on racial discrimination

have you seen the memorial for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.? it's awesome in my opinion and i really hope to take my girls to see it along with the rest of Washington D.C. some day. all of the news about the opening, etc. got me thinking. a lot.

now, you shouldn't need a disclaimer but i'm going to throw one out there anyway. i can't stand bigots. i don't care what color, faith, sexuality, nationality, etc. it takes a rather egocentric a[hem]hole to think that they corner the market on what is good and right based on what are mostly external to who they *are* as a person. so make sure you don't catch yourself thinking i'm a racist, i'm just going to talk about racial discrimination from a neutral point - if there is one, and oh yeah, i'm a white guy. but i did grow up in a predominantly black neighborhood until i was about five and the prevailing wind in psychology would suggest most of my personality developed in that time.

i remember there was a white kid my brothers age that hung out with him, and that the only kid that played with me didn't really want to, but the other kids didn't think he was "black enough."

the 70s kind of sucked.

i remember that one of the only other white families in the neighborhood are the ones that stole the first color tv and stereo my parents bought a few days after getting them.

the 70s sucked, and white people sucked then too.

in 2000 i walked into a restaurant where i was the only white patron, i didn't realize it at the time but i felt far more comfortable there than i feel when i walk into a restaurant with nothing but people who share my skin color. i don't dislike the color of my skin or anything about me, but i don't like it that because of my skin people think i don't understand what it's like to be discriminated against. those are some of my earliest memories, and it's just the way life was for me back then.

but back to my point. are Americans who happen to be black ready to have a white minority?

it's going to happen, sooner or later. i kind of look forward to when we all get past this and race isn't an issue and we all blend into a nice middle ground and then we'll only be able to complain about eye color.

so back to the question. can all of America regardless of color put aside standing up for someone who 'is like me' or 'looks like me' with no other insight to their color? can Americans look to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream and work on it together? or will we regress into a photonegative shot from the 1950s?

it's a serious question and worth thinking about. however you feel yourself a minority, could you put aside those feelings should you be thrust into the majority and be the person you say the other side is not.

can you adjust your mindset to fit around your solidarity becoming not much different than the ramblings of nutty white folks who think they are better than others because of their muddled European mutt heritage? that's where it goes you know.

if you can't let go of those feelings of mistrust of those who look different than you and a belief that it's "OK" because "the man" kept you down, well, not really you, but your older relatives maybe, then you're going to end up being like the people who are (or who you imagine are) the problem.

you see, Dr. King envisioned a world not where there was mistrust of some and trust of others based on skin color, he imagined a world where we didn't give a shit. his philosophy wasn't based on division, but unity. i think that would include our current idiotic debate about sexuality and marriage but i didn't know the man. i wish i did.

i don't care what color people are, i welcome you all and i will raise my children to see past the external to see who people really are, not what they look like or sound like.

are you willing to do the same?

i hope this finds you well.

.jason