CLUB POOL INCIDENT IN PENNSYLVANIA IS NOT RARE

The press does not get it about racism, the public does not get it about racism, whites don't get it about racism and blacks, as well as 'other minorities', don't get it about racism.What everyone is missing is that the racism born of extreme hatred is just buried beneath political correctness and given the slightest opportunity it will resurface when we least expect it in some gruesome way. Everyone will express their surprise at the extent to which it still exists, the outrage and the ballyhoo will subside and on and on. We, as a country and a society need to raise the discussion to the level it demands.

Eric Holder gets it . We are cowards and , for the most part, unwilling to have constructive dialog. It is as if racism is some nebulous concept, separate and apart, from our daily lives. As far as racist whites are concerned 'niggas' could be anybody who is non-white and are considered subhuman, dirty and dangerous. This notion is inculcated in racist families when children are the most impressionable and , once the racist attitude is planted, it is as hard to eradicate as a ground running noxious weed from the child's consciousness. The racist seed is borne of ignorance and fear. I should know, I was raised in a racist family.

After the pool incident in Pennsylvania, where the white kids got out of the pool when the black and Latino kids got in there was a great ballyhoo about the incident being racist. Well , I'll just be hornswaggled, who da thunk it?

After Obama was elected, according to the press, it seems that all was love and harmony between whites and 'other races' and that racial barriers had been transcended. This in spite of the fact that, at the same time, racist incidents were happening around the country. The true racial hatred cannot be fully measured until the meaning of the word 'nigger' is examined. Out here in the real world some things are getting worse, not better, regarding the attitudes toward 'minorities', who by the way, are fast becoming the majority. For all of the white kids, who got out of the club pool in Pennsylvania when the 'other kids,' got in, the concept of racism is indelibly etched into their perception of 'the other.' Those kids, in all likelihood cannot be wrested away from their racist thinking inculcated by the ignorant adults who are responsible for training them to survive in the world to come. That world will be comprised of a mixture of ethnic individuals who will eventually become one color and one culture.

I have taken a lot of heat from racist individuals with whom I am acquainted. I have been told the name of Obama is not allowed in some households. I have some lifelong friends, and sadly also relatives, who sent anti-Obama emails before, after and during the election. They were surprised when I told them that I deleted the emails, did not ever want to see them again, and that I felt Obama was the best thing that could have happened to our country in a very long time. I did not understand, until the 2008 election, how some of my friends felt and, because I proudly voted for Obama, our relationship as friends will never be the same.

The 'children of color,' were victims of racism, but so were the children whose parents yanked them out of the pool when the camp kids got in. This is a terrible lesson perpetuating an anachronistic, generational attitude of racism which will deprive them of the blessing of diversity and expanded cultural richness. It will also perpetuate, in the minds of the camp children, that they are regarded as inferior, dangerous and that they do not belong. How could the camp kids possibly understand such unjustified treatment? They did nothing wrong, but this one heinous incident planted the seed of resentment in their young minds and the cycle of racism and resentment continues while we do nothing but talk it to death. There needs to be an established forum of individuals from many races to address the opportunities for growth and prosperity through education, trust building and diversity on a national level. Our national security depends on it and our economic survival as a country is contingent upon eliminating institutional racism and injustice. The pool incident is one more truth exposed.

EDUCATING CHILDREN ABOUT RACE

It is well known that children are inquisitive by nature. Since their developmental skills are formulated through observation and questioning, what they see and hear from their earliest experiences will develop into lifelong attitudes. Children ask questions about everything. Why this, why that, and such things as why is a cat a cat and not a dog. For the most part the answers are simple for adults to answer but sometimes they are not easy.



When my son was about 3 years of age we encountered a young man in a wheel chair. We were going into a store just as he was struggling to exit in the wheelchair and I helped to hold the door open. My son looked at me and asked, "Mom, why is that guy in that chair?" I tried to hush him up, but the young man said, "M'am, if you don't mind, I'd like to answer that question myself." The young man went on the explain to my son that he had been in an accident and his injuries prevented him from walking so he needed a wheel chair to get around. My son was fascinated, he understood and accepted the explanation, and from that point on he did not see people in wheelchairs as particularly different but accepted that they had had a different experience.



Years later, when my son was about 9 yrs. old, in 1978, we were in the car on Main St. at the corner of Ridge St. in Charlottesville, Va. and we heard screaming. I was driving and I looked out the window to my left and I saw a young black girl holding her shoulder and screaming. Blood was gushing from under her hand where she had placed it to stop the bleeding. There was a very young child with her maybe, 2 or 3 yrs old. I stopped the car in the middle of the road and turned off the engine, got out and ran to her to find out what had happened. Others in the car were afraid and told me to come back and just leave. They were afraid a crime had taken place and that we were in mortal danger since the area we were driving through was predominately black. My husband, disabled by MS, was mortified that I would just stop the car and run over to someone bleeding on the sidewalk, and leave everyone else in the car.



Since this was a time before aids awareness, I did not know what to do except to try to calm her , watch her crying child so it would not get in the street, and put pressure with my bare hands on the triangle shaped cut in her shoulder. ( I was a Girl Scout) The cut was close to her neck and it was deep. She was lying down on the sidewalk and when she calmed down she told me she had been with some friends, on what is now the Downtown Mall, and they had pushed her into one of the store windows and when she fell through it, it broke. She had some other minor cuts as well but nothing like the big one in her shoulder. A young black man came from the direction of Ridge St. and asked if he could help. I told him to get to a phone and call the rescue squad, and the police, and he did. By this time people had gathered to see what was happening. When the ambulance came the men told me they had it, she was going into shock, and I should leave. I remember looking at the blood on my hands and marveling how it was just blood, not black blood or white blood, just red blood that runs through all human veins. My son's only comment was a question, "Mom is she going to be alright?"



One of the adults commented that I could have been killed just running willy-nilly to help a person in 'that section of town' and that I should have had more consideration for my family than that. It is true that the car was stopped dead in the middle of the road, but the traffic was very light and seemed to move around our car just fine. I was concerned about what might have been said in my son's range of hearing while I was not there. We had members of our family who were then, and still are, racist. I can only hope , that by example, I was able to negate any racist mutterings to which he may have been exposed .