Maybe if more people understood the root of what the hands up meant, they wouldn't make outrageous comments, but, then if one hasn't experienced what most people of color have experience, it would be very difficult to relate. But why even try to understand, easier to disconnect since some have never lived it on a nearly daily basis at one time or another in life.
It's funny, I have had a couple of friends witness what happens up close and personal during a shopping excursion some years ago, it was mind blowing for them, they just didn't understand what was happening, I just grinned, wasn't much of a way to explain it other than to say, it's because you are with me. they'd never experienced that kind of harassment before. I don't get it often, just once and a while depending on where I've gone. Never held a grudge, but, the accumulation of experiences of the nature can where on the psyche after a while if it happens too often and depending on just how blatant it is. But why would others that this doesn't effect get it or care right. This support these athletes are displaying isn't about Brown, it's about an across the board system that is in play that many deal with daily in life.
How many of you have had a child come home from a playdate the child is in tears, unconsolable, you have to get the information out of your child and you find out the playmate's grandmother had sat your daughter and her playmate down and told them they can't be friends, they shouldn't be playing together, your daughter was beneath her friend so to speak and it just wasn't right. Like me, many of my daughters playmates were of various ethnic groups, mostly white, just happened by chance. I couldn't console my child, she'd never been spoken to like that about her skin color before this was back in '85 '86, my daughter was around 10 y/o, changed her in ways that I couldn't convince her to not hate that women and continue that friendship regardless of those words spoken to her. I've had similar things said in my youth, many of my closest friends were white and on one occasion in another situation, one of my best friend was bi-racial, but looked white, we were walking down a road and ran into a woman that knew her, the woman made a comment that she thought we shouldn't be together, this was late 60's. I'm not going to talk about all the instances since those days. I've always just brushed it all off as no big deal until more recently when too much stuff just keeps getting forced upon me and I can't any longer just ignore every little thing. As I've said it wears on you after a while. I haven't been called nig_er many times, but the one time that stood out in my mind was coming out of a club and some guys called it out to one of my friends and I as they drove by us, this was, in the mid '90s. In NJ, there were still the occasional cross burnings on a few lawns even then. Anyway back to those bad boys, we had the last laugh since the police pulled them over as they sped just outside of the stripe mall; we saw them getting a ticket. LOL.
I don't have anything against any people based on skin color, I just feel annoyed these days more often than not due to more and more instances of things being pushed in my face and on top of it people acting like everything is just hunky dory because it's not happening to them and they don't witness it up close and personal. I'm forever grateful for the folks that don't have blinders on. I know most minds won't be affected, touched, changed or even sympathetic, just had to get this off my chest. At times it's a pain the weighs heavily on the heart, just had to release.
Anyhoo, rant over.
