Your Thoughts Exactly

The first two MCs that came up on ITunes for me this morning were KRS-One and Chuck D, so I guess I may as well speak about what a terrible racist I am.

After writing my endorsement of Barack Obama for the blog last Saturday, I took a nap, then went down to Clark Street Alehouse for a friend’s birthday party. Upon walking in I noticed two things. First, there were a solid amount of good looking women complete with engagement rings, which not only depressed me because I was unlikely to hook up with them, but also frayed my corneas and depressed me again based on the lack of funds in my bank account to spend on such a crappy rock. After recovering from this depressive wave, I notice for the second time this weekend that I had ended up at a bar with only white people.

Ok well the bouncer was black. And over the course of the night I was able to spot one other black guy and an Asian dude. But still, I was in Crackerland. And hey I guess it’s cool to roll with your own right?

I do believe in the melting pot America of the 21^st century. But America is a big place, and it’s going to develop at different speeds and with different dynamics depending on local history and demographics. One of the reasons I loved Miami was its multiculturalism. It felt like a city that was twenty five years ahead of the rest of the US in this manner. Sydney also was surprisingly multi-cultural, considering Australians in general are about thirty years behind in terms of racist attitudes.

Chicago, not so much. It is a city of 9 million people that obviously has representation from every racial demographic somewhere. But something about it, maybe the sprawl, maybe where I have chosen to live, maybe the weather, gives me the impression that there are still barriers that separate groups of people.

The bottom line is, I should never be in a situation where there is only one race of people in a bar in a major city in the US. Now, bars don’t help by catering to specific races of people. I know this from my brief experience working as a barback. One weekend, we hosted a “black party,” on a Friday and a traditional “white party,” on a Saturday. The main difference, of course, was the music played. Interestingly, my bar manager had decided that black people prefer Heineken while white people prefer Amstel Light, so we served one on Friday and one on Saturday. Weird.

I was talking about this with Breezy Boo (my African-American sister) last year; she said that is was natural for groups of people to “hang with their own.” I guess that is true. While I grew up in an extremely multi-cultural neighborhood, my parents’ decision to send me to private schools with mostly all white kids limited my exposure to families and friends of different ethnicities.

I guess it is “natural,” for me to not be friends with very many black people because I haven’t interacted with as many as I have white people in my lifetime. And when people “hang with their own,” they develop different cultures and backgrounds, which lead to an increased divide between groups. Increased divide in racial subcultures means that people have to expose themselves to unfamiliar situations to bridge gaps.

Well, people don’t like uncomfortable situations. Most people are self-conscious and don’t like being in situations where they stand out, or where their differences are noticeable. No wonder all the black people avoided the bar last Saturday. This isn't the America I want though...But what can I do? Any Suggestions?

# posted by Marmaniac @ 7:52 AM