Racism, or not...?

I am not going to say I have "lots of Black friends". I don't. (I don't have "lots of friends" period, since I'm private nearly to the extent of being a recluse.)

I'm also not going to say that "I've never had a racist thought in my life". The fact is, I was raised to be racist. I grew up hearing my "loving" mother blither that "Hitler had the right idea" about all sorts of "undesireables" (which tended to include the entire group or sub-culture of whomever she imagined had somhow, at some time,"slighted" her). I grew up hearing her spit the epithet "ni**er!" every single time a Black person showed up on the television, or had the misfortune of coming into her field of vision.

Not even a fundamentally decent person has that sort of shrieking pounded into thier brain from birth, pretty much day in and day out, without ending up needing to re-hink and re-learn pretty much most of the things that were taken on faith while a mere child.

The benefits of these efforts at self-improvement have been a wide variety, and increased depth, of experience and human interaction than I would have had if I'd merely accepted my mother's knee-jerk hatreds. An additional benefit is a reduction in stress, because it's exhausting to live in a constant state of fight-or-flight paranoia. Reducing that stress and fear therefore frees up a great deal of emotional and physical energy which can then be applied to creativity and enjoyment. All of this also makes one a more civil and likable person, with the various associated social benefits.

That being said, what thoroughly disgusts me is that certain members of certian political leanings demand that their views be respected, when their unwillingness to do the above-mentioned rethinking and relearning is so blatantly obvious that much of what they say drips hypocrisy the way venom drips from a yawning rattlesnake's fangs. Worst of all is when they are also the elected officials who have sworn to defend and protect the Constitution, meaning, the rights and freedoms of all U.S. citizens.

Unlike such people, I do not, and cannot, assert that I am not racist - all I can assert is that I have tried, and continue to try, to cleanse my mind of my mother's arrogant and narcissistic prejudices, and see all people as being just that - people, fellow Human Beings, who should be taken on their own merits, not on the ill deeds of this or that other individual. I've long striven to bring my scientific objectivity to my examinations of the human condition, and avoid the simplistic fear-or-food bare-survival impulses of my mind's primitive "reptile brain". In the end, although I have not been able to purge that shrill, nasty voice from my mind, I at least know what it is and, like a puppy that's peed on the carpet, can relegate it to the mud room and get on with better things.

In the end, then, although I cannot and do not claim to be angelic or "perfect", I do emotionally and even physically cringe when I hear people who swear up and down and sideways that they "are not racist", yet turn around and say things that lead me to feel embarassed and even ashamed to be a blue-eyed blonde. And isn't that what racism is all about, an attempt to make people ashamed of their skin and eye color...regardless of one's intended target?