re: Post a story or scene from your memoir on your experience with race in the South

There’s no reason to respond to that. I didn’t say there was no racism in the north

This feels like an Oweo post.

How about a funny story?

There's a shite ton of coonass expats in south east Asia. frickers are like cockroaches. Everywhere.

Also a fair amount of black guys from the carolinas and Alabama.

I'm sitting in a bar on this tiny arse island. Black guy sits next to me. I'm staring into a beer which I'm hoping will lead to another ten and let me sleep that night.

The South Carolina legit cracker is on my left.

Over there, if you aren't asian, you're a "boley". It's a racial slur the men call everyone to their face.

So black guy orders a beer, little Asian guy says "yessuh mr boley suh".

Black guy visibly bristles at what is probably the 100th time said to him that day.

He goes, "gettin real tired of this boley bullshite."

Same time, myself and the guy next to me both say, "you get used to it". Him with a drawl, me with a hint of Louisiana.

We all look at each other. We all bust out laughing. Still talk to my brother today.

Cracker killed himself. I guess he hated it more than we did.

quote:

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Generally, proximity and diversity leads to more overt racism (or other forms of prejudice - it could be religious). We are hard-wired to be suspicious of outgroups, and the more proximate they are, the stronger that bunker down mentality becomes, I think.

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Go relocate 50k residents from inner city Birmingham, New Orleans and Memphis to Portland and check back with me in a year. Half of the hipsters will have moved to the suburbs.

Slept with a black girl for a couple of months in high school. It was sort of taboo in my small town, because of our race and because of our churches (her dad was a pastor/policeman) so we kept it on the down low. We would meet at the park and then go bang in one of our cars, or at her older brothers apt when he was at work.

We had a ton of fun together and we still keep in touch on social media, but we’re both married with families and I don’t think either of us have any desire to hook up again.

But it was fun while it lasted.

I don’t think that was what OP was looking for but it was fun strolling down memory lane.

That part isn't funny

We were kindred spirits. Separated by a few hundred years of grooming on his part, and a mountain of inherited responsibilities.

But we enjoyed bourbon, didn't shy away from spirited discussions, and drinking with him was the only time I ever felt like a child learning from a wise man.

He had one helluva life. Unfortunately, that life has a way of kicking the shite out of you.

1967. The main highway leading into the capital of the State of Florida, Tallahassee. Stopped for gas. Station also had a small grocery, liquor, and bait store. Two entrances. “White” in front. “Colored” on the side. shite. I didn’t know where to go.

Was punched by a white fraternity dude in the face . But I've felt racism from black white Asian and a few Latino . And my own race

I've also found good people of those races too.
Florida or Austin Texas was least segregated racist to me

Long time ago, I was a teacher.
One of my classes was African American history. (Which I never quite cottoned to because our history is so intertwined. Our history is the history of all of us, bad and good and in between, but that’s another discussion).

At an urban public high school. Most of the kids in there (mostly black, a couple European immigrants and Hispanics). And sure, most didn’t care and thought it was an easy A. Some were disruptive, ne’er-do-well little shite who gave zero fricks, but I had some great students who were smart and wanted to learn.

One of my best was a young black girl. Smart as a whip, well spoken, always tried hard and excelled. Well one day I split them into groups and found her at a desk by herself in the corner crying. I asked her what was wrong. She told me that the other kids were making fun of her for “acting white” because she tried hard and wanted to learn.

Really impacted me. How that mindset is so pervasive and damaging. I quit teaching not too long after that and went to the plants. Just didn’t seem worth my effort to try and teach kids that had such a toxic view of education.

In 2005, I went to Tuscaloosa to visit my sister. We were gonna try and score cheap tickets to the Tennessee game. Heading down US-45 south of Tupelo, my car broke down. This black gentleman, who had to be in town for work in 45 minutes, pulled over to check on me. He didn’t know how to fix the problem, but he saw a semi truck parked across the street at this house. He got in his car, drove over there, knocked on the door and asked the homeowner if he could fix the problem.

He came back and followed me over to this guy’s house. The homeowner was another black guy and was the truck driver. The other guy gave me his phone number and told me to call him once I got back on the road. The truck driver fixed the issue for me. He told me he drove his truck through my town before. He was an Ole Miss fan, so we talked football to. I offered him money and he wouldn’t take it. I shook his hand and called the other guy to thank him.

That’s my story. Much like any race, there’s a lot of good people no matter skin color. Unfortunately, there will always be ignorant arse people who will try and frick it up for the good ones out there.

I’ve never been a racist. I wasn’t raised one. Not bad for a baw who went to a high school of 1500 kids. 330+ my class and black kids made up like 1% of the school population.