JBvM
VIP Member
My family moved to an almost all Black neighborhood for a year right after MLK was assassinated. Whatever was my family thinking. Me and my mom (mother and child) had rocks thrown at us on a few buses (and more shit), and it was not a good year for a youth growing into adolescence. I walked away from that with little in the way of feelings of anger or hatred towards Blacks as a group. Why would I? I was an extremely curious and intelligent youngster, and I was not going to look at others to blame for the actions of a few, and a mob. Sadly, I had a brother who walked away with different lessons and outlook.
Later as a Teenager, I along with two others got Summer jobs in a pilot program. It was determined that one of the three of us had to be a Black person. The terrible part of that Summer was watching the Black kid we grew up with being told "You don't have to hang around or do anything. Just check and and come back at the end of the day and check out." That really, really made an impression on me, and in ways a Black person could never understand, because any Black person could never have been on the outside looking in, feeling what I had to feel. This through no fault of my own. I was a friggin Teenager. I was not in control of the adults in the world around me
A year or so later I went for a Summer with the city. I was told even though it was early (for us regular folks, the set asides for politically connected, the quotas, were always filled by default), that I shouldn't bother, a new system had quotas for minorities and I would not be getting a Summer job that year. Did I get angry or upset? Not really, I was pretty easy going. But I did run it all through my mind. I understood it was more about setting things straight in the now, than it was about making up for the past. I struggled with, was it about the - (pay attention IM2), sins of the fathers? I guess it all depends on how one seeks to see it and how it is framed, but I didn't see it as a punishment.
But was I personally paying for the past, a past I had absolutely no control over? Was I really paying for the past, or was I just there at the wrong time for myself? Was it really about me personally? The point is not an attempt at an equivalency with what people of color have had to go through, and still have to go through. What some/many Black people experience on a day to day basis (depending on where one lives), is something I can only observe through a prism that distorts just what I am viewing. The point is we all have our individual stories and experiences. Were I to hitch mine to those of others and become *clannish, I would probably start viewing it all as a personal assault on me as a White person.
IM2 MarcATL
Years later I moved to a few mostly Black cities for periods of time (years). I experienced ignorance, anger, and sometimes outright hatred by a few Black people who looked at me as being a symbol of their own personal pain and suffering. I could have focused on that subgroup and come away with a justified anger and hatred of Black people. But I have had far too many Black friends throughout my lifetime to go down that easy road. I guess what is lost is the personal contact between people of different cultures, and nationalities. There exist programs where outright, hardcore racists are brought into close personal contact with others and something very enlightening happens.
I believe Malcolm X had some kind of enlightening experience after he visited Mecca. He was able to see more clearly. Then he was assassinated because of it
Later as a Teenager, I along with two others got Summer jobs in a pilot program. It was determined that one of the three of us had to be a Black person. The terrible part of that Summer was watching the Black kid we grew up with being told "You don't have to hang around or do anything. Just check and and come back at the end of the day and check out." That really, really made an impression on me, and in ways a Black person could never understand, because any Black person could never have been on the outside looking in, feeling what I had to feel. This through no fault of my own. I was a friggin Teenager. I was not in control of the adults in the world around me
A year or so later I went for a Summer with the city. I was told even though it was early (for us regular folks, the set asides for politically connected, the quotas, were always filled by default), that I shouldn't bother, a new system had quotas for minorities and I would not be getting a Summer job that year. Did I get angry or upset? Not really, I was pretty easy going. But I did run it all through my mind. I understood it was more about setting things straight in the now, than it was about making up for the past. I struggled with, was it about the - (pay attention IM2), sins of the fathers? I guess it all depends on how one seeks to see it and how it is framed, but I didn't see it as a punishment.
But was I personally paying for the past, a past I had absolutely no control over? Was I really paying for the past, or was I just there at the wrong time for myself? Was it really about me personally? The point is not an attempt at an equivalency with what people of color have had to go through, and still have to go through. What some/many Black people experience on a day to day basis (depending on where one lives), is something I can only observe through a prism that distorts just what I am viewing. The point is we all have our individual stories and experiences. Were I to hitch mine to those of others and become *clannish, I would probably start viewing it all as a personal assault on me as a White person.
IM2 MarcATL
Years later I moved to a few mostly Black cities for periods of time (years). I experienced ignorance, anger, and sometimes outright hatred by a few Black people who looked at me as being a symbol of their own personal pain and suffering. I could have focused on that subgroup and come away with a justified anger and hatred of Black people. But I have had far too many Black friends throughout my lifetime to go down that easy road. I guess what is lost is the personal contact between people of different cultures, and nationalities. There exist programs where outright, hardcore racists are brought into close personal contact with others and something very enlightening happens.
I believe Malcolm X had some kind of enlightening experience after he visited Mecca. He was able to see more clearly. Then he was assassinated because of it