I love your realness, Monique, and many of your writings. A lot of what you say, many don’t want to dip their toes into. I am white and the things going on with racism makes me sick. My grandma taught me to love everyone. I’ll tell you racism is definitely taught.. my mother tried to force that on me and my brother at a very young age and I have no idea why because her mother and father were not racist at all. My grandmother made sure that didn’t become us as children, how my mother was. My mother didn’t like anyone who was not like her, blonde and white. My grandma always brought me to her best friends house, who was a black woman and my mother couldn’t stand when my brother and I would go there. Miss Vivian lived in the projects. Miss Vivian was such a nice lady, and she was such a hard worker. She was a switchboard operator back in the day for New York telephone, before it was Verizon and she was in the union. Housing I guess no matter what year it is, is expensive, especially she was caring for her granddaughter and people seem like you are less than, when you live in affordable housing or need assistance. But one day the tables were turned and my mother was the one waiting online for public assistance. I just never understood why she was the way she was. Also growing up, one of my best friends was black and my mother was like don’t eat their food and blah blah blah. It was just disgusting behavior.. As a child it was very hard to deal with her behavior and the way she treated my brother and I about things like this. She would be screaming at us, but not just about Black people just about anybody that wasn’t like her, but more so about Black people. She would even tell my grandmother why are you buying black dolls for Vivian’s granddaughter, like it was something wrong..And to be honest back then I didn’t even know that they made dolls that didn’t look like me and my brother. My grandmother made sure we were exposed to other cultures and ethnicities, because we were isolated by my mother.
This is how I know that racism is taught in the home and when I saw these two little kids hugging on TV the other day, one was black and one was white. They love each other, and I wish it was like that for everyone because it reminds me of when I had a close friend that unfortunately, I could only be so close with. I couldn’t even bring them over my house I don’t talk to my mother, and I totally disowned her for a lot of reasons, but this is one of the most disgusting ones. I just hope there is peace in this world for everyone. But like the other two people said race was created to make a distinction, skin, ancestry, but it’s going to divide people like when you apply on an application you have to put if you’re male, female, intersex, non-binary, along with your race.. why can’t someone just apply for something who cares the race or sex or whatever. If someone is more than qualified for a position, it shouldn’t matter and that would lead me onto my next thing, how women in the world make less than men overall still..it’s getting better, but it’s nowhere near it should be. And to me whiteness is white people think they could do and say whatever they want and get away with anything and the sense of this entitlement is disgusting.
Race is the categorization of people by the color of their skin and ancestry. Racism is assigning negative connotations to different races.
Race, is a made up construct used to categorize and divide. Weaponized, as a “Rat Race“ for hierarchy and privilege.
Racism, is the systematic oppression of a group of people based off their ethnicity or “Race”
Whiteness is… I can’t even!
I love your realness, Monique, and many of your writings. A lot of what you say, many don’t want to dip their toes into. I am white and the things going on with racism makes me sick. My grandma taught me to love everyone. I’ll tell you racism is definitely taught.. my mother tried to force that on me and my brother at a very young age and I have no idea why because her mother and father were not racist at all. My grandmother made sure that didn’t become us as children, how my mother was. My mother didn’t like anyone who was not like her, blonde and white. My grandma always brought me to her best friends house, who was a black woman and my mother couldn’t stand when my brother and I would go there. Miss Vivian lived in the projects. Miss Vivian was such a nice lady, and she was such a hard worker. She was a switchboard operator back in the day for New York telephone, before it was Verizon and she was in the union. Housing I guess no matter what year it is, is expensive, especially she was caring for her granddaughter and people seem like you are less than, when you live in affordable housing or need assistance. But one day the tables were turned and my mother was the one waiting online for public assistance. I just never understood why she was the way she was. Also growing up, one of my best friends was black and my mother was like don’t eat their food and blah blah blah. It was just disgusting behavior.. As a child it was very hard to deal with her behavior and the way she treated my brother and I about things like this. She would be screaming at us, but not just about Black people just about anybody that wasn’t like her, but more so about Black people. She would even tell my grandmother why are you buying black dolls for Vivian’s granddaughter, like it was something wrong..And to be honest back then I didn’t even know that they made dolls that didn’t look like me and my brother. My grandmother made sure we were exposed to other cultures and ethnicities, because we were isolated by my mother.
This is how I know that racism is taught in the home and when I saw these two little kids hugging on TV the other day, one was black and one was white. They love each other, and I wish it was like that for everyone because it reminds me of when I had a close friend that unfortunately, I could only be so close with. I couldn’t even bring them over my house I don’t talk to my mother, and I totally disowned her for a lot of reasons, but this is one of the most disgusting ones. I just hope there is peace in this world for everyone. But like the other two people said race was created to make a distinction, skin, ancestry, but it’s going to divide people like when you apply on an application you have to put if you’re male, female, intersex, non-binary, along with your race.. why can’t someone just apply for something who cares the race or sex or whatever. If someone is more than qualified for a position, it shouldn’t matter and that would lead me onto my next thing, how women in the world make less than men overall still..it’s getting better, but it’s nowhere near it should be. And to me whiteness is white people think they could do and say whatever they want and get away with anything and the sense of this entitlement is disgusting.