Everyone, regardless of background agreed that the man who moved over 3 rows of seats to tap me on the shoulder and to ask for a ball scratch was provocative---ie trying to provoke a response. I can't read the young man's mind but I kinda doubt he was just hoping that I would ignore him and leave, but maybe that is a racist assumption.
Please feel free to stop reading here--I will return to lighter fare with my next post. I promise. But if you want to think about race please consider reading on.
I believe my views are formed by my experiences and 'knowledge' that I have absorbed. I believe that is how most of us form opinions of other groups and yes it does involved a lot of assumptions--each individual does not a group make. Maybe if I had time to get to know each individual in the group that was in the movie theater I would have felt comfortable telling them to shut the f*ck up, but I didn't have that opportunity.
I grew up in a white part of St. Louis with mostly white friends. I did experience getting pulled over at gunpoint by Ladue police officers in high school with an African American friend because he was black, but in general I can't claim to have experienced the kind of racial prejudice my black friends experience all the time. They have told me stories about being pulled over for being black, being unable to hail a taxi, being closely monitored in stores, and having people cross the street when they approached. I have no doubt that happens all the time, and you could argue I did a version of that fleeing the movie theater.
However, some of those same friends told me of being assaulted by people of color. A quick look at some statistics indicate that you are 6xs more likely to be shot to death by a man than a woman in the US and 7xs more likely in Missouri. In Missouri you are 3.6xs more likely to be shot to death by a black person than a white person. Those are objective facts---mix that in with horribly subjective feelings like what kind of energy did they radiate? what seemed to be their intent? and my actions can be seen as very racist or very smart.
I have spent much of my life trying to ascertain risks. Between having my son with me and the small chance that someone was carrying a gun created a very asymmetric risk profile. If I call out their bad behavior and stand my ground, maybe they shut up and I get to watch the movie in peace. Maybe either or both of us die or are injured. Do I want to risk even a small chance of my son's death to watch the last hour of Dark Phoenix? NO.
There is also an interesting question of what my son learned from the experience. You could argue that I have implanted racists assumptions into him--assume the worst of black people and flee, or that I taught him to turn the other cheek, take the high road, and don't get goaded into a fight.
Conclusions:
Trusting your gut can be racist, but it can also be right. Judging a book by its cover can be predicucial but it also can be informative. Statistically I am much less likely to be shot by a group of white girls than black men. If the white women all looked like Ronda Rousey, I might feel just as scared (although what would she ask me to scratch?)
We need to be more empathic. Americans need to try to realize how much it stinks to be judged by your skin color. To get pulled over for driving while black (and yes studies that control for every factor including high crime neighborhoods etc show that racism does drive traffic stops). To fear being shot because your skin color and sex is considered threatening. However, there are approximately 20 million traffic stops in the US per year---only a tiny tiny fraction of which result in a horrific outcome.
The situation around Oberlin College is informative of how complicated issues around race can be. It's worth doing your own case study on that incident, but at a high level a black student shoplifted a bottle of wine from a store, was caught and prosecuted, then other students with support from the college decided the bakery was racist and protested the store and the college pulled business from them. A jury found no racial discrimination and awarded $44 million in damages against Oberlin. Less noted but worth noting, the jury was all white.
oh oberlin
It's also important to realize how far we have come. The Voting Rights Act was signed in 1965 and less than 50 years later a black man was elected president. In 1986 the US Supreme court ruled sodomy laws WERE constitutional. Only in 2003 did the Supreme court rule that sodomy laws were unconstitutional. Twelve years later the Supreme court legalized gay marriage. That is a lot of progress in a short period of time. Some are impatient we haven't moved faster on eliminating all discrimination, others are unhappy with identity politics, and feeling they are being told how they must behave.
Bottom line---I think more perspective and empathy would go a long way to reducing racism and discrimination, along with accepting that people tend to group with like people. To put it simply--I would very much enjoy watching a Blues game with a bunch of St. Louis hockey fans, not so much with a bunch of brain eating Martians (who might be really great, interesting life forms with a passion for hockey and a take out bag of brains to eat BUT I am not that woke).
