![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Race and Color
Jul. 13th, 2009 02:35 pmI'm white. To a certain extent, I don't get a say in all the drama because I have white privilege at my back. Hell, I have long hair and blue eyes to boot.
But most of the kids I mentor aren't white. They always seem a little surprised when I mention race in passing -- like referring to one of my fellow mentors who was having a hard time keeping a beat when some of the kids were trying to teach her a clapping rhyme as "whiter than I am."
I know I've told the story about one of the boys saying he didn't like to go outside because then he'd be black. Without thinking, I turned to him, looked at his hand, then mine, then his and said, "Kid, I hate to break it to you ... " Thank heavens he laughed.
And then all of them tried to explain to me why it was better to be light.
There was an article in The Washington Post yesterday on the subject.
I wish they hadn't put it into Michael Jackson terms, but I would like to hear from my friends about this.
But most of the kids I mentor aren't white. They always seem a little surprised when I mention race in passing -- like referring to one of my fellow mentors who was having a hard time keeping a beat when some of the kids were trying to teach her a clapping rhyme as "whiter than I am."
I know I've told the story about one of the boys saying he didn't like to go outside because then he'd be black. Without thinking, I turned to him, looked at his hand, then mine, then his and said, "Kid, I hate to break it to you ... " Thank heavens he laughed.
And then all of them tried to explain to me why it was better to be light.
There was an article in The Washington Post yesterday on the subject.
I wish they hadn't put it into Michael Jackson terms, but I would like to hear from my friends about this.
