A White Guy from Ohio Talks About Black History Month

Am I going to be awkward or offensive? How about we risk it to continue the conversation?

Map of the underground railroad, image put together by the author via Canva

I grew up in a town with no people of color. Most of them were Christian; most of them racist. I’m not sure what happened, considering my town was a major hub of the underground railroad. But I’m committed to using Black History Month to find out what happened. More on that later.

I won’t say if I was racist, because how can a person judge themselves? Just because I didn’t tell certain jokes or participate in certain activities doesn’t mean I wasn’t racist, does it? I didn’t have the opportunity to use the white-person-cop-out of having black friends. So, who knows?

But this much I do know:

When I joined the military

There’s something about stripping naked in front of 20–30 other people. It humbles you: all kinds of colors, facial features, penis sizes (some circumcised, some not), and body types displayed in front of one another. I would say different hair textures, too, but we all went bald upon arrival.

Soon, we all began wearing the same clothes, shouted the same phrases, marched in the same lines, and even pissed in the same urinals (sometimes up to four guys…