| dinner at the neighbors |
[Dec. 21st, 2006|08:31 pm] |
"all of those minorities just get pregnant because they want welfare. those young black teenage girls just have babies because their parents want the welfare money. i know, i'm a doctor. i've seen it, they've told me."
... |
|
|
| ces convention |
[Dec. 21st, 2006|08:26 pm] |
my dads at one of those electronics conventions
walks up to the table like everyone else.
white guy jumps and grabs his wallet. |
|
|
| [correction] |
[Dec. 21st, 2006|08:13 pm] |
In college he noticed the German foreign exchange student absolutely staring at him. the khakis, the polo, the loafers/moccasins come into play here -- probably slightly different since he was much younger.
she was fascinated by him, as she told him, because she didn't know black people looked like that.
"In my country they say all black people dress like superfly shaft" (keep in mind this was decades ago)
'Superfly shaft? That's a movie!'
"Yeah, but that's all they show us...that makes me sad." |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Sep. 26th, 2006|06:43 pm] |
fucking matt walks by me in the hallway and goes "blackie"
if i wasn't rushing to my locker and he wasn't disappearing the opposite way fuck knows what would have happened |
|
|
| lunch and the mall |
[Sep. 1st, 2006|09:33 pm] |
scene: legal seafood
hey there bill.
this guy walks up as our waiter and i know off that bat he is fucking pissed he has to serve the blacks. like, i'm not even joking. as soon as i saw the look on his face and his super causal mannerisms and his name escaped his face i knew he was just some pissed racist asshole. but i think, why not give him the benefit of the doubt.
first offense.
my dad gets a dirty mug with his tea. he tells this girl 'catie, his assistant as well' and she comes back with the same cup but it's wet now. i'm looking at it from across the table, not trying to see what he's talking about, but i also see a big brown patch. i say nothing, whatever. "oh maybe it's the light" says catie. this time big bill comes back and fucking SLIDES the cup across the table to my father saying nothing and walking away.
after this. we get our food and everything. my dad and i have the same trio with different sides and he gets them wrong but that i don't really care about. he walks past us a few times and says absolutely nothing. there was no "is there anything else i can get you" there was no "is everything okay?" there was no politeness or even a slight bit of respect that you give to your customers. the place was pretty empty. he wasn't busy. the one time we could speak to him was when he put down a refilled ginger ale in front of me and my mom had to say something before he ran away again. there have been my dad's finished plates sitting at the edge of the table for the past fifteen minutes that he's past us three times and he sneers and goes "ooh are you done with these?" like he didn't see them. wraps our food for us. comes back with the bag. no we would not like a dessert menu, thank you. he looks everywhere but us when he talks now.
i'm getting sick of these fucking sheltered white guys who treat black people, especially with more money than them, worse than other people in the restaurant (store/service area/whatever) as if they need to "equalize" or some bullshit like that. if you have a PAYING CUSTOMER they shouldn't even have a race to you. what the hell did we do to him? ask for a fucking mug without brown patches of dirt in it? my dad is a laid back guy. he's not loud or obnoxious or demanding. it's disgusting.
and to think i told myself i was wrong, that i shouldn't judge him off the terrible vibe i got from him within seconds. |
|
|
| oh sweet jsa |
[Aug. 27th, 2006|01:18 am] |
jsa = debate/political discussion team
you know columbia university? new york city?
the jsa president gets rejected.
our topic is "is it too hard to get into the college of your choice"
whatever, fine.
somehow it's black people's fault.
somehow it's dispicable that if you add up all of the minorities and other from a chart from the website they make up almost 50% of the school (this school in new york city which HAS a hell of a lot of minorities that apply to schools in new york city)
and oh, but it's all affirmitive action, oh, but there's so many minorities there.
finally someone suggests that the "problem would be solved" if colleges were segregated. and the president is like "yea, but that would be bad, we can't do that now."
and the part that pains me the most is i was the only one who felt negative / opposed to the idea of SEGREGATING a fucking college. not neutral and defeated about it. and i adore that these same people go, really? is racism a problem? it's not really a big deal anymore is it? |
|
|
| i see black people |
[Aug. 27th, 2006|01:12 am] |
you ever been completely ignored at a store?
i walk into a friendly's up north... MA or VT it was. we want some chocolate milkshakes. not so hard.
so no one's at the register. i see a guy making a sunday. he looks at me. he keeps making a sunday. i see people behind him that look at me and keep walking around. i go to the opposite side of the divide and see two girls gossiping. they look at me. they stop. they keep talking. all of these people are far enough so i would have to yell. one girl with the other two girls finally walks up to the register. my mom has had time to walk in, go to the bathroom way in the back and come back before i'm ordering.
would it have killed someone to get the person working register? to apologize for the wait? to offer some type of service?
the stares into our car or as we walked down the street were enough, jesus. |
|
|
| don't tell me that "well maybe it's because of money" bullshit |
[Aug. 27th, 2006|12:56 am] |
there's a "good" part of my neighborhood and a "slightly worse" part. the "good" part is across the street from a bunch of mansions the next town over.
even after expressing interest in houses elsewhere, my parents were only shown houses in areas with only/mostly minorities. it has nothing to do with price range. everything always goes smooth until people meet my father in person. we have been trying to get into this group of houses since i was born.
it has nothing to do with us wanting to live away from minorities, nothing crazy like that. there were houses we looked at in an area with minoriries and decided against because of size. it just disgusts me, that struggle we go through and went through just to walk into a house on this side of town; that we need so much luck and to wait so long just to get the chance to give people our money for a home.
i've moved so many times, it's like we slowly got closer and closer to this house. thank god. 12 years later we get the chance to live in this area and buy instead of rent. it's so frustrating and useless.
i don't exactly mean where i live, but i rreeeeeeeeally hate that worse neighborhoods means they're blacker and more minority filled and better neighborhoods means there's a lot more whites and the blacks/minorities that "can" live there have to pass a certain money standard that a lot of the whites don't. |
|
|
| sir? your line's over here. |
[Aug. 27th, 2006|12:46 am] |
my father is a businessman.
he dresses like one too!
when he's ready to go on a plane, after going through extensive checking because of his skin color & maleness (and likely because he travels with his laptop, although my mom has never had that problem), he walks up to the first class line like every other first class ticket holder.
upon getting to the front of the line, the woman immediately goes, "sir, this is the first class line."
he presents the ticket and she stammers and babbles like the idiot she is.
and, no, this has not only happened once. |
|
|
| nordstrom! |
[Aug. 27th, 2006|12:34 am] |
my mom keeps a burberry scarf tied around her purse. god knows why, it's dirty as hell and i don't even think she uses it, but there it is.
so my mom walks in nordstrom. she goes downstairs and looks around mens for a while. there's some guy down there working. she goes up the escalator and toward the parking lot. as she nears the door this guy is coming out of the elevator and goes HEY STOP. no sensors have gone off. he picks up the scarf and asks her if she took it.
"did you pay for this?"
'this is my scarf'
"i don't think they took the sensors off"
'why are you touching my scarf?"
this dirty motherfucking scarf with no tags no sensors that we got from burlington coat factory years ago, we have now stolen from the mens section of nordstrom in the winter-spring which means winter shit isn't even down there anymore.
and my mom likely stole it, right? oh, maybe they were just looking for someone, right? and my mom tied it to her bag to be discreet about it, obviously.
so he realizes his mistake. or, no, he doesn't REALIZE it but he stammers and feels dumb. no apologies. no i'm so sorry mam. no explanation.
i can just imagine him in sensitivity training (which we were told her got). i'm not sure, but i think he was fired later. i don't really like asking for details about things like that, bringing it up again. i can't believe she didn't file a lawsuit. they gave her $1000
~~~
BP nordstrom.
i go get some leggings, put them on hold since they're the last in my size, come back later with my mother (probably spent all my money) and walk to the register. i ask the (new) woman for the leggings i put on hold. she looks at her register and scans it and says "oh i must have put them away" and i'm actually convinced. meanwhile i'm staring at them wondering if they're something else? i go back to look if she put them away and come back.
while i'm gone she takes the next customer. she whispers that a whole new shipment of jeans are coming in and there's free tailoring and there's gonna be a huge sale. there was no one else there. the only person she had to hide it from was my mom. i bet she didn't think she was interested.
meanwhile i come back, no, no one has put them away. wait, oh, here they are.
my fault for not pointing them out. that's not what bothers me. just another case of "oh, black customers? why should i bother?" |
|
|
| gotta love the retail racism |
[Aug. 27th, 2006|12:27 am] |
howcome every time i walk into anthropologie the doorman follows me?
forget the usual workers, i'll just pretend that girl was having a bad day and totally didn't realize i needed a fitting room or that i enjoyed politeness and even a slight offer of attention, even though she did notice as soon as that white woman by me picked something up.
every time i go into anthropologie and the white doorman is working he slowly drifts back to wherever i am. i go to the right and look around and he's kind of walking around by me. i go further back and he gets further back and watches me. i got to the back ROOM in the sale room and he suddenly has to fix something there. what, he hasn't seen me buy things the past three times? he doesn't register that i'm always completely unshady and friendly and that i walk to the register and pay?
it never happens when the hispanic doorman is working. |
|
|
| my mom's old office shows you what two different worlds people can be in for superficial reason. |
[Aug. 27th, 2006|12:17 am] |
i forget the woman's name...anne marie? nancy? she's white.
she made...$30,000 a year? she charged things like $700 disney figurines, expensive breadmakers on a whim for my mom, stupid things like that.
so finally my mom asks: you make far less money then me, how can you keep charging all of these things?
and she says...well my husband's a cop, so when i overcharge i just apply for a new credit card. they like that my husbands a cop and i never have trouble with my credit.
meanwhile, a black woman pays $600 a month for an apartment. it's not just her, it's her kids too. she needs to move to a different apartment and finds one for $600 a month. but they don't want to give her an apartment. even though she's already proven she can pay $600 a month, they don't dare give her a chance "only" because they don't like her credit. i bet if they switched places the first girl would have the apartment no question. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Aug. 26th, 2006|11:38 pm] |
red polo = staples uniform.
i was in staples wearing a BLUE kimono sleeve DRESS
i was standing by my cart of school supplies like everyone else in the store
a lady comes up to me and asks me where to find computer paper, and gets a little surprised when i tell her i don't work there.
~~~~~
this one is worse.
footlocker uniform = black and white referee striped polo
my friend evan was at footlocker, probably looking for sneakers like anyone else.
he was asked to find a pair of shoes...
i didn't ask what he was wearing, but i can guarantee you it wasn't a ref's shirt |
|
|
| it's definitely questionable |
[Jul. 4th, 2006|11:23 pm] |
cut back to 9th grade, 2005, earth science
a group of the popular white girls in different classes were found cheating on the quizzes. it was noticed because they got 100s on the quizzes and failed the tests. the earth science teacher is the toughest there is and married to the principal. there is a new honor code that specifically gives them the right to throw out people who cheat even questionably, especially if it has been ongoing. you have to sign something in the beginning of the year promising never to cheat, too. so, she interrogates one girl and forces her to give her the names of the other girls. nothing happens. i think she switches up the quizzes per class. fun girls, but what do they have to provide for the school? a little whiteness and a little money isn't everything.
fast forward to this year, 10th grade, biology.
a black kid's mother buys him a test generator off ebay. it happens to be the one the bio teacher uses. if you know his mom, you know he wouldn't dare refuse to use it to study from only. he's really smart. he always gets amazing grades, over the years and before and after using this new study guide. the biology teacher sees a different kid, he's white, and he's studying from it another day. he's also one of the more perfect students. he's used it at least once. the bio teacher makes him say where he got it from. he tries to lie by saying it's a website but when they force him to show them he has to tell who he got it from. they are both missing from their classes. the mother comes to school and explains. the white kid sharpens pencils in guidance and takes a 0 on the next test. the black kid is immediately removed from school, even with the protest of the principal's son, the biology teacher. we lose our likely valedictorian of the class of 2008. he gets amazing grades, he composes his own music on the piano, he plays an amazing trumpet, he makes everyone laugh, he provides insight in ways no one else can possibly imagine, he's probably a genius... and he's just thrown out for listening to a mother that hey, we all know is crazy. teacher: "i've had to deal with his mother before."
i bet the others [the precious soccer team girls he coaches and cheerleaders] would have been left alone if one of them was in the same situation. i bet my life on it that they would remain in this school, because something already happened and they do. i know it's different teachers and different situations. but they were cheating just as long as him an in an even worse and more direct way. it's something they weren't sure about so he was simply gone. but with a past incident they were sure about they were kept in the school. it's not fair. but that's just how i feel. |
|
|
| but you're not white |
[Jul. 2nd, 2006|02:17 pm] |
when my mom gets off the phone with her clients and meets them in person, there's always that initial shock.
"............YOU'RE Susan?"
speaking clearly and being direct & friendly on the phone doesn't indicate that you are white. why is it so discomforting?
at a country-wide meeting of her last company, she counted 2 other black faces. |
|
|
| the true inspiration |
[Jun. 27th, 2006|04:15 am] |
i remember a conversation i had with my mother and my father. we were going back and forth about all the shit we'd been through or seen people go through simply because of skin color and all types of discrimination. it could've gone on forever. so my dad told me to write it all down; every time something at least questionably racist happened, just to make a note of it.
well, typing it is just as good. |
|
|
| navigation |
| [ |
viewing |
| |
most recent entries |
] |
| |
|
|
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
racism_journal's journal
