Friday, September 3, 2010
Since eighth grade I have attended predominantly white schools. Being one of the few African Americans in a school of white people I got many questions that i had to answer because they were very persistent. They would ask me could i touch your hair? Why do you use grease? Why do you brush your hair so much? Then they would expect me to act a certain way but i didn't carry myself in the way they expected so they would try and tell me that i wasn't black. This is when I looked at them and said who made you God? You cant tell what I am or what I'm not so just worry about you and let me worry about me.
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I'd like to say that your way of using God as your main point, I believe, is an effective and smart way of trying to stop the sterotyping you were subjected too. I believe that we are all God's children and no one should be subjected to things such as this because in his eyes we are all perfect and he made us for a reason.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with what you are saying. People take the african-american race way out of context and fail to realize that the judgement is disrespectful.Many people find an unecessary fascination in our race and it is very annoying. Like you stated God made us in his image and he created us all differently. No one was created to be the same.
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry to hear about these experiences Shane; it is frustrating to think that such stereotypes are still perpetuated. I agree with Brooke that a lot of it stems from natural curiosity, that can come across as disrespectful if not expressed in a sensitive way. I would have liked to see you address the last part of the prompt about literacy...
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