Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
Ugh. I'm still fuming about this. I host a poker game on Thursday nights and last night one of the regular players invited a new guy to the game that no one else knew. In the middle of the game, someone brought up politics (not me; I don't talk politics with most of that crew, I just play poker with them). And this new guy blurts out, "I can't believe no one has taken a shot at Obama. Can you imagine if they elect a fucking nigger as president?"
I was absolutely stunned. I told him to get the hell out of my house, he wasn't welcome here. And then I got the typical answer: "Oh, I didn't mean...." Bullshit. Yes you did. You just didn't know it wasn't safe to be a racist around me. Now get the hell out of my house. This is not the first time this has happened in my life.
It happened when I was in college when a co-worker said something similar. As soon as you tell them that you've got members of your own family that you love who are black, they always start to backpeddle. 'Oh, I didn't mean..." The hell you didn't. You meant exactly that, you just thought since we were both white it was okay to let your true feelings show.
I've had the same thing happen with anti-gay slurs as well. Unlike most people, I don't just nod and smile when someone calls people faggot or other such slurs. While I will gladly fight for their legal right to say such things, I won't let it go unanswered and I certainly won't allow it in my house. And the reaction is the same every time.
Comments
Well done, Dr. Brayton. That attitude needs to become commonplace, rather than exceptional (as in the exception, rather than the rule). Bigotry remains prevalent, mostly because too often bigots are not challenged.
Posted by: Blaidd Drwg | March 28, 2008 9:49 AM
You get that a lot with racists - they don't seem to be able to percieve that people that they interact with in their daily lives will not share their bigotry.
Posted by: SteveF | March 28, 2008 9:53 AM
Hear, hear!
I've gotten into some pretty rough discussions with family members about various topics and it is tough to do.
Posted by: Bourgeois_Rage | March 28, 2008 9:55 AM
Ed, I know exactly how that feels. I grew up in Northern Minnesota. My father is Ojibwe/Lakota and my mother is white. My dads family lives on the rez and I grew up in a small white community about ten miles down the road. The vicious racism is astounding and growing-up I was often "One of the good ones", or I also heard "Well, you're not REALLY Indian so..." (because of my filthy, European blood).
Racism makes people feel like part of the community. It's not so much about hating the "other" rather than connecting with your people. It seems that guy at your poker night was doing his best to connect with the group, be one of the guys. I am guessing he's probably had success in the past with similar lines in similar circumstances. That concerns me.
Posted by: Jesse | March 28, 2008 9:57 AM
For whatever the opinion of a stranger is worth -- I applaud you.
Posted by: Maureen Lycaon | March 28, 2008 10:05 AM
I was just telling someone a few days ago that one clear sign of progress after decades (or centuries) of racial conflict is that today, people who espouse racist viewpoints openly are generally regarded as nuts or idiots. I guess I needed this reminder that the phenomenon I was describing may be more veneer than reality.
Posted by: Scott | March 28, 2008 10:14 AM
Jesse - Hope your dad pased on his culture (along with your mother's of course) to you. The best revenge is SURVIVAL. Australian Aboriginals 60K+ years strong.
Ed - Perhaps you need a sign at the door "No Racists Tolerated (so FUCK OFF NOW)." Maybe then they might (just) get the hint. -DJ
PS Like the new photo.
Posted by: DingoJack | March 28, 2008 10:21 AM
They Might Be Giants has a song called "Your Racist Friend" that describes a similar situation, including the backpedaling. They always backpedal when confronted: "Oh, I'm not talking about all of them, blah, blah, blah..." I've had to stop going to a friend's parties because he has a racist friend he tolerates. Too bad not everyone is as willing to put their foot down.
Posted by: uncle noel | March 28, 2008 10:40 AM
I too experienced a similar incident 20 years ago when I worked in private business, in suburban Detroit. What was interesting is that I had no idea that what appeared to be a very nice, considerate person in all (apparent) respects harbored such ill feelings towards African-Americans. After having called him on his racisim (I won't recount the incident, because it's still painful), I could feel his anger and hostility, as if I had been instantly ostracized from his tribe. Trust and whatever reciprocity from our relationship could no longer take place, and after that incident when I gazed upon him in the halls of work I sensed all but coldness. After the incident, I was actually proud of what I did: I really didn't loose anything (friendship with an schmutziger putz?), and gained my dignity (respecting people the basis of their deportment, not their genealogy and heritage) and self-respect.
Acting in the way Ed did is honorable (in my book, that is). However, what really challenges people is having to act in that way when the person their kicking out is a friend, family or close relative. It should happen more often, but more often than not another's racism is simply tolerated, and not confronted head-on, because the social costs of losing that relationship are much higher. Other strategies are needed.
Posted by: ebina2 | March 28, 2008 10:42 AM
As a half-Japanese American, I still find some people's off-hand comments about me to be shocking. When I lived in the UK, the mother of my girlfriend at the time had an irrational hatred of Americans (because of WWII - "Americans are over-paid, over-sexed, and over here") and of Japanese (because of what they did to Hong Kong and Singapore during WWII). While I had no chance of engendering any good-will at that meeting, what really pissed me off at that time was that it seemed that my girlfriend didn't even try to take my side on anything. Since returning to the United States, and living "outside" the area where most East Asian Americans live, I've encountered deep-rooted stereotypes of East Asians (mostly because my face looks more "Japanese" than "White"). Some I find humorous, others annoying.
"Oh, you're tall." (As if a half-Japanese person can't be 6'3".)
"Wow, you don't have an accent." (As if I should sound more like Mr. Moto or something.)
"You aren't in engineering/math?" (No, I'm half-Asian, have an aversion to math, and find engineering - and many engineers - tedious.)
"What martial art do you do?" (While I actually do a martial art, being Asian-looking does not mean that I am a martial artist. And why do you choose that as a subject of small-talk anyway?)
"Are you Buddhist?" (No, I'm a half-Japanese guy who likes to have his head cropped short. This secondary physical characteristic makes me as much a Buddhist as it makes me a neo-Nazi skinhead.)
"Shut up, Chink!" (While this slur does not really bother me - I'm always tempted to correct them, to tell them to call me a "Nip" instead - the use of a racial slur to try and shut someone down is never a nice thing to come across.)
"Your blood is not really Japanese." (This last one - or ones like it - usually come from a Japanese person, and is very insulting. I've wanted to floor a couple of idiotic Japanese still living in their xenophobic little mental worlds, but had to merely content myself by telling them off verbally.)
Posted by: Umlud | March 28, 2008 11:03 AM
Good for you, Ed!
Posted by: Strider | March 28, 2008 11:04 AM
By the way, I like the new picture.
Posted by: Strider | March 28, 2008 11:06 AM
As I have memorized most of the Scienceblogs by the portrait in the upper-left corner, the new picture disorients the crap out of me. It's still nice, though.
Umlud: Wow, that is really disturbing. Personally, I can't blame someone for being racist. After all, you can't be held responsible for what goes on in your own head, right? But, how could anybody possibly think that asking a Japanese-American, "What martial art do you do?" is a good idea? Even more than racial tolerance, we need to teach kids the basic rules of etiquette in a multicultural society.
Posted by: Brandon | March 28, 2008 11:14 AM
As I have memorized most of the Scienceblogs by the portrait in the upper-left corner, the new picture disorients the crap out of me. It's still nice, though.
Umlud: Wow, that is really disturbing. Personally, I can't blame someone for being racist. After all, you can't be held responsible for what goes on in your own head, right? But, how could anybody possibly think that asking a Japanese-American, "What martial art do you do?" is a good idea? Even more than racial tolerance, we need to teach kids the basic rules of etiquette in a multicultural society.
Posted by: Brandon | March 28, 2008 11:14 AM
Living in a heavily Hispanic neighborhood, I've encountered the same attitude toward "Mexicans." One time I was in Safeway and another gringo told me, "I should go up to the checkout and shout 'Immigration!' and watch them scatter." It wasn't my home, though, so I couldn't tell him to get out, I could only glare at him and move on.
Posted by: Squiddhartha | March 28, 2008 11:14 AM
That is simply shameful and disgraceful in this day and age (or any day and age, for that matter, but especially considering that it is 2008). I applaud your reaction, though.
Posted by: Sadie Morrison | March 28, 2008 11:30 AM
I was in a local Safeway a few weeks ago (with my three small children) when an elderly woman started up a conversation after I helped her get something from a tall shelf. Within a minute, she went on an incredibly bizarre rant against Asians. I was a little stunned at first. Whatever you may have heard about Arizona in general, you don't usually hear this kind of racism, especially in Tucson. Furthermore, I hadn't seen any Americans of Asian descent all day. It was kind of a non-sequitur.
As I was trying to think of a polite way to let her know that I couldn't disagree more with her statement, my youngest (age 5) asked me, "Why doesn't she like Chinese people?"
My response: "Because she's ignorant and her parents never taught her any better." Then we walked away.
I've decided not be polite about it anymore, no matter how old the speaker is (or how closely he's related to me). I have a responsibility not to tolerate that kind of behavior, especially in front of my children. How else will they learn?
Posted by: Kenneth New | March 28, 2008 11:53 AM
I applaud Ed's stance. Were I in his position I probably would have done the same (and have in the past).
But I don't think that the only answer to encountering racists should be ostracizing them. I've had racist friends. With these people I've tried to be a positive role model. I'll confront them, challenge them, I'll refuse to look the other way when they spout their crap. Sometimes I'll be loud and angry, and sometimes reasonable or some might say didactic. My thinking is that these folks will never change if the only people they interact with are those that support their views or who refuse to challenge them.
I guess it all depends on what I see in them are they virulent in their racism, or simply ignorant and in need of guidance.
Posted by: Abby Normal | March 28, 2008 12:02 PM
As someone else 6'3", but completely white, I can assure you, I get this all the time.
Posted by: Michael Suttkus, II | March 28, 2008 12:08 PM
Ed: Bravo! Someone needed to send some consequences in this guy's direction.
Posted by: Julie Stahlhut | March 28, 2008 12:18 PM
Um. I said this to a 6' tall Japanese American woman.
But I was being a laviscious, sexist pig, not a racist...
Posted by: gwangung | March 28, 2008 12:20 PM
Bravo, Ed, Bravo. NO, not for what you did in kicking the guy out of your house (which was most excellent), but rather for blogging about it. There are many people living in a comfortable little bubble or geographical region of the US who have convinced themselves that we are indeed in a so-called "post-racial" phase. Bullshit.
Your little vignette reminds us of this.
Posted by: DrugMonkey | March 28, 2008 12:23 PM
Above: "I find...many engineers - tedious."
Because it's okay to stereotype engineers provided you're attacking other kinds of stereotypes.
Posted by: EK | March 28, 2008 12:32 PM
This is how bigotry should always be dealt with, confronted head-on and not permitted where civilized people meet.
(I'm vicariously interested in what the reaction was of the friend who brought him to the card party. Did he sit there in embarassed silence or feel he had to leave with his buddy?)
Posted by: kodiak | March 28, 2008 12:36 PM
Not say much about your reading skills, hm?
Posted by: gwangung | March 28, 2008 12:43 PM
The new picture is from my speech the other night to the Center for Inquiry - Michigan. The other picture was many years old and since Wes always has his trusty camera around, I had the opportunity to get a new one.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | March 28, 2008 12:57 PM
Wow Ed, I'm in awe of you. I wish I could say I would have done the same thing. I probably would have given him the cold shoulder for the rest of the night and then informed whoever brought him that he is no longer welcome in my house. But you know what, as I get older, I find myself less and less willing to tolerate such crap, so who knows, maybe next time I won't be so willing to let things like that go by (at least I hope not). Thanks for the great example.
Posted by: Bruce | March 28, 2008 12:59 PM
I've booted people out of my home three times over the years, once for being racist and twice for being (horrifyingly so) sexists.
Keneth New, depending on her age and mental health, the elderly lady may have been ignorant, or she may have been suffering from early dementia. I've known several very old people who spoke well out of character as their minds declined.
Posted by: Bee | March 28, 2008 12:59 PM
"I should go up to the checkout and shout 'Immigration!' and watch them scatter."
I should go to a right-wing blog and shout "What did Jeremiah Wright say that was racist, exactly?" and watch them scatter. I've done it before. It's fun.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 28, 2008 1:00 PM
Kenneth New: the old lady may have had a relative tortured or killed by the Japanese in WWII. That, and the "Yellow Peril"/Chinese Communist scare, fueled a lot of anti-Asian bigotry.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 28, 2008 1:07 PM
One racism-related memory that has always stuck with me. This was maybe 15 years or so ago, when I was about 11 years old: my grandfather used to take me out to the park pretty regularly. One day, these assholes in a pickup truck driving by the park started yelling "Fucking niggers!" at a black family that was nearby. My grandfather ran over to the family, apologized for the whole white race, then came back to me and said, "What them boys did was wrong! Them niggers got the same rights we do!" Given his upbringing, that's probably the closest to be an anti-racist one could have hoped for from my grandfather. But, all in all, it was very important for my growing up to be anti-racist. I think a lot of this kind of stuff boils down to upbringing, and though there are a lot of racists in my family and I grew up in a part of the country where racism is common, I was lucky to get something that at least in some way counteracted that influence.
Posted by: Wes | March 28, 2008 1:11 PM
Congratulations, Ed, on both your action and the new photo. When something like that happens to me, I'm offended more that the bigot thinks I'll agree with him because I'm white than I am by his bigotry.
I've also been told twice by such dirtbags that "when we take over your kind is going up against the wall/to be hanging from the lampposts too."
Posted by: Pieter B | March 28, 2008 1:17 PM
I had an experience similar to this a little over a year ago, when I was a student doing a clinical placement at a school. My supervisor was chatting with the young mother of one of our kids, and he made a self-effacing joke about Iranian men (he himself was an Iranian man). Oh, no, the mother said, I like Iranians. You know who I hate? The Asians. Blah blah blah, Asians bad. Seeing the very bad turn the conversation was taking, my supervisor asked her, well, are there any other groups you do like? She then said a few complementary things about The Jews, before offhandedly remarking, oh, but you know, they're devious, too, so what are you going to do?
I almost choked. Not because of what she said -- it wasn't the first nasty racist remark I've heard, and it won't be the last -- but because of how she said it. Her comments were casual, relaxed, not like spouting a tirade, but rather just like she was stating a generally accepted fact. It was the way I might have said something like, you know, we get a lot of snow up here in Quebec.
It wasn't her racism that shocked me, rather, it was the fact that she was so completely comfortable and casual about expressing it in public, in the presence of two people she barely knew, one of whom was a visible minority.
Posted by: borealys | March 28, 2008 1:25 PM
I clicked over from Google Reader to read the rest of the post, and I must say: the new picture is quite nice!
Posted by: mollishka | March 28, 2008 1:30 PM
As we all know, poker is a necessary, but not sufficient, cause of racism.
Posted by: Bad | March 28, 2008 1:39 PM
Unfortunately, I have a Caucasian mother who is prejudiced against African-Americans and a Caucasian brother-in-law who is prejudiced against Filipinos (and probably other ethnic groups as well). I can't show them the door, really, although there have been times I've wished I could. My mother tries to be subtle, but she can't disguise her biases. When I called from Peru to tell her that I had begun taking care of my soon-to-adopted daughter, her first question was whether my daughter had curly hair, which her way of finding out whether my daughter had African ancestry. Ironically, it is very likely that my mother's ancestors were Jews forced out of Portugal. Sigh.
Posted by: Elf Eye | March 28, 2008 1:49 PM
It's not just the racial epithet, but the threat of violence that's particularly horrifying. You did the right thing.
Posted by: Siamang | March 28, 2008 2:08 PM
Fortunately, it's been years since I last heard that kind of talk, but growing up in South it was all too common. I've been in situations where, I'm embarrassed to say, I kept silent because I was the only white person in the room who wasn't telling racists jokes.
Posted by: Bill in NC | March 28, 2008 2:12 PM
How could no one have mentioned They Might be Giants' song Your Racist Friend?
Your Racist Friend
This is where the party ends
I can't stand here listening to you
And your racist friend
I know politics bore you
But I feel like a hypocrite talking to you
And your racist friend
It was the loveliest party that I've ever attended
If anything was broken I'm sure it could be mended
My head can't tolerate this bobbing and pretending
Listen to some bullet-head and the madness that he's saying
This is where the party ends
I'll just sit here wondering how you
Can stand by your racist friend
I know politics bore you
But I feel like a hypocrite talking to you
You and your racist friend
This is where the party ends
I can't stand here listening to you
And your racist friend
I know politics bore you
But I feel like a hypocrite talking to you
And your racist friend
Out from the kitchen to the bedroom to the hallway
Your friend apologizes, he could see it my way
He let the contents of the bottle do the thinking
Can't shake the devil's hand and say you're only kidding
This is where the party ends
I can't stand here listening to you
And your racist friend
I know politics bore you
But I feel like a hypocrite talking to you
And your racist friend
Posted by: Jerry | March 28, 2008 2:27 PM
@uncle noel, Sorry, I missed your comment.
Posted by: Jerry | March 28, 2008 2:30 PM
I had a similar experience when in college. I started dating this girl whose father was a count tax assessor in Louisiana. First time I'm over to his house to meet him he gets up and shows me his KKK robe!!! I was like WTF?
Unfortunately, I couldn't kick him out of his own house. And being young and somewhat intimidated by a KKK member who are know to be violent, I quickly found an excuse to leave instead of confronting him.
Posted by: Jim | March 28, 2008 2:32 PM
good on you, Ed! that was the right thing to do, and it was courageous to do so.
Posted by: thalarctos | March 28, 2008 2:38 PM
Ed: Did you discuss the incident with the friend who invited the guy? If so, would you mind sharing what came out of the discussion?
In any case, I applaud you loudly with my typing fingers. You may not change the racist, but you send a loud message to those who have unformed opinions and could swing either way.
Posted by: xebecs | March 28, 2008 2:42 PM
I remember as a kid one of my closest friends saying to me, "If I were President I'd send all the Mexicans back to Mexico." I was shocked. We started arguing and I reminded him buddy was Mexican. "Oh yea," he said, suddenly looking pensive. I thought maybe I'd gotten through. But no, a moment later he says, "I'd send them all back except for Corey, 'cause he's cool." Arrrgghhhh!!!!!
Posted by: Abby Normal | March 28, 2008 2:46 PM
Umlud:
"Oh, you're tall." (As if a half-Japanese person can't be 6'3".)
As someone else 6'3", but completely white, I can assure you, I get this all the time.
Ditto, except I'm Mexican-American. I'm pretty pale though, so I don't get the "tall" comments as much as my father does.
My father's secretary is openly bigoted against just about anything not white and far-right wing. He's admonished her before for it to the point where she finally stopped spouting racial epithets. Mind you, my father is a Mexican-American, and is reasonably dark (complexion like George Lopez). But the capper her comment during the Houston Rockets' recent 22-game winning streak: "I can't cheer for the Rockets. They support the Communists."
I guess having one Chinese player means that an NBA franchise can prop up and support an entire foreign government.
Posted by: Bouj | March 28, 2008 2:54 PM
Long-time listener, first time caller. Spot-on, Ed. You not only let the offender know that his attitude was unwelcome in your home, but the other people in attendance got the message, as well.
So here's my racism story: My boyfriend is half-Hispanic. When I was talking with my mother on the phone, I told her about how his mother is so sharp-witted and funny, and that she has a *TON* of stories of growing up in Chile. A beat passed. "Where's Chile?" she asked. "It's a country in South America. You know, right next to Argentina." Another beat. In a quiet, almost strained voice, she asked, "Does he *look* white?"
I was flummoxed by the question. How do you even respond to something like that? I demurred, and muttered "yeah, I guess so" and quickly changed the subject. But damn, I felt like such a coward.
Posted by: lonelyShoes | March 28, 2008 2:56 PM
Wes ... total spit-take. No really, I was drinking tea when I read that.
My 91 year old grandmother lives in southern Ohio. I have never heard her mention the N word or say anything at all derogatory about a race, but I know that black folks make her uncomfortable, almost to the point of fear. I've always been able to see it in her face. Not all black people, of course - not the ones she knows - but it's still totally racist as she's not automatically afraid of white people she doesn't know.
My dad said he remembers a Thanksgiving when he was in elementary school and his grandparents (her parents) brought in servants for dinner. To his surprise - and much pondering on race and society for years after - the woman they hired brought her daughter to help, and the daughter was his classmate. He says it bothered him that they were spending their holiday serving his family.
I've only had people say surprising things around me once or twice, for which I am grateful. I wonder sometimes if women are less likely than men to say potentially sensitive things around people they don't know (except when it comes to Christianity - everyone assumes I'm Christian, it seems), because the two times it's happened have been men. One time was in my home and I didn't kick him out but told him I expected never to hear statements like that in my presence again. He never did. I like to hope that perhaps I made him think on it a little.
Posted by: Andrea | March 28, 2008 2:57 PM
Bravo, Ed.
One of my favorite memories is working with a young guy from Nevada, cleaning campgrounds in Yellowstone. One day as we drove into the campground, we saw a young black women come out of a tent. More to get my goat than anything, my co-worker said, "nigger," under his breath. I replied, "Yeah, she's cute." He was shocked as hell. Then I pointed out that my wife, who he thought was really cool, was part Indonesian. I don't know what's happened long term, but at least he learned that not everyone he respected shared his views.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 28, 2008 3:12 PM
xebecs wrote:
He was very apologetic. I should probably note that most of the guys I play poker with during this particular game are really not my friends. Three of the regular players are guys I've known for years and consider friends (two of the three were not there last night because they're out of town). In fact, I had asked the guy who invited him to find another player or two if he could because some of our regulars couldn't play this week. The guy who invited him is not really a friend. He's become a regular in the game the last 3 weeks, but I know absolutely nothing about him. I met him at a VFW charity poker tournament a few weeks ago when we were playing at the same table and when I mentioned my weekly game he said he was interested in playing in it. I know his name and I know the town he lives in and that's about it. But he was apologetic and said he barely knows the guy who did it, similar to the way I know this guy. But after it happened, he was very apologetic and said he's sorry that he invited him and he'll be more careful in the future.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | March 28, 2008 3:26 PM
Go, Ed!
I did about that same thing in Junior High about 45 years ago - angrily told one of my best friends that he could just leave my front yard if he ever used that N-word while sitting in it again. And he never did.
But I've become an old polite chickenshit here in my old age, despite my black daughter-in-law. I think you've inspired me to do better in the future. Thanks.
Posted by: Coragyps | March 28, 2008 3:29 PM
It *is* a nice picture Ed, but you better keep the beard -- it distracts the eye from your televangelist hair...
(Runs)
Posted by: xebecs | March 28, 2008 3:50 PM
My grandmother, longtime wife of my relatively tolerant grandfather, is pretty overtly racist. When my grandfather was dying she'd express her exasperation in caring for him by saying things like "I'm so desperate for help around here I'd even let a negro in the house." I guess his "treat others with kindness no matter who they are" philosophy never really rubbed off on her.
And I totally sympathize with people simply assuming you're Christian when they meet you. It's something I rant about from time to time. It's not uncommon in Oklahoma for people, upon meeting and getting to know you, to ask "What church do you go to?" as if the possibility of you not going to church at all isn't even worth considering.
Another personal story relating to that (since this thread seems to have become a place to vent about personal experiences with bigotry): my neighbor, who does not even know my name (and has never even asked), has tried to invite me to his church twice. Each time I told him the same thing: "Thank you, but I'm not religious, and I don't go to church." His eyes grew wide, and he started asking if I'd ever considered salvation yada yada. I told him yes, I used to be Christian. At this point he became more relaxed and comfortable (because rather than a total outsider I was just a "lost sheep") and tried to re-convert me, which I of course refused. He's done this twice. I guess the second time he had just totally forgotten we'd spoken before (because he obviously has zero interest in me as a person--at least as long as I'm not a Christian). It's mildly insulting.
Posted by: Wes | March 28, 2008 4:02 PM
You really should have seen that incident coming, Ed.
I mean, what else do you expect when you invite Bill O'Reilly over to play cards?
Posted by: CHV | March 28, 2008 4:10 PM
This happens constantly in taxicabs in NYC. For whatever reason, many taxi drivers feel free to share whatever their most bigoted thoughts are with their passengers.
I have been in a taxi where the turbaned Sikh driver is listening to Rush Limbaugh and telling me that the damn Mexicans are child molesters and need to be deported.
Posted by: PhysioProf | March 28, 2008 4:31 PM
You get that a lot with racists - they don't seem to be able to percieve that people that they interact with in their daily lives will not share their bigotry.
It's not just the racists; I think it's a pretty common human trait. I know I'm always inordinately shocked when people who seem otherwise intelligent turn out to be nasty racists, because I grew up in a liberal NYC family, and it's hard for me to get that people really think that way. I always have to stop and remind myself how ingrained it is in the country at large. And yeah, I know there are racists in NYC. But they don't tend to be as loud and bold as elsewhere.
P.S.
All this is part of why I like Obama so much; he seems able and willing to address the complexity of this stuff.
Posted by: Hypatia | March 28, 2008 4:57 PM
Prof:
Not that I believe NYC is a racist town per se, but it's always baffled me how one immigrant can use racist remarks to describe another, especially in a city which has historically been America's immigration capitol.
Maybe the recent to-do about Jeremiah Wright was, in fact, a good thing if it forced the nation to acknowledge that thought it has made large strides towards racial equality since 1964, it still has miles and miles more to go.
Posted by: CHV | March 28, 2008 5:02 PM
Of course, it shouldn't even matter if you have black family members.
Posted by: Ben_Wraith | March 28, 2008 5:07 PM
Wes -
My grandfather ran over to the family, apologized for the whole white race, then came back to me and said, "What them boys did was wrong! Them niggers got the same rights we do!" Given his upbringing, that's probably the closest to be an anti-racist one could have hoped for from my grandfather.
This was a very, very common sort of response to such situations, not all that long ago. A contractor that my old roofing company used to work for did something similar on a job, when some of the white stucco subs, were talking shit to some Hispanic framing subs. He ran over, seriously pissed and shouted; "leave those fucking spics alone and get the fuck off my job site." Then apologized to the crew lead about what had happened. He was nearly seventy and I doubt it even occurred to him that what he had said was offensive. Of course the crew lead just thanked him for intervening and left it at that.
Umlud -
I used to buy my weed from a gent who was of Japanese descent. I will never forget the shock of a friend I took over, when he found out my dealer was Japanese American. He didn't say anything while we were there, but definitely found it worth mentioning after we left. The supreme irony (more because of your comment on stereotypes) is that he was selling dope to put himself through school - to be a structural engineer.
I actually mentioned it to my dealer the next time I saw him. He thought it was hilarious and told me that this was not an uncommon reaction. Indeed, he found it rather difficult in the beginning to sell weed, because he just didn't fit the stereotype that many people have about drug dealers.
Posted by: DuWayne | March 28, 2008 5:54 PM
On the racists comment thing, kudos to you.
It is hard especially with a guest, invited or not.
Odd to relate I've found more racism betwixt Indians and Philipinos than between Caucasians and Arabs; then again I work in the Persian Gulf. Not so not many african blacks here; then again Ab means slave and black, so racism exists in most places.
The new picture not so great. Do you really have so much hair (yes I'm jealous); you look like a young whippersnapper :o), did you copy the style from the 50s hip cats?
Posted by: Chris' Wills | March 28, 2008 6:19 PM
This is an incredibly interesting discussion. And it touches me somewhat. You see, the stereotypical attitudes behind overt racism of the kind that got Ed's "poker friend" kicked out the door, tend to exist even among people who think of themselves as very "progressive" or "liberal". Let me give you some examples culled from people I know.
One of these people is a woman married to a Mexican guy. They are very nice people. And they have two school-aged girls. The mother is blond, but they have the "genetic stamp" of their Mexican father. Okay, so far, so good. But Grandma has been heard to make a remark like this: "Oh Ana(the younger sister, not her real name) looks "so" Latin!" "Ana" has a slightly darker complexion and curlier hair(just like her father), than "Lupe", the older one. But "Lupe" is spending a year at her Mexican father's home town and going to school there. She came back tanned darker than her sister! So what is a "Latino" supposed to look like, pray tell????? I've seen lots of "Lations" of all complexions.
Example Number 2: One of my nieces married a black guy. When she had her first child(now a married woman herself), the little baby "looked white". She proudly told everybody, "She'll darken up in a bit". She didn't. If you had never laid eyes on "Myra"(again, not her real name), and her father wasn't persent, you wouldn't know her from Adam, so to speak.
These are all nice, liberal, well-meaning people. Yet they have stereotyped ideas about how some people "ought" to be. And it *really* irritates me to hear this kind of thing. Because, among other things, I have an anthropology background(a major, though long ago), And I've learned, along the way, to be *extremely* wary about these kinds of "thinking processes". They are lazy, among other things. People can be quite unexpected. And they should be. As a species, we are quite diverse. And it's really not much of a step from this kind of "lazy" thinking, to the "poker friend's" "I can't belive a f------ n---- is running for president" remark. To make a long story short, I'm glad Ed stood up to the guy. The "lazy" thinking I described is a lot harder to deal with, but we all have to start somewhere.
Anne G
Posted by: Anne Gilbert | March 28, 2008 6:42 PM
I would pay good money for a video of that. In the meantime all I can do is link you in admiration.
Posted by: DarkSyde | March 28, 2008 6:48 PM
Ed, you've got sterner balls than I. If that happened to me in my home, I'd feel like kicking them the hell out, but I'm too non-confrontational to do it. Instead I'd be a puss and just never allow them back after they left.
So bravo for unfailingly sticking by your principles.
Posted by: Ted | March 28, 2008 8:04 PM
Jim wrote:
I couldn't help but laugh at this. Maybe he just kept a costume KKK robe around the house to freak out all his daughter's boyfriends? My dad wasn't much of a racist, but I could completely see him doing something like that just because he'd have thought it was funny.
****
In high school I dated a guy who was a skinhead but, for whatever retarded reason I came up with and for what unfathomable purpose, I decided he just couldn't possibly be the racist kind of skinhead. I started to get the feeling I might have misjudged him when, in the car on our way to a party, his loser soon-to-be-in-prison friend put a freaking Screwdriver tape in. Oh. My. God. Screwdriver!
(For those of you lucky enough to have never heard of them, they were a horrid 80's British skinhead punk band, whose biggest hit was a song in which the only intelligible words are "Nigger! Nigger! Out! Out!". This was the song my stupid boyfriend's stupid friend chose to grace us with that evening.)
I was stunned. And also incredibly stupid, so I said nothing. I just sat there thinking "Holy crap?! Is he saying nigger nigger, out out? Did he really just say that? Oh my god! Should I say something?? Holy shit. I totally think my boyfriend's a Nazi." Honestly, I don't even remember if I said anything. All I remember is that moment of sheer horror when I realized my boyfriend was not only a racist, but a totally unapologetic, rocking-out-to-racist-music kind of racist that I didn't even think existed. I mean, I'd hear of them of course, but I never thought it was like, real. And then I did what any stupid teenage girl would do- I rolled my eyes and decided that it didn't matter, and that with a little prodding I could probably even bring him around to the good side. But that would happen later.
So to my most absolute shame, I still actually dated the guy for a few months after that. Although, at some point later I got in a disagreement with him about immigration and, brave soul that I was, finally told him he was being an asshole when he said we should only let white people in. I think I might have finished it with a resounding "Well that's just stupid!" Good grief. Well, that's my embarrassing story of standing up to racism.
That said, way to go Ed. But really- what else could you do? Sit around the table with the guy pretending to have fun all night? Ugh! Kicking his ass out was the only tolerable option available. (Except possibly locking him in a spidery basement closet with a ball gag until the night was over.)
Posted by: Leni | March 28, 2008 8:22 PM
(Oh, woops. I should have spelled it "Skrewdriver". An important detail, indeed.)
Posted by: Leni | March 28, 2008 8:32 PM
Way to go, Ed!
And I really like the new picture!
Posted by: CanadianChick | March 28, 2008 8:36 PM
While a senior in high school, I asked a friend of mine out to a school dance (not the prom, just some midterm function). She was Japanese. She told me that I couldn't pick her up at her house because her parents didn't "approve" of Americans...not white, mind you, but "Americans".
I don't recall having much of a problem with this...we simple met at the dance, but your post brought up the memory.
Her parents were from Hiroshima.
Posted by: BobbyEarle | March 28, 2008 11:15 PM
I'm a woman of mixed race (black mother, white father). Since I have fairly light skin, and curly, but not kinky, hair, I have been priviledged to hear all sorts of ridiculous remarks made before people realize who they are talking to. My favorite was my landlord coming to my door to warn me that the plumber was coming. "Don't be scared," he said, "he's a big black guy, but he's very nice." I asked him what that was supposed to mean. He said that a nice young girl like myself couldn't be too careful. I told him I'd try not to be scared of myself.
I have also witnessed someone point out to my parents a couple consisting of "a chink and a chicano" in disgust. Racists of any ilk should not be accepted into the society of rational people.
Posted by: acmegirl | March 28, 2008 11:44 PM
I'll throw in a couple of anecdotes.
The first one is a little off-topic, but I think you'll see the connection -- in my local several years back, it was a busy night, and a couple of guys came in, obviously together, and one loudmouth said, loudly, "Hey, what the fuck, there's no sign saying 'gay bar' outside, is there?", and I said, "Gee, no -- but there's no sign that says 'assholes welcome' either, but they let YOU in."
Long story short, it's MY local, so he got tossed and I got a talking to for making trouble. "isms" come in all flavors.
More on-target, however, my late (southern) grandma asked me, some years back, when I was going to move "back home", by which she meant, I guess, Carolina. I allowed as how I felt uncomfortable in the south, mostly because of the racism, and she said, and I quote, "Why, honey, you know that's not true. We just LOVE the niggers down here."
And there wasn't a shred of irony in it: I think, in her heart, she really did "love the niggers". I'm sure her (black, of course) housekeeper wouldn't have batted an eye at the comment. It was just how people of her age (born around 1900) were. I hope things are different now, but I just don't know.
Posted by: Josh Hayes | March 29, 2008 2:57 AM
You were right - very right - and also wrong. I wasn't there and I think it would be a judgement call. Is the guy a conscious or unconscious racist? I think that makes a difference. To me (as for you) his behavior is unacceptable (that word should never be used by anyone) and needs to be corrected (as you did) but you seem to have missed part of what he said.
When Obama is elected he is going to have a lot of evil people "gunning" for him. Due to recent racism allegations and cases in the Secret Service I am not even sure he will be adequately protected.
While I am not particularly racist and object strongly to racism (having borne it) and as some would say "white" I actually wonder the same thing. I think Obama is a brave man and has considerably less chance of surviving his presidency than some one "white" would. He is sure to face assassination attempts and I hope the Secret Service is capable and willing enough to protect him.
In summary, the "fucking nigger" was enough to throw him out but I could see myself asking the same question - but differently and just maybe it wants discussing.
Posted by: Truckle | March 29, 2008 6:22 AM
Good on you Ed, 2 thumbs up. But i'll go one step further, i don't think we should put up with it in public spaces either. Some months back, we (8-10 vets)were setting in a waiting room at the Marion VA recovering from chemically induced cardio-stress tests. A kindly older gent with a magazine bag sat next to me. We exchanged a few pleasantries and quickly found that we were both buffs of anything that flys, he hands me a newer copy of 'Flying' magazine. So far, great. But in less than 2 sentences he has segued into a pro Bush-as-flying-hero rant. So much for stress recovery. I countered with facts, to no avail, then he pulled out his ace, "well we ain't goin' to have n***er Muslim for President, that's for sure". I think what i said next was: "You're not only racist, you're too stupid to read, now leave before i call security". Then it hit me: 'you better chill, you might be the minority here'. So after his quick departure, i looked around....nothing but approving smiles and thumbs up. Sometimes going out on the limb can have positive results, at the very least, you'll feel better about yourself. Cardios not withstanding.
Posted by: Greg | March 29, 2008 6:23 AM
"Kenneth New: the old lady may have had a relative tortured or killed by the Japanese in WWII. That, and the "Yellow Peril"/Chinese Communist scare, fueled a lot of anti-Asian bigotry."
Raging Bee, I hope you put that forward as a reason and not an excuse.
Even so, I cut people no breaks. My dad fought in Vietnam, and he's an Indiana farm boy to boot. He doesn't use that as an excuse to indulge in racism. I found this out when I started dating a Chinese man and thought he'd have a problem because of the Asian factor.
He didn't. He wasn't prejudiced against Asians in general; not even against Vietnamese in particular, despite a year of getting shot at and returning fire. The only one he's prejudiced against, he announced, was the one who shot him. Fair enough.
When my dad got back from Vietnam, he made a point of studying up on Vietnamese history to find out just what the hell he'd been over there for. He came to the conclusion that we didn't belong, that Ho Chih Minh wasn't the devil incarnate, and they were better off making their own choices. Every time we've spoken about Vietnam, I've always gotten a deep, warm sense of respect and admiration.
Upshot of all that: people choose to let one event color their thinking. They're not racist because of a war or terrible injustice or similar that happened once in their lifetime: they're racist because that's what they choose to be. In this society, with all of the exposure to alternate views and opportunity to learn more than stereotypes, there's no excuse.
Posted by: Dana Hunter | March 29, 2008 6:39 AM
(I'm not the same guy who posted earlier)
Kudos to you Ed.
But one reason racism is so tough to deal with in the US is our individualism, I think.
Let me put it this way: there might have been a lot of non racists in the segregated South. But the laws on the books forced them to behave in a racist fashion. I might be a very nice guy who works in the county clerk's office but the law said I had to deny black people the vote. Thus the system itself forces racist behavior on people who might not ordinarily be so.
Nowadays it's more subtle. But the fact remains there is such a thing as institutionalized racism that doesn't depend on the feelings of the individuals in the system.
Racism isn't just your attitude, it's a matter of power. Basically, a white guy that hates non-whites can do a crapload more damage to a black guy's (or any other non-white's) life than they can ever hope to do to white folks. A good real life example is in my hometown. Charles Stuart killed his wife and child and said "a black guy did it" and all over Mission Hill black men were getting picked up, and one was even accused of the crime and arrested -- and the cops swore up and down he was the one, that it couldn't be any other way. When Tim McVeigh blew up the Murrah building nobody was rounding up white Christians or questioning. Manmy rights white people take for granted simply aren't there for non-whites, and are effectively meaningless. Presumption of innocence is one (nobody ever got stopped for driving while white, and look at the difference in treatment between white college students caught with a little weed and a black kid-- even a black middle class kid).
That's why non-whites get so frustrated sometimes, and why it's impossible to get across that, for example, black people don't care that your best friend is (insert race here). It's not about your individual feelings..
This is also why some people feel comfortable saying the kinds of things they did in your house. The system itself (even a lot of free speech battles) tend to favor the people in power. And those folks aren't black or brown, though strides have been made in this regard.
A lot of the bad attitude from the Limbaughs et al. is not about who they like, it's about loss of power and privilege. They don't like having to treat people who are different with any respect because the privileges that used to go with being white and protestant have been eroding for 100 years. (That's why electing JFK was a big step as well-- it was the culmination of white ethnics finally getting to be called "white" primarily by the no-holds-barred acquisition of political power through population increase and votes in big cities). Anyhow, the polite racists you see around now are nervous because attacks on racism are attacks on the system they are used to living in.
The guy you kicked out of your house was a fine example of that species. He's probably not used to treating the "other" as really human, and for a long time the environment he was in reinforced that in a thousand tiny ways.
Posted by: Jesse | March 29, 2008 7:32 AM
funny how seven card high low games can be ruined when you find out what the other jolly lads think about stuff beyond their last bet...
Posted by: singe | March 29, 2008 7:59 AM
You're my kinda guy Ed. You're welcome in my poker games any damn time.
Posted by: Peter | March 29, 2008 8:13 AM
Some people do live in strange little bubbles where they don't think racism exists anymore. I moved from SD/MN to Seattle WA for a few years, where I met this super cool First Nations (from Canada) Professor. I was taking her class and she said something to the effect that it was nice that racism against Native Americans has really gone away, and that you really don't see it anymore...
After I got done sputtering, I just spoke up and said, "Ever been to South Dakota? or Minnesota?"
Just because Seattle is wonderfully, uber-liberal doesn't mean that the rest of this country is. Even in South Dakota, I'd rather live East River than West River due to the varying levels of racism.
Good grief!
Posted by: Nikki | March 29, 2008 8:45 AM
smooches, hugs and kisses...
I agree with you 100%
Good for you!!!
Posted by: statusquomustgo | March 29, 2008 9:30 AM
Dana said
Yes that is true however in certain cases as Raging Bee suggests there is an understandable bias and suspicion from those that suffered through war in occupied territories. My grandfather, and two uncles were held and tortured in Japanese camps, two of my aunts were raped and spent months in fear and hiding (they were 12 and 16). My father lived in German occupied Netherlands struggling just to survive and eat while his father was in a German work camp. They had no choice, they weren't sent, they lost family and friends, they were children and emotionally rattled by those experiences. Now I have never seen any of my family act prejudicial towards anyone but I do understand their hesitation to trust a people who for reasons they could not rationalize the killing and torturing of family, friends and neighbors. So it also puts into perspective for me why African Americans and other oppressed groups hesitate to trust or embrace their oppressors. So although I don't condone prejudice, in some cases, there are rational reasons and we should be cognizant of them rather than jumping in to condemn them.
Posted by: JoH | March 29, 2008 9:34 AM
You kicked him out of your house?!?! You were unnecessarily kind. I would have buried him UNDER the house.
Posted by: Mark F | March 29, 2008 9:46 AM
As for Ed - Sometimes a bigot is just a bigot and I agree with your showing him the door.
Posted by: JoH | March 29, 2008 10:59 AM
Glad you spoke out & put your foot down. Retracting a comment shouldn't earn someone a "Get Out Of Jail Free" card; even my six-year old son is learning that lesson pretty well.
In our world, we're fighting a different perception battle, but maybe there are some similarities. My daughter experiences a cognitive disability, so I'm busy educating people (including my boss' boss) that "retarded" and like terms are offensive. Your example & consistency in principle will help me maintain my own!
Posted by: Rob at Kintropy | March 29, 2008 11:09 AM
Back in college in Missouri when I joined a fraternity, half my pledge class referred to themselves as the Tri-Kaps. Peer pressure and the desire to belong basically led me to try my best ignore it, but I couldn't keep it up.
It just wasn't in my nature to put up with crap like that. Most of the women I've dated (and the one I ended up marrying) were minority women, and during summer breaks back in my hometown, (which still has de facto segregation), the friends that I mostly hung out with were black.
To make a long story short, I started to mock my pledge brothers with friendly sarcasm whenever they started their racist rants. We'd all laugh it off at the end of the day, but eventually they ended up giving me a really shitty nickname (a less obvious way of calling me a N* Lover)... and after that, I stopped being their friends.
It kind of ruined part of the college/fraternity experience for me... but I ended up a better person because of it. 10 years later, I'm not in touch with any of them, and I can't look back on it without regret that I ever even tried to be friends with them.
Posted by: doctorgoo | March 29, 2008 11:17 AM
Truckle says:
"When Obama is elected he is going to have a lot of evil people "gunning" for him. Due to recent racism allegations and cases in the Secret Service I am not even sure he will be adequately protected.
While I am not particularly racist and object strongly to racism (having borne it) and as some would say "white" I actually wonder the same thing. I think Obama is a brave man and has considerably less chance of surviving his presidency than some one "white" would. He is sure to face assassination attempts and I hope the Secret Service is capable and willing enough to protect him."
My understanding is that Obama has bonded really well with the SS agents assigned to his detail, which is significant in size for obvious reasons. He invited them over to his house to watch the Superbowl, and regularly shoots hoops with them for exercise.
On the other hand, I did read one article where there seemed to be a security lapse at a stop in Dallas where he was to give a speech, where a Dallas police officer told the press that they were instructed to stop searching the incoming crowd for weapons during the final hour by the Secret Service preceding the speech in order to facilitate getting the house packed.
The Secret Service has been stretched thin and greatly expanded as a result of this campaign year, and there's no reason to think Obama's own detail is not loyal to him. But the Dallas security lapse does make you wonder about conflicting loyalties amidst those whose purpose is to protect the candidates that are most vulnerable.
Posted by: arias | March 29, 2008 11:19 AM
Thank you for standing up to the bigots, whether racists or homophobes or any other type. I honestly feel that if more of them were called on their bullshit, it would die out quickly.
The paradigm hasn't shifted for these people yet. That doesn't excuse their bigotry. Good on you for calling that jackass out - and then throwing him out to boot. I applaud you.
Posted by: Killer of Sacred Cows | March 29, 2008 11:33 AM
This old homosexual thanks you from the bottom of my heart!
Posted by: Paul In SF | March 29, 2008 11:49 AM
I have stopped speaking or seeing my own parents due to their racism/bigotry. When people choose bigotry over their own children, they do not deserve to be tolerated.
I refuse to tolerate discrimination and bigotry.
Posted by: taking a stand | March 29, 2008 12:06 PM
You can't cure a bigot by not tolerating him/her, but you can enforce 'rules' in your own home/property. I've had to boot a few over the years invited to a gathering or bonfire, usually for spouting anti-religious bigotry (which is as offensive to my way of life as racist or homosexual bigotry). Friends and family have learned not to invite them.
Or, as the common wisdom states, the vampire can't enter if you don't invite him to cross the threshold. Best we can do is teach bigots that it's not PC to spout bigotry in mixed company if they're unsure of positions.
Posted by: jb | March 29, 2008 12:31 PM
As the parent of three children of mixed racial background, I commend your speaking up. Silence implies consent, so saying nothing in a case like this is never an option. My parents long ago abandoned me because of my children, but I have not and will not abandon my beliefs.
Posted by: Mosesmom | March 29, 2008 1:16 PM
I'm glad you spoke up. As a White male, you are in a unique position to challenge other White men as a peer. Taking America from these bigots step by step is the only way we'll have racial harmony and escape tribalism. I hope other White men follow your example and lead from the front on this issue.
Posted by: Marie | March 29, 2008 2:27 PM
Nice article!
Posted by: Ahmed | March 29, 2008 4:05 PM
You were absolutely correct. Absolutely. Now, if he'd said, "Can you imagine if they elect an inexperienced clown who speaks in sound bites, espouses change but can't explain how he's going to make these changes, and follows the teachings of a racist lunatic who urges violence against caucasians?" I'm sure he could have stayed to finish the game, right?
Posted by: Gonzo Don | March 29, 2008 4:19 PM
The Japanese American commentator is lucky he wasn't in Japan. That's where you will encounter true racism of the most extreme sort.
Posted by: Dan-o | March 29, 2008 4:31 PM
Gonzo Don wrote:
Of course. Might even have made for an interesting discussion. But I'm afraid that statement has too many words that this particular idiot wouldn't know the meaning of for him to have said it.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | March 29, 2008 4:58 PM
The most charming example of this that I recall was when I was dating a girl from my neighborhood. I was just starting UCLA and she was still in high school. Her mother, who had been a Rose Princess, had died very young and she was being raised by her single dad, who was a very nice guy [I remember that not all dads at that time were very friendly to me]; and the relevant thing was that, it turned out in conversations with him, that he was also very tolerant. He had no objection to his daughter dating african-americans, or Jews (me); but he drew the line at Catholics. I was totally non-plussed. I didn't understand it then, and I still don't, especially since he did not express this with any sense of ethnic animus.
Posted by: Mike Cohen | March 29, 2008 5:20 PM
I feel for the commenters that have had to sever ties with family because of racism. I, too, have been placed in that position and have been less principled. I still talk to my family despite their racism and have chosen to vocally protest whenever they say or do something offensive. It hasn't had the transformational effect that I hoped for, but I'm not giving up.
My wife's family, on the other hand, can go to h...Sorry! Her uncle, who lives only about a mile away, was looking for a used car. He narrowed it down to two choices: a broken-down rust-bucket at a high price or a well-maintained late-model sedan at a really great price. The problem, as he saw it, was that the good car had been a rental car, so there was a chance that black people may have ridden in it. He chose the crappy, older car. Neither my wife nor I have spoken to him since then.
Posted by: Will TS | March 29, 2008 5:34 PM
This young(ish) homosexual thanks you from the bottom of my heart!
Posted by: Richard Eis | March 29, 2008 5:58 PM
That happens to me, too - although not as much anymore. It used to happen so frequently that I was reluctant to befriend white people at work, because - inevitably - we'd have to have that confrontation because - inevitably - they'd say something racist. Every time.
When you are white - lots off people assume that "we ALL think this way, right?"
Good for you. I'm glad you spoke up.
Posted by: Nonie3234 | March 29, 2008 6:30 PM
I applied to a college back in the day when it was still permissible to ask the candidate to attach a photo to the application. Dad saw me affixing the photo and asked, "Why do they want a picture? To make sure you're not a nigger?" After several seconds of not getting a reaction from me, Dad asked, "Did you hear me?" I replied, "Yes, Dad, but I was ignoring your remark and pretending you didn't say it." It wasn't as cheeky as saying I didn't like to hear him talking like that, but he did avoid it around me afterwards. Was that really an improvement? Perhaps a small one. Thirty-five years later and I have yet to hear him talk like that again.
Posted by: Zeno | March 29, 2008 7:24 PM
Such a coincidence that this post is here today. (Thanks, Ed.) Last night I watched segment #2 of Eyes on the Prize (library DVD). It is about the desegregation activities in Little Rock and other southern towns. Very moving to see the courage of the young kids and appalling to see the hatred they were confronting. A difficult program to watch.
So this morning I was having coffee with a friend and talking about the program and about experiences I had had with bigots. I recalled a few times when I had risen to the occasion and confronted friends who'd made racist remarks. Including hanging up the phone on a guy I had been dating. I also recalled a time when I said nothing. As hard as it may feel to challenge a bigot in real time, the shame of saying nothing made me feel much worse.
Posted by: Gerry L | March 30, 2008 1:56 AM
This has been an interesting thread for me.
I read Paul Krugman's "Conscience of a Liberal" just a few weeks ago, and a considerable chunk of his thesis (as I read it, of course) is that the distinctions between what are usually called "conservatives" and "liberals" in the USA these days are down to race-related issues.
It seemed a little far-fetched, but the more I thought about it, the more I agreed with it. We compare ourselves in social statistics and economic status with western European countries; maybe Canada as well. But what we have that none of them have is 10-15% of our population being descendents of slaves. Yes, we're a racially diverse nation, but how we got that way is an immense blot on our shared heritage -- and yet we don't seem capable of talking about it. In many ways, it's the one thing that really separates us from the other "first world" nations, but it's the one thing with which we assiduously avoid grappling.
It's not surprising, of course. Guilt, anger, the desire to distance oneself from events of the past, it all plays a part. But until we come to grips with it, it's an open wound.
Posted by: Josh Hayes | March 30, 2008 2:41 AM
I am white, and from the Midwest, and oddly my grandparents, from both sides, have never made any kind of offensive comments. They aren't necessarily liberal, either. All four were politically disengaged and never cared about politics or about being white or Christian or anything else. They were working class people concerned about their own lives and the goings-on of their friends and family. On the few occasions they have mentioned politics, they seem to have a very nonchalant, mildly left-of-center point of view. "That Obama fellow seems great", and then they'll make a joke about how crappy Bush is. In the 90s they made light-hearted jokes about Bill Clinton's affairs. It's strange to hear so many tales of racist, or even opinionated, grandparents. Racism always looks to me like a problem of heat, passion, testosterone, and youth. At the end of life, in my family anyway, people tend to be too calm and laid back for hate, looking at life through the lens of the years - and it looks a lot like one big comedic, beautifully stupid drama. Then again, my grandparents bear the stamp of a practical German immigrant and Yankee upper-Midwest heritage, and part of their culture is keeping quiet about hullabaloo and other people's nonsense.
Posted by: Chuck | March 31, 2008 12:53 AM
I do have a story of a friend's courage in the face of racism, however. A friend whose parents were originally from Arkansas but raised their family in Indiana moved back to Arkansas when my friend's dad retired. When he passed away in Arkansas, the friend moved to Arkansas to be with his mother and grandmother for a while. At his job there, there were three attractive women, and he was talking to another guy, a co-worker, about them. "I think I'll ask her out," he said. "Which one?" the coworker asked. "That one," said my friend, pointing to the most attractive, and apparently the smartest and most interesting girl in the group. "Oh, God, you would date a n*****?" At which my friend risked his job and called the coworker a racist, telling him he never wanted to hear his bigoted opinions again. Anyway, I thought of that story when I read this post. It's quite good of you, Ed, to stand up for all that is decent and refuse admission of a bigoted piece of shit in your home. Humiliating and alienating racists is an important tool for defeating bigotry. Let their sensible friends and loved ones convert them by example and with reason. For you, a stranger, the best thing you could do is kick him out of your home and spoil his night.
Posted by: Chuck | March 31, 2008 1:08 AM
"The Japanese American commentator is lucky he wasn't in Japan. That's where you will encounter true racism of the most extreme sort."
Really? how many racially-motivated murders have there been in Japan in recent years?
Having travelled in Japan and studied Japanese culture I'm well aware that there is racism in Japan. But I'll believe it's of "the most extreme sort", when there's a nation-wide epidemic of murders of foreigners of the sort that's been going on in Russia for the past several years.
Posted by: Ian Gould | March 31, 2008 7:48 AM
Ian-- I think (speaking also as someone who has been to Japan, speaks some Japanese and has Japanese relatives) that there is racism in Japan, but it is of a very different character than in the US or Russia.
In this sense you are quite right-- the idea of murdering foreigners hasn't occurred to the Japanese, though there are nativist parties there that seem to think all was wonderful in WW II.
But it's important to note that only in the US was ethnically-based chattel slavery practiced, and we were among the last countries in the world to give it up. (While many think Brazil has that dubious honor, in the US it was still legal to enslave native people in California until about 1880 or 1890).
Even in Brazil there wasn't the same obsession with how much black blood you had -- it wasn't possible to accurately measure after a certain point. Not that they don't have an odd relationship with their African forebears. But it's very different.
Japan always struck me as a society grappling with having no real immigration since 800 AD and having to come to terms with a world that is much more heterogenous than Japan is. At the same time, it's a society that is willing to adopt things from other societies if they think it works -- there's no shame to them in doing so. (I had an old Japanese history teacher who said a hundred years from now the Japanese will have a "traditional" musical form that involves four guys in bowl haircuts and called a "beteru").
Russia is dealing with no longer being an empire. Even the Soviet Union took on many of the features of czarist Russia, (as they say, you go with the models you know) including the ethnicity-tracking bureaucracy. SO in Russia it isn't racism in quite the same sense that it is in the US. After all, even in the Russian Federation, Russians are a majority, but not by much, and it never really was ethnically homogeneous to begin with. In that country you have people reacting to foreigners because they really are foreigners. (I'm speaking of the violence against Chechens, Kazakhs, Siberians and the like). It would be as if in the US we had a large population of people who didn't see themselves as US citizens, really. That's not quite the case here unless you count the Native Americans, and that's a whole 'nother kettle of fish.
But I think you have observed a fundamental problem with Americans that I noted earlier. We tend to see racism here as a one-size-fits-all phenomenon that is all about your personal animus towards other people. It isn't either one, and that makes us often blind to how people interact in other countries and why what we have here is so pernicious and frankly, weird to other people in other nations. Except pre-1994 white South Africans. Unfortunately they get it. Thankfully they decided to let go peacefully, unlike their counterparts in the South (who had to be forced by the Federal government - twice -- to acknowledge black people as human).
Posted by: Jesse | March 31, 2008 8:29 AM
Great Job.
I teach at a 100% Title 1, Dual Language school with a large Hispanic population. Once at a district wide meeting a teacher came up to me and complemented out school TAKS scores.
She said, "You kids did real good - for your population"
With that tone - that says so much is wrong with the speaker.
I looked her in the eye and said our population is human children - what do you teach - goats? Then walked away.
I heard through the grapevine our superintendent was around the corner and heard the exchange. The other teacher apparently was written up for her attitude/comment.
The superintendent has addressed me by name outside of school when I wasn't wearing my tag. I guess he knew who I was and had no problem with my response.
Posted by: Kimberly | March 31, 2008 11:00 AM