
I taught my black kids their elite upbringing would protect them - ColinWright
http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/11/06/i-taught-my-black-kids-that-their-elite-upbringing-would-protect-them-from-discrimination-i-was-wrong/
======
nether
There was a Fresh Prince episode about this!

 _After Carlton and Will are pulled over and detained..._

> Carlton (to Will): What's your complaint here? We were detained for a few
> hours, Dad cleared things up, and we were released. The system works.

> Will: I hope you like that system because you'll be seeing a whole lot of it
> in your lifetime.

> Carlton: Not if I bring a map.

> Will: You just don't get it, do you? No map is going to save you and neither
> is your glee club, or your fancy Bel-Air address or who your daddy is.
> Because when you're driving in a nice car in a strange neighborhood, none of
> that matters. They only see one thing. (taps Carlton on his face)

> Carlton: Well, maybe growing up where you did has made you a little touchy,
> but I think you've blown this whole thing out of proportion. If you look at
> the facts... (Will walks away disgusted)

[http://freshprince.wikia.com/wiki/Mistaken_Identity](http://freshprince.wikia.com/wiki/Mistaken_Identity)

------
tedks
I can imagine a very easy parallel to the tech community: "I taught my
daughters their nerd cred would protect them."

It's irritating how the author has to buttress his statements on privilege
with "of course, the existence of white privilege doesn't mean all white
people are violently racist." White people, and white men in particular, are
so reactionary when confronted by the mere existence of their
institutionalized privilege that they demand such things. I'm sure this post
won't be popular for exactly that reason. It's a lot like this Onion article:
[http://www.theonion.com/articles/i-dont-support-feminism-
if-...](http://www.theonion.com/articles/i-dont-support-feminism-if-it-means-
murdering-all,37301/)

~~~
facepalm
I'm not convinced the plight of women in tech compares even remotely to the
plight of actual minorities in the US.

~~~
tedks
If you're a man (I'll bet $20 right now that you are) your opinion isn't
relevant.

~~~
facepalm
Just a thought: why do you then hang out on a web site with presumably mostly
people whose opinions you consider irrelevant?

~~~
webjprgm
I think the point is that if the speaker is not one who may have experienced
the discrimination then the speaker is not able to say that it does not exist.

Do you agree or disagree with this idea?

(Pithy comments may be fun, but a flame war is not productive.)

------
staunch
As a white male who grew up in (American) poverty, from my point of view
they've have been incredibly insulated by their wealth.

By 15 years old, I had been physically attacked a dozen times without cause,
chased by gangs in cars for being in the wrong neighborhood, had a gun pointed
at me at least twice, and threatened physically dozens of times over nothing.

~~~
DanBC
> As a white male who grew up in (American) poverty, from my point of view
> they've have been incredibly insulated by their wealth.

But do you agree that "Didn't get called 'nigger' until the age of 15" is
lousy? Shouldn't we be aiming for "didn't get called 'nigger'"?

~~~
stefantalpalaru
> Shouldn't we be aiming for "didn't get called 'nigger'"?

No. Getting insulted once in a while is the price we pay for living in an
environment that allows freedom of expression. The alternative is very similar
to what people in totalitarian countries do: use the newspeak in public,
calling _surveillance_ "the S-word", and speak their mind at home, after
checking for listening devices.

~~~
cafard
How about "can say it but don't"? Their getting insulted is a price they pay,
but not one I pay. They might reasonably object if I say "we pay".

And if you have never been in a situation where you are the white stranger in
a group of persons wondering whether they can break out the n-word in front of
you, you have missed an (obnoxiously0 amusing but uncomfortable situation.

------
shetter
You don't need to become rich, just move to another country than the USA. A
good one is France, here "colored" foreigners are socially protected. Just
make sure to move into a neighborhood with the same general level of education
as yourself and your family (as that's the aspect on which most of the
discrimination occurs) and you will be fine. Don't make the mistake of being
white and educated and moving into a poor neighborhood though, you'll fare
worse than having your children being called "whities" or similar heart-
wrenching insults (think broken windows and physical aggressions).

~~~
differentView
>Just make sure to move into a neighborhood with the same general level of
education as yourself and your family (as that's the aspect on which most of
the discrimination occurs) and you will be fine.

And never leave that neighborhood?

~~~
shetter
If you don't want to feel discriminated against yes, make sure to keep your
culture/lifestyle level in check so it doesn't clash with your (new)
neighborhood.

------
lumberjack
I'm not black though I am a minority and I don't live in a particularly racist
area but it was always my experience that education and especially wealth
trump race any time, meaning that people discriminate first by wealth, then by
education and only afterwards by race, if they do at all. Does it not work
like that in other places?

~~~
kenjackson
Go and read anonymous message boards. Race dominates. At least in the US.

There's a good bit by Chris Rock where he talks about how no white guy would
want to trade places with him, and he's rich.

The show Blackish had a counterpoint though, where the black dad is trying to
get his black son to be friends with other black kids -- so they can share in
the struggle together. Until he realizes that his son's struggle is more about
being a nerd than being black.

~~~
lumberjack
Actually in the US it seems to me at least that wealth is a far bigger means
of discrimination than race. It does not seem likely to me that a
multimillionaire would prefer socializing with a poor person of the same skin
colour over socializing with another multimillionaire who happens to be black.

And anonymous boards do not break my rule. They do not discriminate by wealth
and education because they are poor and uneducated so they resort to
discriminate by race. But wealthy and educated people do seem to me quite
likely to consider uneducated and poor people as far less worthy human beings.

~~~
HillRat
_It does not seem likely to me that a multimillionaire would prefer
socializing with a poor person of the same skin colour over socializing with
another multimillionaire who happens to be black._

Ah, but it's the other side of the socioeconomic coin that's key; southern
plutocrats blunted the sharp tip of progressive unionization by convincing
poor white sharecroppers and field hands that they had more in common with the
wealthy white landowners than their fellow black workers. Similar political
strategies dominate today -- some race-based (and sharper than ever!), some on
other social issues.

------
facepalm
"But I am no better able to explain the lackadaisical response of the two
white men to whom I reported the incident than"

A very sad story, but I must admit, I have no idea what response he would
expect? Those two white men he reported to can not make racism go away. What
could they do to make the guy feel better?

~~~
umm_what
I suppose they could have recognized it as something that has the potential to
have a profound negative effect on a young black child's psyche. Racism, even
subltle racism, can challenge your sense of self-worth and belonging, and
ultimately make you feel like "less" of a person. It sounds like his son was
struggling with some of those feelings and school officials could have
attempted to help him through it.

~~~
facepalm
So offer counseling? OK, fair enough, that would be an idea.

Edit: not sure about the US, but in Germany universities have counselor
offices that are always open to students. But perhaps sometimes it is a good
idea to actively encourage somebody to seek counseling.

------
Bootvis
This is crazy and makes me sad and angry.

Sad because of the unfairness bestowed on this parent and his kids and sad and
angry with myself because I never realized how deeply racism is ingrained in
our society.

------
ColinWright
I guess the HN hive-mind is deciding that this is inappropriate:

[http://hnrankings.info/8574299/](http://hnrankings.info/8574299/)

~~~
umm_what
It's strange how quickly it was kicked off of the front page. 78 points in one
hour should be more than enough I think. But it's currently at #49...

~~~
ColinWright
It's being flagged - people think it doesn't belong.

Now at #62 and falling fast.

~~~
tzs
Although it is quite interesting, it's getting flagged I think because it is
bringing out a bunch of idiots in the comments.

Many have concluded that this kind of thing cannot be discussed here in a
civilized manner, and have taken to flagging such stories.

------
andyidsinga
As a white man, i'm saddened and shocked (but I shouldn't be shocked) to read
that these things are happening.

The article is a difficult reminder to be self-aware of privilege and
resulting behaviors.

I'm embarrassed to admit that sometimes its hard to know what to do to make
things right after poor ( hopefully not awful ) behavior. A recognition,
apology and attempt to understand the impact is a starting point.

I've been lucky to have a wife and mother who have never been afraid to call
out anything that approaches racist/sexist/homophobic behavior.

Similarly, that's why article is important - its needs to be called out when
it happens -- and folks like me need to respond and do better in the future.

------
acjohnson55
When I first read this story in Princeton Alumni Weekly [1], it reminded me so
much of my own upbringing. My parents grew up in inner city Detroit and Gary,
but fortunately came of age in the 70s, at a time when higher ed was becoming
much more inclusive. This gave them the means to get out, just as those cities
were beginning to crumble. They raised my siblings and me in a nice upper
middle class suburb of Chicago. Like the author and his wife, my parents
raised us from a very young age to know a behaviors to exhibit around
authorities and non-black people, so that we would appear as non-threatening
as possible.

Reading the story brought back a memory I'd almost forgotten. My father, a
lifelong golf fan, sent my brother and me to golf camp in Wisconsin. I was
probably about 14 and this was right around the time Tiger Woods first went
pro. So golf suddenly seemed like a viable sport to young black kids like us
-- it had been less than a decade since Augusta National had admitted it very
first black member. At camp, I remember hearing the word "nigger" yelled at us
from a truck speeding by a road adjacent to the course. My brother and I had
never experienced such racism up until that point and were basically frozen.
One of our teammates thought quickly and yelled "rednecks" back at the truck,
and to our teenage minds, the score had been more or less evened. No one ever
talked about what happened, and we sure as hell didn't tell my father, who
likely would have been as upset as the author of this piece.

I can't say that this particular event stands out as a watershed moment of
racism in my life, however. Far more frustrating were the countless
microracisms I endured growing up. A feeling (and reality) of not belonging
socially, exclusions from group outings, always standing out like a sore
thumb, off-color remarks, overt distrust from friends' and girlfriends'
parents, and so forth.

It wasn't until my late teens that developed the confidence to turn my
difference into a strength in many cases. Developing that ability allowed me
to be much more successful within the dominant culture, although it's never
too long an interval between overtly racial situations. In my twenties, I've
been questioned by police specifically on account of my race and I once had to
date a girl secretly because her father had told her he would disown her for
dating a non-white guy. At a middle class suburban bar,a totally random guy
I'd never seen before tried to fight me after telling me a "a nigger fucked my
wife".

But I'm on the very lucky end of the spectrum. I've benefited from all sorts
of privileges in my life. So many minorities face an intersection of
circumstance that can deprive them of privilege. We can never fully banish
discrimination, but I share this in hopes that people will read one person's
experience, understand that these issues are very real, and want to learn
more.

[1]
[http://paw.princeton.edu/issues/2014/10/08/pages/7596/index....](http://paw.princeton.edu/issues/2014/10/08/pages/7596/index.xml)

------
webjprgm
Very interesting. As a white male, the closest experience I have is living for
a couple years in Venezuela and Chile. Chile not so much, but in Venezuela I
was frequently harassed with anti-American phrases. But I wasn't a child so it
didn't affect me the same, I knew that back in my own country I would be
respected and fit in perfectly and that I would head back soon enough, and I
was never accused of a crime (other than being accused of being in the CIA by
passers-by).

Is this experience even close?

I might point out that I also felt discriminated against when trying to get
scholarships, since such a huge percent of the help goes to non-whites or
those in lower income classes. As a middle class white boy wanting to go into
Computer Science I got almost nothing. In theory this counter-discrimination
is supposed to make up for the racial discrimination to try to level out the
economic privileges. I'd really like to get rid of both.

I note that since I wish discrimination did not exist I tend to pretend that
it does not. Perhaps this is part of the problem. But I have never called
anyone a racial slur and I try to counter any racial biases I find in my own
thinking. So I don't feel like I'm part of the problem.

------
guard-of-terra
Having such a huge attack surface is the problem. If there is a _word_ that
can freeze you and ruin your day, someone is going to jump over that
eventually.

Words should make you laugh, especially when uttered by someone clearly
inferior.

~~~
kelukelugames
You sound like one of my co workers. " _This_ doesn't offend me. I don't
understand why it should bother you."

~~~
guard-of-terra
If something may offend you, it will. There are a lot of people around who
would like to hurt you for cheap - and they're not going away.

~~~
eksith
There's offense and then there's denying one's humanity. That word represents
the later which elicits a far more harsh response than mere offense. I'm sorry
you can't see the difference.

~~~
guard-of-terra
That's for you. For the offenders these words are as cheap as any other. They
just got a good weapon on you.

------
induscreep
It's embarrassing to realize that racial discrimination was happening in the
USA even 20 years after WW2/Holocaust. Didn't the world learn that being
racist = bad??

------
notastartup
This is an absolute outrage. Reading this made me realize maybe moving to
France or Germany might be better. I'd move to Brazil but too much robbery.
The reason I say France and Germany is because they scored less on the racism.
I live in Canada but racism is still around, just not direct and in your face
most of the times. It's like an invisible wall you run into as a visible
minority in certain situations, the cohesive side of normal human interaction
is present but without the acknowledgement of another human. You take a step
back and look at the invisible wall that surrounds the people inside it and
you walk away thinking and you begin to doubt yourself. Then you find open
minded people and it hits you in the head, the wall was real. it's still
around.

~~~
acjohnson55
Europe often has a different manifestations of racial issues, in my
experience. Some feel that racism there isn't so cloaked and ingrained in the
culture, see [1] for example.

It was in Austria that I, a black guy, along with 2 white American guys, were
stopped and interrogated by police in one of the large public parks. They
peppered us with a whole bunch of questions of who we were, where were our
papers, where were we coming from, where were we going, etc., before letting
us leave. As a black dude, my instinct when released from the cops is to non-
threateningly disengage as quickly as possible. But one of my white buddies
asked the cops why they had stopped us. One cop told us point blank that there
were a lot of black guys dealing heroin in the parks, and they wanted to make
sure I wasn't up to no good.

It's kind of darkly comical, but I'm pretty sure if you had snapped a photo of
us at the moment, you'd have seen two white dudes with their jaws agape and
who knows what my face looked like. I remember clearly feeling a mix of
feelings. Sure, I felt some anger and annoyance at being hassled simply
because I was black. I felt embarrassed for being the reason my buddies were
also hassled. Mostly, I was just like, "wow, I can't believe they admitted
that". In a small way, it was a vindication of all the times I had felt
marginalized because of my race, but couldn't say for sure. And as racism is
so hard to explain to non-minorities, I was kind of thankful my two friends
were there to witness it. Quite frankly, their minds were blown.

[1] [http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/black-body-re-
rea...](http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/black-body-re-reading-
james-baldwins-stranger-village)

~~~
notastartup
I don't know what to say. You absolutely did not deserve that kind of
treatment. It's very disappointing to hear even a big economy like Austria is
this backwards in terms of races.

I think even though this article highlights that racism transcends wealth and
status I also feel like there's a strong voice,view from Americans in general
of being aware and against racial prejudice where as in other countries
there's not even such awareness, rather racial profiling is the norm. It's
appalling.

~~~
acjohnson55
Yeah, but it's weird. That awareness leads to a more humane society on the
surface, which I think is a great thing. But the racism itself doesn't
evaporate; it condenses into more subtle and coded forms. Racial issues
continue to perpetuate a stark opportunity divide between minority groups and
white folks, and as minorities, it's a constant struggle to convince society
as a whole that there are real systemic problems unbalancing the playing
field, requiring real systemic solutions to address them.

~~~
notastartup
you said it. it's hard out here for minorities. unless we are absolute best
and stand out, we won't get treated as equals. sad, but i think this is why so
many minorities are so driven to succeed, especially immigrants.

------
Cuuugi
Odd how two legally justified shootings are considered the epitome of racism.
I feel bad for the author and his kid, but referencing the Trayvon Martin and
Michael Brown shootings took me out of it.

~~~
FireBeyond
I'm not sure how you come to that conclusion. The grand jury and FBI have yet
to issue a finding about indictment or civil rights violations in the Michael
Brown shooting, so wondering how you determined that it was "legally
justified".

Whilst George Zimmerman was acquitted, he was only charged with second-degree
murder, and multiple legal experts question whether he would have been found
guilty had the charge been lesser, or manslaughter.

The Martin family have also begun civil proceedings (and already settled one)
for wrongful death. There were significant (and valid) questions of race in
and around the investigation and trial.

------
clarkmoody
_> We never encountered drawn or discharged guns like those faced by unarmed
black teenagers Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Fla., or Michael Brown in Ferguson,
Mo._

Seriously?

In the context of the rest of the article, the author is implying that Martin
and Brown were killed because of their race alone, thus perpetuating a false
narrative. And to what end?

~~~
pessimizer
>thus perpetuating a false narrative.

Seriously?

You are aware that your opinion is controversial, so treating it as fact is
dishonest and nothing but a dog-whistle.

The alternative is that you actually want to have a discussion about why
anyone would want to say something that is false, but fits with the narrative
that they are delivering. Is that what you _really_ wanted to have a
discussion about? Do you _really_ want to know why people lie when they want
to convince someone of something?

~~~
clarkmoody
The author implies that the reason those teens were shot was because of their
race.

The first case already went through trial and found no guilty verdict,
especially no hate crime.

The second case involves a guy who reached for a police officer's gun. It
doesn't matter your race, if you try that, you're not leaving the scene alive.

 _> nothing but a dog-whistle_

If you want to call me a racist, then do it. Politically-correct buzzwords get
us nowhere.

~~~
tzs
Martin was not shot because of race--but the confrontation was started by
Zimmerman because of Martin's race.

------
jalcine
Realistically, I blame the father for being so hopeful in people. Living in
the 60s should have been a blatant sign that racism isn't only prevalent in
the US, it's what it was built on. It's not going away and instead of making
them more submissive and obedient to the laws of the land, they should have
been more proud what it mean to be Black. It reads like he wanted them to be
more submissive. No wonder the kid ran away in fear.

~~~
umm_what
So the kid should have done what? Confronted the two adult men and possibly
get assaulted? Or get himself arrested? No, he did the right thing. He walked
away.

