who was a friend of mine. I was stunned but not surprised once the reality of him set in for me. It took years to figure it out but God knows life leads us with some harsh stuff and some joyful stuff. I thank God for that experience, all of them. As a man of color I learned that racism is very subtle nowadays. I also learned that loving who I am is up to me and not others opinions of me as a person of color. Amen, and amen.
Are you racist?
You are a racist or equal to one if you:
1. Say that you don't see color and pretend that there are no differences between you and others. Unfortunately "whites" have a tendency to excuse themselves from the group called racist by saying thing like "I don't see any differences" or "I don't see color". It is more often than not the people who say they don't see color that do see color and that are attempting to negate those of us who are of color. They think that by ignoring the differences and not bothering to ask us about our culture that this makes them "liberal". Not at all true and in fact the furthest thing from the truth.
2. You say things like "you live in America speak English" and you disrespect others languages by mocking them.
3. You are sexually attracted to people of color but you don't respect them. You involve yourself with people of color or other ethnicity other than your own because it was something taboo and you are doing it to satisfy your own ego. You spend years with someone who speaks another language and you never bother to construct one sentence in their language. In fact you don't learn their dances and you ignore the fact that they are of a culture they love. You not only don't construct a sentence in their language you literally ignore this fact.
4. You go after men or women of color because you are playing out a slave master ego inside of you that is simly being played out and has been needing to be released. You use a person of color to validate your belief that you are superior by manipulating and making them feel beholding to you in a relationship or friendship. I love the group that has the one Black friend who is especially articulate and educated and who happens to be self loathing. I absolutely can see how bigoted this group that hangs with that one self loathing Hispanic boy are. Another way to validate how "multicultural" they are. I won't ever forget bringing my culture up on chat lines and how violent guys would react telling me things like "who cares if you are Hispanic" or "Why are you talking in Spanish" and much worse. It was astonishing to me yet I would later experience first hand for years. The indirect abuse was unacceptable yet the wisdom I derived from it was invaluable.
I think that people still believe that if you invite a Latino to the dinner table we should feel honored. In fact I was once told that I should feel lucky to be a part of a family and be invited to the parties by a white gay male who was a friend of mine. I was stunned but not surprised once the reality of him set in for me. It took years to figure it out but God knows life leads us with some harsh stuff and some joyful stuff. I thank God for that experience, all of them. As a man of color I learned that racism is very subtle nowadays. I also learned that loving who I am is up to me and not others opinions of me as a person of color. Amen, and amen.
Comments
Post a Comment