Bigots
THIS article breaks my heart.
You know, when I was in college and taking classes such as Minorities in American Society, and Gender, Race and Class in American History, and others, I was amazed to find how many people failed to recognize that race issues still exist so predominately in this country. So many of them were either ignorant or in denial that race issues still exist in our society today. So many of them are either blind or indifferent or just don't grasp the reality of it because they are oblivious to the world around them.
They are too distracted and programmed by our public education system to really SEE anything. Even more gross was that so many of them started out indifferent about it and remained indifferent through the courses. And these were just people in my classes. I can't imagine how many of them are out there floating around in the masses nationally.
I think those people fail to recognize that, in our parents' lifetime, segregation still existed. In our parents' lifetime, interracial couples such as my mom and dad were not legally allowed to marry (miscegenation) up until 1967. That wasn't that long ago.
As Obama gets closer and closer to the Democratic nomination, I am hearing more and more people speculating that he will be assassinated if he gets elected President of the United States. More and more people are arguing that, although sad and unfortunate, that is just the reality of the way things are.
How much more eye-opening proof do we need that racism still exists and runs ramped in this country? In our day and age, a man who isn't even full-blooded African American- a man who is HALF WHITE- can get THIS close to the presidential seat and so many of our citizens are preparing for some redneck piece of shit to kill him?
There are still people in this country who only see the color of a person's skin and the "ethnicity" of their names and feel so threatened by those aspects of that person's existence that they choose to make assumptions and decisions and conclusions based on bigotry because they are lazy and hateful and uneducated.
Those people are idiot cowards who are no higher on the food chain than feral dogs with mange.
Oh yes, we've gotten BETTER...better at diluting our prejudices and sugar coating the ugly truth: this country is not as progressive as we give ourselves credit for. It's disgusting. It's embarrassing as a nation.
People still make their bigot jokes and brush them off as just being funny and get defensive if you say they are being racist or call them out for being jackasses. They're not racist, they say. "Lighten up," racism doesn't exist like it used to- it's 2008. Civil rights happened. Everyone is blended and that ship has sailed.
Obviously, "smiling prejudice" is coming to the surface as this election year continues to unfold and exposing so many people for who they really are.
If you speak your mind and go against the grain when some jerk off makes a black or "Mexican" or Asian joke (this goes for sexist and homophobic as well), you are told to lighten up and stop being uptight. Put a muzzle on calling out verbal vomit so that prejudice and bigotry can still simmer and stew under the smoke and mirrors. FUCK THAT. It makes me angry.
I think the people who fail to recognize that not only does racism still exist, but that it is more predominantly influential than anyone wants to admit, are just people who contribute to a disease that hovers under the radar. They keep it alive.
Racism isn't exposed and out in the open for everyone to see like it used to be- BUT IT IS STILL THERE. It is just so deeply embedded into some people's minds that it is just a normal way of thinking and they are literally incapable of recognizing the context of their own words and actions and prejudices.
It's all coming out now though.
Even if Obama doesn't get elected as president, I am thankful for him and his determination and the issues and HOPE that he truly has brought to the table. It's like he's unintentionally holding a big mirror up in front of this country, in regards to race, and saying, "LOOK at what we truly are. Look at where some of us have come from, and look at where some of us remain. Look at where we could go."
