Perception and Racism

My nephew-in-law is a black man.  He's been dealing with racism for his entire life, and now he sees it where it may not exist. I can understand this, as I do the same thing with Welfare.  If he and I were standing in line at the grocery and the cashier was rude to the food-stamp-using black person before us, we would jump to different conclusions.

Another example, from fiction.  Professor Slughorn is surprised by a student who was born to Muggles - non-magical people - excelling in his class.  Harry Potter, angry, responds with "One of my best friends is Muggle-born and she's the best in our year."  The first few times I read this, I thought Slughorn was in the wrong.  But what if his surprise came, not from the bloodline, but from the notion that a Muggle-born has no exposure to magic until the age of eleven?  Imagine a child raised with no exposure to music suddenly becoming a virtuoso!

I'm sure there are many others, but I'll get to the point.  We do not know the motivations of strangers. The cashier in my first example could have been rude for any reason - maybe even just be a rude person.  When I was a cashier in a grocery, there was a woman who came in regularly.  She always tried to buy twice as much food as she had money for.  Every time.  Had I been rude to her, it would have had nothing to do with her race or method of payment.

I had a chat the other day, with a ten year old, about "The N Word".  He said that sometimes people use it to mean "friend".  One woman I knew used it the way I use "Black".  Some folks use it as they do the term "White Trash"- but for black folks.  But the problem is, the perception of it as a slur is simply too strong, so I told the kid to never use it.

The same is coming to apply to the word "Redskin".  I've read lots of historical documents where that word was used simply as a synonym to "American Indian".  Clearly, having it used as the name of a sports team is intended as a compliment.  Those who the term applies to need to pull a Hermione Granger (back to Harry Potter) - she embraced the wizarding slur "Mudblood" as a badge of honor.  Basically... "Damn straight I'm a Mudblood.  Mudbloods are awesome."  It's too late, I fear, to save the N word, but the R word still has a chance.  

I'm not going to tell you racism doesn't exist.  We do, though, need to keep a calm head about our own perceptions.  That guy cut you off in traffic, not because you are a different color, but because he would have cut off his identical twin. That lady who tells you that your half-black children are beautiful means well, even if she is kind of ignorant.

Come to think of it, this advice applies to life in general.  Don't assume to know why people do things.  I bet everyone reading this has a different take on why the stick people family on my truck is huge.  Some of you, those who know me best even, might be wrong.