Author Topic: Don Lemon asks 'how can you not be racist' if you grew up in America?  (Read 1291 times)

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Offline Axeslinger

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Re: Don Lemon asks 'how can you not be racist' if you grew up in America?
« Reply #25 on: June 14, 2020, 04:15:37 pm »
I had a really good conversation with a black guy at work a couple of years ago.  He’s also a Democrat.   We were discussing race and racism.  I surprised him with my statement:
“I am absolutely not a racist.  I believe we have all been blessed with the divine spark of God.  No one man is INNATELY superior to another.  However, I am absolutely bigoted against the inner city thug culture that glorifies everything harmful to a functioning society”

And I watched his face and is went from shocked to thoughtful and then he said, “I agree with you completely”
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Offline sneakypete

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Re: Don Lemon asks 'how can you not be racist' if you grew up in America?
« Reply #26 on: June 14, 2020, 05:02:23 pm »
I had a really good conversation with a black guy at work a couple of years ago.  He’s also a Democrat.   We were discussing race and racism.  I surprised him with my statement:
“I am absolutely not a racist.  I believe we have all been blessed with the divine spark of God.  No one man is INNATELY superior to another.  However, I am absolutely bigoted against the inner city thug culture that glorifies everything harmful to a functioning society”

And I watched his face and is went from shocked to thoughtful and then he said, “I agree with you completely”

@Axeslinger

One of the saddest parts about this is that he could agree with you because he knows it is safe to do so because you are white.

He also knows it is not safe for him to agree with your statement to a black he doesn't know because he might get attacked if he does.
Anyone who isn't paranoid in 2021 just isn't thinking clearly!

Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Don Lemon asks 'how can you not be racist' if you grew up in America?
« Reply #27 on: June 14, 2020, 10:01:21 pm »
I was raised in a farming community in SE Texas in that same period and I can tell you that there was only one dipper in the water bucket at the end of the row out here. If we wanted to see any of that racist BS we had to go to town to do so.
Yes, it was much the same where I grew up, in Southern Maryland, out in the country. Whether baling hay, picking tomatoes, or working tobacco, thirst knows no boundaries, nor does hunger. "Company rules" were much the same, and "Respect your elders" was an inviolate rule, regardless of who they were. Kids played together, worked together, eventually went to school together (6th grade in the public schools) over the objections of some parents--black and white.

I still remember an elder gentleman talking to my mother saying they'd had to 'send some boys who'd come down to visit back up to D.C. cause they were down here trying to make trouble with our white folks. We ain't never had no trouble with our white folks!" That last said proudly. But eventually, with the marvels of television, the troubles in any urban enclave can be imported into the most remote living room in the country and made yours.
How God must weep at humans' folly! Stand fast! God knows what he is doing!
Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

C S Lewis