The Racist in My Head (for IBARW)

[chomiji]

The Scene: An uptown urban street.
The Time: 7:30 p.m. on a hot summer's evening - last night, in fact.
What Happened: A tallish, chunky middle-aged white woman (yours truly) was trudging home from the Metro when a group of half a dozen young African American men appeared across the street, being loud and boisterous. And the Racist in My Head sat up and squawked "Uh oh! Are we in trouble?"

Yes, that is what I thought. Closely followed by "I can't believe I'm doing this during IBARW."

Then I used a crutch I've developed for myself: I imagined what those young guys would look like if they were white. And with that, I then saw that they hadn't noticed me at all, and they hadn't noticed the smaller, cuter, younger woman waiting at the crosswalk for the light, either. They were clearly friends, they were joking with each other and joshing each other, and they were casually but neatly dressed. In fact, they were all dressed about the same: dark slacks and clean white T-shirts. So maybe they had just come from working on some sort of summer job, perhaps even volunteer work. Whatever it was they had been doing, it had made them feel good about themselves, and they were in high spirits.

That's all. Why the hell hadn't I seen that at first?

I still need a lot of work, obviously, before I'm the decent person I aspire to be. Because I'm clearly not colorblind, and my prejudices are still hampering my judgment.

So let's hear it for IBARW, which reminds me how far I have to go and gives me opportunities to educate myself toward that goal.

Comments

well I already blogged about being colorblind

[theloomofmoira.livejournal.com]

it wasn't really because you saw them as "black", it's because you saw them as "other", and only when you removed the "other" filter that you connected with them :)

Re: well I already blogged about being colorblind

[chomiji]

I think you're right, for at least part of my reaction ... see also my remarks to ipperne (above).

(And I did make you an icon - did you see?)

Re: well I already blogged about being colorblind

[theloomofmoira.livejournal.com]

oooh, I hadn't seen yet. I'll go see now!