Chapter 2:

All American Girl vs Injustice

Chapter 2:

 

Lest you think I’m totally hard-hearted, I want to share with you today my own (inadvertent) racism. Let me preface this with some facts.  I took some classes in college where we studied how people react to each other. When we first encounter someone, we make several judgements within the first five seconds.  We categorize based upon race, gender, sex, sexual orientation, looks, etc.  This is not a bad thing in itself.   We need that categorization so we are comfortable.  For instance, on Saturday Night Live, there is a character named Pat.  Everyone is uncomfortable around Pat because there is no definitive sex characteristic.  Is this character male or female?  When we don’t know which pronoun to use when describing someone, we are uncomfortable.  (SIDEBAR:  this may not be the best example, because nowadays, there are so many different descriptors and we need to be cognizant of all and use appropriately.  I’m not fluent enough on this particular topic to discuss.  Someone else can feel free to jump in and explain.)

On with my story . . . when I lived in Chicago, I had my first encounters with Hispanic/Latino people.  Growing up in Muncie, Indiana, you were either Black, White, or a combination of the two.  There were very few people of other races/nationalities.  I can think of three families from that time and I don’t even think I knew anyone Jewish.  I don’t even know if we had a Synagogue at that time.

One evening, after choir practice, at church, I went to dinner with one of the young men from the parish.  He spoke mostly Spanish and some English, and I spoke absolutely no Spanish.  We were able to communicate during dinner. It was challenging, but it was fun.  Me being me and wanting to know more about him, asked him the following question: “What part of Mexico are you from?” From the look on his face, you would have thought I shot his dog. He was livid and stood up from the table, saying (loudly), “I’m from El Salvador.”  (SIDEBAR: if you know me, you know I’m geographically challenged.  Want to beat me in Trivial Pursuit? Ask me geography questions.) I stupidly kept at it. “So, what part of Mexico is that?”

Needless to say, I was treated to a tirade about stereotype, racism, lumping all Hispanics/Latinos into one category, you name it.  Luckily, I was still really cute and was able to diffuse the situation.  I asked him to (calmly) explain what I had done wrong and how to correct it in the future.  I certainly didn’t want to make the same mistake again.  He explained that El Salvador is not part of Mexico, that not all Hispanics/Latinos in the US are from Mexico, and that it is insulting to lump them all together.  I apologized profusely and I LEARNED from this experience.

I also explained why I thought the way I did so that he would understand that it wasn’t intentional. Me being me, and geographically challenged, explained that I just assumed (remember assume makes an ass out of “u” and “me”) that since Mexico was our neighboring country that anyone Hispanic/Latino was from Mexico. I did say that I knew a lot of Puerto Ricans are on the East Coast and Cubans in Florida, but really wasn’t sure of the difference.  I asked him to educate me and he did.

Now, you would think that I would have learned my lesson here, but . . . fast forward 20 years.  I’m in Southern California, I work in LA, and I have lots of different ethnicities around me, probably 20 different ones just in my job alone.  At a company event, I was hanging out with one of my co-workers.  He was born and raised here but speaks fluent Spanish because of his family.  He has absolutely no accent when speaking English, but when he is drinking, the heavy accent comes out (mostly on purpose).  So, we were boozing it up and I said to him, “You know, you never have an accent until you start drinking. And then, you talk with such a thick Mexican accent, you’d think you were born there.”  He laughed (because he knows me) and said, “That’s funny, because I’m Cuban.” Facepalm.  Will I never learn?  He took it in stride and we still laugh about it today.  I got to learn about his family history (his father was a prisoner in Cuba because he defied Castro) and that his wife is actually Mexican, so their kids are “Cubicans” (his word, not mine). 

The bottom line is, even those of us who are enlightened make mistakes.  Own them and learn from them.  Will I make this mistake again?  Probably.  Will I own it and learn from it?  Definitely. Have I learned to ask questions or make comments differently?  You betcha!

*Note—throughout this essay, I have referred to Hispanic/Latino.  This is because some of my friends identify Hispanic and some Latino.  I’ve asked the question many times of how/why they identify in certain ways and received a variety of answers.  I can’t possibly keep track of how each person identifies, so I use both.

I hope you’ve learned something from my experience and it’s ok to laugh.  Laughter is good medicine.

 

#vote  #blacklivesmatter  #JesusSaves #nojusticenopeace #wecandobetter #askthequestions #learntheanswers