Musings in Search of a Muse

In some subtle, subconscious ways I may very well be as racist as the average bear, though with hope, less so. I find the idea completely abhorrent. My parents raised me to not think about race. I played with other children -- black, white, yellow, and brown -- without any thought to our differences. My G.I. Joe collection was integrated. I was even bussed because my school was all white at first.

But there were influences, minor to be sure, that completed the picture for me. Dad was always quiet about mixed marriages and mom was always against them "because what would that make the kids?" When my dad brought home men from the submarines he served on they were never other than pale white. Dad always made it clear that race made no difference in his Navy because everyone depended on each other for their very lives. But I don't remember my parents ever socializing with people of color (well, other colors, at least). And while dad never told a race-based joke, he never told others that it was inappropriate when he heard one. Mom never indulged in such humor but the patronizing manner she would often don like a fine coat made her a parody of tolerance.

So to this day when I meet with someone new I don't notice if they are white unless they aren't.

That I find very disturbing. And depressing.

Then there was last Thursday: A new person in my work group came into the team meeting in stating to someone he was talking to "I don't got to do nuthin' but be black and die." Later in the meeting a black woman on the team commented sotto voce "my people don't get treated well here." And a number of other seemingly innocuous reminders of race cropped up as they do daily, all of which I found as greatly disturbing as any other day.

And yet, I can't help but think I am racist.

Or am I? Race, culture, religion, or any difference that I may have with others does not influence my relations with coworkers, customers, or others that I interact with but it is an omnipresent thought. Partly, I'm sure, so I don't let it be an influence. But partly it is something that pops up when a culture clash occurs.

An obvious example of this is when of my work buddies throws on a CD to help keep him occupied. It is almost always rap or hip-hop. What I'm about to write may remind you of "but some of my best friends are ..." and that's okay. My music library has a fair bit of rap and hip-hop. The difference is that his music is annoying. Aside from the annoyance of his keeping the volume down so I hear nothing but the bass line, what bothers me is almost all the songs are of the Gangsta or Thug sub-genre. Here's a middle-class white lad in his early twenties that clearly has had no connection with the lifestyle outside the music he "identifies" with (as he says). It also clear even in casual conversation that the lyrics shape his attitudes toward women, money, morals, and life. And worse, I hear it and think to myself "this danged black music ...." And I stop.

Without thinking I labeled the music and the associated culture in racist terms. There I am, a man old enough to remember signs on water fountains for "Coloreds Only" and being berated for calling a black man "Sir." I believe in deference for age or experience and that women are generally equal or superior to men in everything; that everyone is entitled to believe what they want and should they reject my religion (which I firmly believe is right) I don't reject them as people. Still, though, I tagged a crucial part of culture with a racist label.

I cry for myself in this as much as I cry for the whole indignity that is racism. While I've been labeled in many ways -- including losing out on a job because I was white and another because I was over weight ("If anybody asks, it is because others were more qualified," I was told) -- I will never know what it is like to be yellow, brown, black, or anything but white.

Nor will I be proud of being white. I briefly talked to a friend (and readers of this blog know how often I sincerely use that label, but she qualifies) about some of my feelings on racism and asked if I could discuss them with her sometime as a friend and as a black person. She agreed and gave me a tid-bit to think about: There is pride in being black.

There's a concept that baffles me even more than racism. Pride in a color or a heritage. I just can't imagine that. A few years ago a former KKK member spoke at school about his turn from racism and how it amazed him he could be proud to be white. "It's not like I worked at being white," he told the kids. "I couldn't stop being white." Like him, I can't find pride in a biological condition. Where is the pride in being white, or male, or tall, or any other characteristic one can describe? And how can one be proud of an ancestry, whether it is associated with a race or not? That doesn't make sense to me, either. When my friend mentioned pride in being black she said "like you are proud of being Irish." Well, she may have misinterpreted me last St. Patrick's Day, because though I celebrate my Irish-English-Scottish heritage, I don't take pride in it.

To me, pride is something that can only be linked to accomplishment. I can take pride in being a Penn State graduate, but I can't take pride in being white. The former was a reward for hard work while I came by the latter through chance (or divine will). And I wish not to take pride in my heritage as that would also assume a degree of responsibility. I cannot take credit for defeating the Spanish Armada in 1588 nor can I be blamed for the slaughter of innocents during the Crusades. Umbrage for having my people bound in slavery by pharaoh is not mine to take nor is the cultural shame for my people having taken slaves a millennium later.

Besides, despite earning three college degrees, spending uncountable hours in history texts, and teaching hundreds of children even the merest fraction of world history I still do not know enough to even think about having historical pride. Nor does anyone else (keeping in mind that nothing is absolute, including "absolute"). Which reminds me of another coworker of mine. She had told me a few times that she was proud to be an African-American. This I had to question when one day she asked "What country is Africa in?"

Perhaps it is the nature of humans to label and judge and separate based on differences or similarities. Maybe that animal part of our brain that helped us survive before we were endowed with humanity still controls our interactions within our environment (Yes, I'm a devout Christian who favors Evolution, but that's occasionally discussed in my other blog and in more than a few earlier posts in this blog). But it is our intelligence (or poor use of same) that enables us to perpetuate concepts such as race or pride. It is this same gift that can be used to abolish that which is not a credit to anyone's favor.