I appreciated whattamisaid's excellent diary today and I wanted to put this out there as a modest addition to the conversation. If you have the patience to wade through some of my personal ugly, well, kudos.
I'm a white male, raised quite liberal, with both parents and teachers working hard to counteract the "normal" prejudice whattamisaid speaks of.
Nowadays (at 41) I'm more of a racist than I was growing up. Maybe you wouldn't call me racist. I'm not Archie Bunker. I make an effort to see and treat others for who they really are. But I carry around some resentment.
Much of this comes from my experience in college. I started college in favor of institutional, race-based affirmative action. I ended up really disliking it.
I knew a rich, privileged kid who got admitted into school because he had one Mexican grandparent. I knew a white kid who couldn't get promoted in his financial-aid department job because he was white (the university administration had a strong affirmative action policy).
I spent a lot of time dealing with financial aid bureaucracy, and I often felt disrespected by certain people working in the department. They seemed to enjoy making me wait while they chatted. They were African-American. I would stand there, silent, fuming inside, thinking: I don't deserve to be treated this way, and you don't deserve to work here.
In my sophomore year, our student-body president-elect was disqualified because his GPA was too low. He was Mexican-American. When a re-vote was held, angry members of a Hispanic student group (La Raza or MECHA I think) went around and physically tore down down voting booths. That really struck me, and not in a "now I feel your pain" kind of way. More like, "this one isn't about racism, you guys are being assholes."
I resented it.
* * *
I know this stuff is trivial. Not comparable to the "dull ache" of daily bias. Not worth bringing up, let alone carrying around.
Which is why I don't normally bring it up. I don't want to get slammed by those who have experienced real racism, which I know I have never experienced.
I avoid talking about anything that might carry a racial zap when I'm in "mixed company". I envy people who are comfortable talking about our differences when we're together. Me, I worry a casual comment might open a wound.
So it stays unsaid.
* * *
I am listening. I believe that if I were black I would have steam coming out of my ears 24/7. Dealing with racism would burn. It might burn just to read anecdotes like mine, as if such trivialities could possibly form some kind of counterpoint to the life-changing reality of racism in America.
Even so, I'm putting this out there. It's what I've got.
Thanks for listening.