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<\/a>Courtesy of Creative Commons<\/p><\/div>\n
I don\u2019t recall when it was exactly that I was made to feel different, but what I do remember were these comments:<\/p>\n
\u201cYou must be from another planet.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy do you always have to play with the black kids?<\/p>\n
\u201cDon\u2019t you have any friends who are white?\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
The crap hit the fan as a teenager, when\u00a0I decided to date\u00a0the brown and black boys against my parents will. My parents happen to be like many who grew up in an era of racial ignorance. They were a product of their environment. All I knew was that I didn\u2019t think like they did nor did I want to.<\/p>\n
One childhood memory stands out the most. I had a best friend. She was like a sister to me. Forty something years later, we are still friends. I remember hanging out in her house a lot. Her parents loved and embraced me like if I was their own.<\/p>\n
Yet, my parents would not permit my friend to enter our house. My girlfriend eventually figured out why and I remembered feeling embarrassed and ashamed. I wanted to bury myself in a hole somewhere. It was the worst feeling in the world and I never forgot it.<\/p>\n
I vowed to never have my kids feel this way. My home is open to any race, religion and creed. I am not raising them to be racists or discriminatory toward anyone.<\/p>\n
Gratefully, when friends or family come to visit, they feel comfortable, as it should be.<\/p>\n
I am not a racist. I love and embrace the African American community. Truthfully, the African American community has always treated me better that my own demographic.<\/p>\n
I\u00a0would love to live in a world where no racism, discrimination, ignorance or injustice existed. Unfortunately, that doesn’t to seem to be happening.<\/p>\n
I can’t change people. The only thing I can do, as a white person, is bring awareness and not go along with the status quo, but challenge it.<\/p>\n
With the recent current events, I\u2019ve been inclined to speak up in favor of the black community. I am finding that many people want to shut me up. But I will never be silent when it comes to injustice.<\/p>\n
Maybe I couldn’t do anything as a child to defend my best friend, but I can now as an adult. I will always speak up and stand up for what\u2019s right. Regardless of\u00a0what anyone else thinks, feels or says.<\/p>\n
Do you go against the grain of what was expected of you regardless of what your family or friends think?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I was born in the late 1960\u2019s to European parents. My parents were pureblooded Spaniards, but for all intents and purposes, acted \u201cwhite\u201d. I don\u2019t recall when it was exactly that I was made to feel different, but what I do remember were these comments: \u201cYou must be from another planet.\u201d \u201cWhy do you always […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[10],"tags":[866,794,795,864,865,796,544],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ordinaryservant.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2942"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ordinaryservant.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ordinaryservant.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ordinaryservant.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ordinaryservant.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2942"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.ordinaryservant.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2942\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2950,"href":"http:\/\/www.ordinaryservant.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2942\/revisions\/2950"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ordinaryservant.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ordinaryservant.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ordinaryservant.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}