Thursday, September 1, 2011

Sad little racists



"It's really, really dumb."  No kidding!

Cristina Rad gets pretty worked up here, doesn't she? But she's right to feel that way. It's the 21st Century, yet we still have these pathetic little racists?

As a white man, I hear this stuff sometimes, from people who don't know me and assume that I'll agree with such idiocy. Mostly - not always - it's from people much older than me, people who grew up in another time and still haven't learned any better.

Of course, I don't want to give the impression that things aren't better than they used to be. We have indeed progressed - progressed a lot - in America. (In fact, I heard more blatant racism in Europe, when I traveled there years ago, than I ever did here. That surprised me.)

Most racists in America will indignantly deny being racist, and then, in the next breath, say something incredibly racist. Well, they tend not to be very smart.

They also find it very easy to believe the worst about blacks, Hispanics, immigrants - anyone different. That's why so many people believe the most idiotic things about Barack Obama. They wouldn't be quite that stupid if Obama were white.

Oh, and I like Cristina's t-shirt: "We Are All Africans." It's true, too. Everyone in this country is an African American, in the sense that our ancestors came from Africa.

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