I Am One of Those White People

A Personal History of Racist Participation

I chose my first crush in Kindergarten: Adam, teacher’s son and 6-year-old Leonardo DiCaprio look alike. More specifically, Leo while he was clinging to the floating door. Very pale skin, shockingly red lips, hair sharply parted and swept to the side. (It was 1998.) Adults laughed, saying, “You have a crush?”

I chose my second crush at age 6, at a new school: Raul, Afro-Brazilian soccer player, sweet. Skin like light-roast coffee beans, kind round eyes, a head of curls. Adults laughed, but this time, they said,“Raul? Really?”

In fifth grade, I shared a classroom with Corey, a dark-skinned student who slunk in his seat and sucked his teeth when the teacher asked him to do things he didn’t want to do. This aggravated the teacher, who in turn made fun of him in front of the class for his larger front teeth. So we all made fun of him.

“He looks like a bat,” someone decided.

“He looks like a bat,” we all decided.

Someone passed me a pencil drawing of a bat with buck teeth, “Corey” scrawled above. I laughed. I passed it to someone else.

In sixth grade, I overheard several groups of people saying they didn’t like the new kid. I asked why.

“Because he’s an Oreo.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means he’s black on the outside, white on the inside.” They laughed.

I didn’t defend him. I didn’t say anything. The new kid left our school before the year had finished.

In seventh grade, Larry sometimes walked with me from our bus stop, jeans dragging a bit, occasionally picking at his afro. He talked with me even though I was a few years younger and horrifically unpopular. His calm conversation and willingness to be seen with me made me feel less isolated. One time, when I was thirsty, he walked me to his house so he could run inside and grab a water bottle for me. He made sure I made it to my street safely.

One day, an adult came to pick me up from my bus stop. As we eased down the street, she glanced in the rear-view, pulled her purse closer, locked the SUV doors, and pressed down on the gas pedal.

“Why did you do that?” I asked. I twisted around in my seat and saw Larry, 50 yards away, walking his slow and measured pace on the side of the road. “Did you do that because of Larry? You know he’s the nicest kid on the whole bus to me, right? He would never hurt anyone.”

Silence.

“Are you scared of him because he’s black? Seriously? That’s stereotyping!”

“Stereotypes are based in facts and statistics, Katie. Higher crime rates. You don’t know, you haven’t researched it. You’re just naive.”

I rolled my eyes and shook my head, angry. Five minutes later I forgot about it.

In eighth grade, my dance instructor went to trial for running over four black children who were crossing the street at night, injuring two and killing the other two. She had kept driving. One of the dead children had gone to my middle school. The court decided she should serve no jail time for leaving the scene of a deadly accident, a crime that normally carries a minimum of 4 years in prison and a maximum of 30. She would serve only probation.

At the probation hearing, protesters gathered with signs that read “No Justice, No Peace”.

At the probation hearing, her lawyer said, “She’s got her act together. She’s not like these dregs that come before you day in and day out.”

I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to root for her or against her. I felt relieved when I heard she got off and started turning up at the dance studio again. I hoped she would stop looking sad soon. I thought about her much more than I thought about the boy who was no longer at school.

In ninth grade a black student I was friendly with crossed paths with me before the first bell had rung. “You look beautiful today!” I greeted. “You look just like Tyra Banks.”

She drew her head back and glared at me. “Everyone says that to me all the time, like it’s a compliment. I don’t even look like her, and I don’t even think she’s that pretty.” She shook her head and picked up her pace.

The beginning of my junior year of college, working as a Resident Assistant, I sat in the dorm hallway with one of my black residents while she cried. She had received a written arrest because a store at the mall thought she had stolen something that she hadn’t. Now she had to go to court to fight the charge. Her white friend who had been with her had neither been followed nor arrested.

The end of my junior year of college, I was startled by a loud knock on my door. I opened the door to one of my black residents, angry and crying.

“I really respected you, I even liked you! You seemed to be so nice to me this whole year. I had no idea you were racist!”

The word that had never yet been directed at me thudded into my chest. “What are you talking about?”

“You didn’t give me the same resources as my white roommate during this dispute. You told her to go to the assistant director and speak with her directly. I didn’t even know that was an option for me. You just kept telling me we needed to do mediation.”

“Mediation was the next appropriate step for you at that time. By the time your roommate came to me, it had escalated and I thought — ”

“You don’t understand. White people feel like it’s their right to go to authority. They use those channels to make everything bend to their advantage. I was raised to fear authority, and to stay away. I didn’t know I had the option to go the assistant director, and you didn’t share it with me.”

I was more affronted by her labeling me a racist than I was interested in the point she had raised. I spent the next few days making sure the situation was smoothed over, that I would not be deemed a racist by University Housing. I thought it was big of me not to mention to her that I was dating a black man.

My senior year of college, the Christian campus community I was a part of expanded to include the neighboring historically black college. Our community’s black population grew from one to around ten. I was glad to see more diversity, but my relationships with the new students never grew beyond good conversation at community events. Our community shared space together, but we did not all share our lives together.

After graduating, I married my boyfriend of nearly three years, a biracial man and the grandson of a Black Panther. I got to know his family more and more. They became my family, too. I began to read the news of police violence affecting dark-skinned folks with greater urgency, a bigger lump in my throat. I started wondering if I should accompany him when he went to change someone’s flat tire, and having him stay in the car while I asked for directions in towns decorated with Confederate flags. When we were pulled over, I made sure my smiling face was visible to the officer.

Living in a new town after college, we forged new friendships. The woman who became my closest friend in this new town was black. My friendship with her made me realize that my friendships with people of color up to that point had been surfacey. Sharing space but not sharing life. Glad for diversity but not doing the hard work of real intimacy or real listening.

I started displacing myself — intentionally entering spaces, with permission, where I was the minority. I began consuming media not created by white people. I was also speaking, a lot. Jabbering. Whenever a person of color raised a point, I’d chime in and needlessly reaffirm the point with my own words, my own stories. I bought a Black Lives Matter t-shirt. I posted news articles on Facebook with outraged captions as one after another black Americans were killed with no repercussions. I started debating family members. Calling myself privileged. I wanted to prove that I was not one of those white people. I was woke. I got it.

But I didn’t get it.

On November 8, 2016, I invited friends over to my house. I laid out beer, chips, and chicken. I was ready to witness the first female president become elected. The room moved from laughter, to joking “what if?” remarks, to silence, as we watched state after state turn red.

I climbed into bed when it became clear he was going to win. After a mostly sleepless night, I got out of bed, confirmed it, and cried in the hallway so I wouldn’t wake my husband.

The next weekend I sought refuge at the house of the aforementioned dear friend. She was baking us comfort cinnamon rolls while her biracial son played with superhero figurines behind us. Our eyes were tired and slightly swollen.

“I just can’t believe it, T. I can’t believe that that many people could decide all the horrific things he’s said and done weren’t enough to not vote for him. It feels like a nightmare. Or like the Twilight Zone or something. I can’t wrap my head around it.”

She paused, and I saw the corners of her mouth pull down a bit as she checked inside the oven. “Honestly, Katie? The only people I know who are surprised right now are white people. Black people have known for a long time that this is how our country is. We know that people like that surround us in our communities and neighborhoods. It’s our daily reality. White people are just being forced to realize it for the first time.”

My stomach dropped. I looked down at the counter.

The truth is, I am one of those white people. I don’t get it. This article is a cringe-worthy history of me not getting it, a chronicle of all the stories I would never admit while wearing my Black Lives Matter shirt.

I’m not woke, but I’m trying to rub the sleep out of my eyes. And while I do, it’s better to let someone with their eyes open take the lead.