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A Ramble though Memory and Prejudice
I do not remember my father ever having shown prejudice towards anyone. He may have. Memory is a fallible thing. And I was not with him through every day of his life, especially those many days and years he lived before I was born. But I don’t remember any such incident, and I remember the opposite in him quite well. He was willing to let people stand or fall on their personal merits and flaws, not on their skin tone, ancestry, or religion. Oh, he might occasionally have used some words that could get a man canceled by the mobs today. But when he did, they were not applied to a whole group of people by ancestry or religion or culture. They would be applied judiciously to a single individual. My father was a police officer, a street cop. He encountered all sorts of people: the good and the bad of every ancestry. If he did have a prejudice, it was probably against lawbreakers. But that was a class of people who classified themselves through their actions.
My mother? The first thing to say is that she is not who she was when I was growing up in the 1960s. I think she tried very hard not to be prejudiced in any way. She was raised in the Deep South in the 1940s and 1950s. I seem to remember she said something on the order of, We had three synagogues in our city, and only one Catholic Church; I went to school with far more Jews than Italians or Irish. (This is not an exact quote, let me be clear. It is also trying to paraphrase something remembered from around fifty years ago). Yet, I also remember her occasionally using phrases and casual stereotyping of Jews she dealt with. That said, they were very mild compared to what one can easily find today, or could have found any day in the last few thousand years. Unfortunately, even the most pristine can be tainted when it is in the very air we breathe.
Her interactions with black people were a bit different. Mother had grown up around black people: the maid, the cook, the handyman who took care of and painted the houses her family owned. (You may be gathering from this what sort of family my mother came from in the Deep South.) She has many stories of growing up in that time and place, such as how the maid would take her with to do the shopping, because the maid could sit in the front of the bus when she had a little white girl with her. Or Mother remembered being about five years old and wanting to use the “colored” water fountain because she wanted to know what colors the water would come out. She prided herself on not being prejudiced against blacks. She worked with black people during her career. When it came to prejudice against blacks, she did not tolerate it. One thing I remember was her telling us about a word now euphemized as the N-word. She said, “It’s low-class to use that word. It is a mispronunciation of ‘Negro,’ and those who say it show their roots.” As a Southerner of a certain class, “Low-Class” may have been my mother’s most condemnatory phrase.
Some years ago, I met a man who was in his eighties at the time. He has since passed on. When he was a kid growing up around Detroit, his grandfather worked for and was friends with an industrialist. Bob liked to talk about his visits with his grandfather and the grandfather’s boss/friend. The boss respected Bob’s grandfather, because he could fix anything. The boss liked a “can do” spirit. And little Bob loved to spend time with the pair. He considered the boss his friend, too, because the old man would play with him and teach him things. Mind you, Bob might have been around five when this was happening, so he hardly had full exposure to the man his grandfather called friend.
That industrialist that Bob knew and liked when he was a child? He was one of the most vitriolic, hate-filled, anti-Jewish campaigners of the Twentieth Century. And if from that description, you guessed Henry Ford, you would be right. Maybe the child Bob never saw that aspect of Ford. Maybe he never learned of it after. Or maybe it never mattered to him. But maybe five or ten years ago, Bob was still proud to say that he had grown up around Henry Ford. I am not sure that I would have been.
It can be difficult to part ways with friends or icons of one’s youth.
On Ricochet lately, I have seen several bits and snippets of life. A member posted about the difficulties one of his children has dealing with Progressive friends. They can prattle on about their support of abortion and left-wing causes, but if the conservative speaks up? Shouted down or could risk unemployment. Friend, those are not friends. They may be acquaintances, but better to be friendless in this world than have “friends” like that.
Then there has been a black commentator who has been the darling of conservatives and libertarians for a few years who has recently started equating Hamas and Israel. Icons are made. Icons can be broken. Maybe she never should have been lifted up in the first place, but she is choosing her side now.
Meanwhile, a black woman raised in Islam recently claimed to have become a Christian. By saying “claimed” here, I do not mean to denigrate her. It’s just that I don’t really know what it means to become a Christian. In her case, it is a very visible step in aligning with the good that Western Civilization had brought the world and which less-civilized cultures would destroy. I salute her for this, even if I have no idea what it means to her to become a Christian.
On the other hand, there has long been a strain of Christianity that would call Jewish people “Christ-killers.” That is not the Christianity I believe in or practice. The one thing that I am certain of regarding Christianity is that Jesus fellow who lived and died about two thousand years ago? That guy? He lived and died a Jew. His initial followers were Jews. If you’re a Christian who hates Jews, you are an anti-Christ. You hate Jesus. Don’t argue. Don’t talk to me at all. Let us part ways. Go play with Hamas. I’m sure they’ll respect your Christian views.
My own brand of Christianity isn’t doing so well, itself. It has been taken over by feel-gooders, New Agers, and Progressives. It didn’t start that way. It started by trying to be more conservative than the Christian churches of the day, going back to the basics. Somewhere along the way, some of the leadership seems to have snipped out a few too many things. Is Jesus still in there? He’s hard to see anymore. But where is the version we had a hundred years ago? At least they probably don’t hate the Jews. They probably don’t even hate the terrorists of Hamas. Hate is too strong an emotion for the drained and the dead.
There is a fellow with about a million YouTube channels who has several catchphrases. One of them is, “The past was the worst!” No matter what we see around us, there was no Golden Age. Forty-five years ago, Jimmy Carter was President. Eighty years ago was worse. A hundred years before that was worse than that. And let’s not even talk about the Seventeenth Century. Or the Fourteenth Century. The past was the worst. Yes, we still have people around us who celebrate evil things. Yes, we still are surrounded by prejudice. But by nearly every measure, we are better off every day we march into the future. The dystopians and Malthusians want to turn back the clock. But they don’t remember what yesterday was like, let alone the truth of their Golden Age.
I promised a ramble. It may not be up to the standards of the rambles of @johnh. His are usually more scientific, high-minded, and technical or about his travels and languages. If you’d prefer a better ramble, try him out. But this is what I have for you today.
What are your thoughts on prejudice? Any memories? Any realizations?
Published in Culture
A typically fine Arahant post.
You know what I have against Christianity? It takes you away from Ricochet during Lent!
Lately, it has been more likely to be writing books that has taken me away. Maybe I’ll give up Youtube instead next year. They are cracking down on ad blockers. 😈
My clearest memory is at about age 12, on the public school bus. Our bus route was a long one (10 miles or so) and some arrangement had been made so that the bus picked up a Catholic family’s kids and dropped them off at their school a few blocks from ours. One day, as the bus waited to pick them up at their school on the way home, the kid in seat behind me grumbled “Damn cat-lickers.” I turned and told him “I’m Catholic too.” I don’t think he ever spoke to me again.
My parents grew up in in the 1920s-40s in a small town that was somewhat segregated at the time, but began changing in the 1950s and 60s. Henry Louis Gates wrote about the town in his memoir Colored People. I can recall them saying some things early on that would be a no-go today, but as we grew up, they seemed to grow out of it, similar to them growing out of smoking cigarettes.
I am laughing so hard at that epithet. Was that a common thing? Also, good for you in saying so.
Yeah, I guess it sort of astounded me at the time.
From last week:
At least he’s not licking them. In the picture, anyway.
My mother’s term was “vulgar” and her mother’s was “ruffiani.”
As in: I see men in public drinking Coca Cola from the bottle walking down the sidewalk . (Mimes the action with her pinky in the air.) Ruffiani!
I like it. She was Italian, I take it?
Grandma grew up around twenty miles from the nearest town. When she grew up, the trip took a few hours by buggy over bad roads. Thus, when she went to high school, she boarded in town. Buggies were giving way to automobiles by the time Grandpap had pestered her into marrying him, and trips to town became more commonplace. Due to geography and her time as a “townie,” she knew more Jews than she did Catholics. As a matter of fact, she didn’t know any Catholics until one of her grandchildren married one. She asked me earnestly (I being raised in a far bigger town) if Catholics celebrated Easter. I assured her that most of them had heard of it, and those seemed to be in favor of it. That was a load off of her mind.
Yeah. She was Sicilian. Talk about a certain type, 1900s. She had swimming pool and a tennis court in the back yard, a personal tennis coach and a conversational French tutor that came every day. Story goes her father had to emigrate to the US due to an inappropriate relationship with a lady in the court of Vittorio Emanuele III.
I had his pocket pistol, a beautiful, five-shot .25 cal. revolver with a flip-down trigger. The workmanship was remarkable.
A million YouTube channels. No doubt… Simon Whistler.
Read every word of this moving piece, Charlie. Very, very heartfelt, very well-written. Hats off.
Right on the first guess.
Thanks, Michael.
I am amused by the “air of sensitivity” around race relations in todays hyper-racial culture. I am 65. In Kindergarten, there was a cute black girl that I was enamored with. Likely because it was the first black person I ever encountered. Growing up, we clearly identified as Dagos, Polacks, Krauts, (something I can’t quite recall for the Irish) and we were all best friends. The identifiers were not meaningful, other than to possibly identify where the best ethnic food might be available, and what to expect at the weddings and funerals.
Now, my mom worked as a bank teller in a project. They were robbed. Often. The suspects were the locals. She testified in court to identify the perps, despite warnings, threats, and advice not to.
But even she did not espouse racial rantings. At least, I never heard it.
Now my brother… He had encounters when at Michigan University, and later in construction, where he was demo’ing drug houses under state contract, and had to defend himself from those who resented that action. He developed and retains a discriminating view of those who he feels have value. And those who bring chaos and anarchy.
In the mid 70’s I attended Jew B. The colloquial name for University of Buffalo, which had a very high representation of DownState Jews attending UB for out of town but in state tuition.
It was a statement of fact. It was not intended to be racist, or prejudicial. One of those Jews married my first cousin. Great guy.
For me, Racism never was a thing until Obama took office. Then, I was labeled a racist, because I disagreed with policy and program. The term, the label, the accusation is a tool used by the left to divide and isolate.
I have observed and condemned racism- In Live Time. I represented a Korean company, outstanding in technology but the worst, absolutely dehumanizing worst in discrimination. They were fair. All women were subhuman, and Hispanics, Blacks, and Chinese were below women.
A few years back I was in charge of a crew of temps doing inspection/rework on rejected product at the Korean district HQ. The temps were all of the banned class. The Koreans refused to allow them to use the break room for lunch. When I discovered this, I took all of them out to lunch at a local Hispanic eatery, my treat. That afternoon, I confronted the Korean managers and told them their position was unacceptable. They compromised by segregating the times each could use the room. Small victory.
We all need to separate the bad actor from the group. We all need to speak up when we see injustice. Most importantly, we need to mock the racist and the false claims of racism.
Like Dirty Harry. He hates everyone.
Micks. (Or Paddys or Potato-Eaters)
Be they lace-curtain Irish or shanty Irish?
Arhant, your parentage is the mirror-image of mine. My mother was from Chicago but my father was from the Deep South, in colorful-sounding places. He was born in Opelicka Alabama (pronounced Opelacka) and raised in Tullahoma Tennessee. When he entered the Chicago Art Institute (where he met my mom) after World War II, all the students laughed at his funny Southern accent.
My dad was not prejudiced either, and did not like the South’s general attitude toward Black People. However, he loved racial humor and redneck humor. On the serious side, he concurred with an audio book I once lent him, that said Southern White Men is the only ethnic group in America whom the public finds it acceptable to disparage of make fun of.
Indeed.
Not quite. My father was also a Southerner in a sense. He was born (barely) south of the Mason-Dixon Line with Southern antecedents. His patrilineal great-great-grandfather had moved west after the Late Unpleasantness. So had his matrilineal great-grandfather. I believe both were born in North Carolina. And my direct patriline went from Warwickshire to Virginia to North Carolina to Kentucky (during the war) and west from there. He was born in a free state, but it is a very long one that dips well down into the South. (Not the Deep South, but still the South.)
His father got a guv’mint job up near Chicago when Dad was in high school, which was when they moved north. He never liked the culture much, and when he retired, he moved to a small town in southern Missouri that reminded him of where he had grown up.
There is always Sunday during Lent when you could spend part of the day on Ricochet. If you disagree with a post or comment you could always say I’ll need seven days to consider my response.
Your description of the “deep south” and family reminds me of my youth. I guess in a small town where everyone knows everyone else personally, it is easier to be friends.
My great aunts had servants (a yardman and a cook). I wondered why they kept Jack when he was too old to be of much use. He wanted to be there and they would not turn him away. They just continued paying him. I later realized it was a form of charity where he kept his self-respect.
My mother had a helper who came several days a week when we were young. When she grew old, she would call my mother when she wanted to come over and do a little work. My mother would go get her then take her home when she was ready to go because she was more like family. In her later years, their roles reversed. My mother was her helper, picking her up and taking her places when she needed to run errands. She was even included in my mother’s will.
Good manners were expected and people who didn’t have them were the “low-class folks.” For all the “enlightened” “woke” people we have today, we sure seem to have regressed. I am glad I didn’t serve in the DEI military. We respected people who knew their job and did it well, people we could trust, skin color didn’t matter. I had one person under my command who made a racist remark. The offended person came to me quietly and reported it. I took care of it. That ended it. The offended person was hurt but never acted like a victim. He was concerned about the impact on cohesion.
I just don’t get it. When I ate lunch with my daughter in her college cafeteria (~2004), I noticed a lot of self-segregation into racial groups. What good is”diversity” if people choose to self-segregate? An all white world would be a boring place while a self-segregated all black world built on the lie of “white racism” only grows and spreads resentment. Human failings make our lives worse.
”Jim Crow” was Democrat behavior, still is. I resent Democrats in blue states mocking “The South” as if their sordid history was Republican history and their behavior is still manifested here by Republicans. I love living in the “Deep South.” It just seems to be a friendlier place. Yes, I know the past wasn’t always respectable and at times was even ugly. The same could be said about every place. There is no utopia and never will be.
Exactly.
Every time FJB or one of those others yells about how we shouldn’t want to return to the days of George Wallace, Bull Connor, and Jefferson Davis, someone needs to yell back “THEY WERE ALL DEMOCRATS!”
Micks, yes that was it. My brain kept coming up with “Spicks” but that was a perjorative term for a different group. Hah! Actually I think we called many of the Irish “Red” because it seemed most had red hair. Of Course the O’Brian clan made up most of that demographic. There were 12 of them…
Yeah, we had the Hooligans* across the street.
* Well, the same name, really, although they spelled it differently.**
** I have a character in my series named Meallán Ó hUallacháin, and that last name is the origin of “hooligan.”