General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: White DUers: Tell Your Stories [View all]silverweb
(16,402 posts)The small, modestly middle-class town I grew up in had absolutely zero people of color. It's now an expensive bedroom community within easy commuting distance to NYC and with 10 times the population it had when I was young. The only black people even now are Haitian immigrants, who work in the grocery stores but don't live in town. "The Blacks" were images on TV when I was growing up, usually involved in some kind of highly publicized disturbance, and MLK was a "rabble-rouser." That was all I knew. Unfortunately, most of my family is still stuck back there in the same old mindset, so I'm very glad I moved to California and my kids were raised here in modest, diverse neighborhoods.
The first black person I ever actually met was at the regional high school, where she was the only black student in a sea of white. I was delighted when we became friends because I had so many questions, and Carolyn was the beginning of my education. One of the first things I learned was that she, too, could get sunburned at the beach! Later, as we smoothed Noxzema on each other's sunburned backs, she laughed that I ever thought blacks immune to sunburn and said I had a lot to learn, which she gladly helped with.
In the '70s, I was giving a coworker a ride home while his car was out of commission. Bernie was black and about my own age, working nights like me and attending college during the day to become a teacher. There was a lot to admire about him and I'm sure he became a wonderful teacher. We became good friends and eventually started dating. When we went to see "The Exorcist" in NYC after it first came out, I was shocked by the hateful comments from a few white people in line. I didn't understand the reason for the venom at all, and was deeply hurt for both Bernie and myself. He took it in stride a whole lot better than I did and said it was "nothing new, just ignore them."
One night shortly afterwards, I was taking Bernie home after work when I drove through a "puddle" that was actually a huge pothole full of water. It wiped out my oil pan and the car quit right there, so we pushed it to the side of the road, locked it up, put a note on it for the police, and started walking. When we were passing an open bar with several black men standing outside, they made comments like "Black women not good enough for you, brother?" and to me, "You don't belong with him, lady." Bernie told me to "ignore them and keep walking," and said something quietly to them that I didn't catch. That was the end of it, but I felt ashamed for some reason, and I wondered at the time why indeed Bernie was dating me instead of a black woman. Was being with me worth all the harassment he took? It was also the first time I realized that not only many whites were unhappy about interracial couples, and I answered them with defiance, but plenty of blacks didn't approve, either. It all still made no sense to me.
About 10 years ago when I lived in San Diego, I was on the trolley one day when a young white guy got on. He sat next to me and started yakking about his home in the deep South and how he was here "to see California." His next question threw me, though, when he loudly asked, "Where's all the white people at?" It was rush hour and the car was full. The demographic was about half Latino, with blacks next in number, then whites, and a smattering of Asians and others. When I didn't answer, he asked again, so loudly that heads turned, "Where's all the white people and the hot white women at?" I answered that San Diego was a very diverse, cosmopolitan city and if he was uncomfortable with that, he and everyone else would be much happier if he went home. Then I stopped responding to him at all and he angrily got off at the next stop. A small smile and wink at that point from an elderly black man sitting opposite let me know I did the right thing.
The most recent incident just last month, the first in a decade, was funny and sad at the same time. A white neighbor, who is severely paranoid and often delusional, called me "racist against white people" because I'm close friends with my next-door neighbor, an exuberant, big-hearted black woman he decided he hates for no reason. His latest delusion is that she's a "gang leader," who intends to signal to "her gang" on the rare occasion that he goes out so they can rob his apartment. When I told him that was ridiculous, he went on a tirade about how I'm biased against him because he's a white man and how I'm a "race traitor" because I'm friendly with the blacks and Latinos in our apartment complex (whites, too, but that didn't count). I wanted to read him the riot act, but decided that with his mental issues he'd just become more hostile than he already was. Instead, I merely shook my head and walked away.
So that's my entire lifetime experience with race relations - from a suffocating, conservative, exclusively white, middle-class upbringing to "race traitor" - all because I broke out of that monochromatic world and found that there's a whole range of people who don't look like me, all multi-faceted human beings I could get to know and like very much, too. Go figure.
On another note, not to digress, but I find this very funny: According to the linked article below, "Wypipo" Explained, I'm partially "wypipo" and partially just plain old white. The deciding factors for wypipo are that I'm vegan and still have a safety pin on my backpack.
Do I really have to get rid of my beloved safety pin???
http://neguswhoread.com/wypipo-explained/
This is a very interesting and enlightening thread, Effie.
Thanks for starting it.