We're coloured people..

Monday, Oct. 31, 2005 ~ 1:23 p.m.

I felt a little sick last night. Well, "little" isn't the proper way to put it, I don't think. Mom and Nicole and the kids and I all went swimming at the indoor pool in town -- I don't know why, I hate swimming in other people's filth, I hate getting wrinkly fingers, and I hate having to struggle to keep Aadon in my arms so he doesn't drown because he would gladly throw himself into water over his head and not care. It was, unfortunately, the only way for me to get home after work, as mom is my ride and she was going. It wasn't bad, she brought me a plateful of chicken dinner to eat on the way to the pool.

Anyhow, driving away, Alex in the back seat, I mentioned something to mom about a "hot black man", and Alex said "Black people are ugly.". I just wasn't sure how to react to that, truly. I just looked at mom, who turned around and stared him down and said "That's not a nice thing to say." and Alex said "What? I can't help it, it's BRED into me.".

You know, it's a sad, sad world. Later on, I came home and watched Cold Case, it was an episode that I had seen before, where a group of older white men beat a young black man senseless and then hang him from a tree in the forest. That made me feel physically ill again.

With the recent death of Rosa Parks, I was reminded that a history of segregation between races and severe, physically violent racism is not that far behind the "civilized world" that we like to believe we live in. I had thought Rosa Parks had already died, because the people who don't recognize racism as being acceptable would like to believe that we are long past the awful, demeaning, sickening behaviours of racism -- I would like to believe that Rosa Parks made a difference in the world a long, long time ago, but it was not that far back.

The biggest problem with our area specifically is that, although there are some immigrants here, there is not a lot of racial diversity going in and out of our schools. The only place I ever saw a black man or woman up until I was in middle school or so, was on television. There was never a black person or black family in our communities, I never went to school with any kids from other races (apart from the Japanese exchange student in twelfth grade, who was wonderful). People are not used to people with different colored skin because they never meet them until they get older, and then they have no issues.

I really believe in Al's case if he had ever actually MET a black person and realized that they're normal, and just like any white person, he would never think something like that. Unfortunately, there aren't many opportunities. :P