Unpacking Biases

It's about to get real up in here.

This story requires you to know some more about me. My mother is black and my father is white. I grew up in a quiet suburban/rural area and attended a mostly white school district. I had no concept of my race until about middle school when a friend brought it to my attention that my hair was really different from everyone else's. And my nose and lips and skin, for that matter. She brought up an interesting point but I didn't give it much thought.

My family was very well "blended," if you will, and I was part of a racially diverse group of friends, despite the school demographic at large. Aside from having slightly different colored skin, everyone in my life was pretty much the same: well-educated, middle-class, average in every way. No one lived in the ghetto or a trailer park. No one lived in a mansion. We didn't talk about race because it just wasn't an issue.

I went to a private college in the north-east and the majority of students there were white. To me, this was no big deal because it was just like my high school. I hardly even noticed. But there was a distinct difference between the humble, small-town folks I grew up with and the majority of the students at Ithaca: Money. 

With money comes privilege and, as I was quickly learning, privilege meant not having to interact with brown people. Brown people might come to clean their houses or manicure their lawns. Brown people might repair their BMWs or bus their tables after their five-star restaurant dinner. But they were not friends with brown people. They didn't talk to brown people. They were maybe even a little afraid of brown people. So afraid they wouldn't even talk about it at full volume. Why did you just whisper black to describe the guy we were hanging out with yesterday?

This seemed odd to me because my understanding of black was almost exclusively isolated to my experience with my friends and my mom's family and this was not the same image I had of minorities. They weren't super rich but they were doing well for themselves. They were articulate and worldly. Progressive. How could it be that I had this notion of black people and theirs was so different?

And then I moved to Baltimore. 

Talk about the other end of the spectrum. I went from a predominantly white college, where the average student was paying $38K/year out of pocket because it was well within mommy and daddy's budget, to a city comprised mostly of black people, the majority of which live in poverty. And these were not the black people I knew and loved. They were aggressive, they were ignorant, they were angry. They were in gangs and carried weapons. They were scary. 

(The difference between the black people I knew and the black people in Baltimore? Money. But I'll save my rant on socioeconomic status for another day.)

Am I exaggerating? Perhaps a bit. Am I generalizing? Certainly. But keep in mind my frame of reference. My experience to this point had not prepared me to deal with what was happening in this city. Try as they might, the diversity seminars at the TFA institute did not really help me understand what I was getting into.

You're waiting for the happy ending. You're expecting me to say that I left that city culturally competent and realizing the stereotypes are all wrong. I wish I could say it, but it would be a lie. 

Until then, I thought being black was something to be proud of. It was strength and unity. It was beautiful and unique. It was a rich though tortured history that proved the resilience of the human spirit. It was making the impossible possible by working together.

In Baltimore, I learned that being black means that you trust no one. It means that you look for someone to blame for your problems. It means violence is the solution to every conflict and if you choose to turn the other cheek, you're a "faggie." It means hopelessness: you are going to be stuck in this cycle of misery forever and it's because you're black.

Were there people that didn't fit this mold? Yes, obviously. Were there times when I saw teamwork, compassion, ingenuity? Of course. But what leaves a bad taste in my mouth and a pit in my stomach is that my time in Baltimore made me less hopeful and more disappointed. Less proud and more frustrated. Less tolerant and more biased.

Case and point: On my way to band practice today, I saw two black guys with braids à la Coolio, dressed in black hoodies, dark jeans, and Timberland boots. They looked like every corner kid that dropped out of school because trappin' was a lot easier than trigonometry. They looked just like the guys that leered at me as I walked down McCulloh Ave, telling me my ass was looking too fine in dat skirt. They were the spitting image of the inked up weed-smoking, 40-drinking thugs that have five or six baby-mommas and just caught their fifth or sixth charge. I wish I had some pepper spray. What is he holding? Is that a gun???

I put on my "Don't fuck with me" face and tried not to make eye contact. I rang the doorbell to Hunter's place, hoping that he'd buzz me in quickly and I could get away from these sketchballs. Why are they lurking around here anyway. The one with the gun turned to me and asked, "Est-ce que tu es ici pour le jam? Le groupe de musique avec Louis?"

It wasn't a gun. It was a flute. 

And I was ashamed.