Nobody is a racist until you poke around a bit
I am not a racist.
This doesn't matter; I am stuck with being a racist. I, we, live in an ocean of racism. It's the human milieu.
My first trip to Denmark in 1972, the Danes were proud of not being racist. I looked at these Nordic faces and believed them. We were all naive.
In 1986, I went back to Denmark. There had been an open door to immigration for many years. I made home visits with a Danish nurse. "I'm not a racist," she told me, "but these people come here and don't learn our language and don't learn our customs. They need to learn."
We stopped to check psychiatric medications for an Iranian immigrant. He wouldn't open the door. A neighbor, also Iranian who spoke some Danish, knocked on the door for us. When the patient let us in, he looked shattered. He was frightened. He didn't speak Danish. The nurse spoke to him harshly, impatiently. I understood her as a nurse. She had a lot of people to visit. She didn't have time. She shook the pill bottles at him and we left.
"I make appointments with them and I never know if they will show up," she complained.
In 1995 I was back in Denmark and I met a niece of my cousin's wife. She had fallen in love with an Iranian-Dane. He spoke Danish like a Dane; he had grown up in Denmark. Danes sometimes told him to go home and once he was spat upon. The Danes had lost their innocence.
Look at Kenya in 2008. Okay, everyone is black, so it's not race, it's ethnicity. It's "You are one of the others, get out of here or I'll make you get out of here."
Anyone who thinks they aren't a racist hasn't been living shoulder-to-shoulder with someone who has completely diffierent ideas about how to live. Close, so if one of you moves, the other feels it.
When I was in China from 1998 to 2001, my Chinese students proudly told me, "There is no racism in China," and they really believed it. I traveled with a Uyghur woman, a member of a Muslim minority group in China, and we were often refused a hotel room because she was Uyghur.
But I'm getting ahead of my story. That's what I'm leading up to, about what happened when I Ran Away to China. That's a book I've written, and I tell that story in this blog.
This doesn't matter; I am stuck with being a racist. I, we, live in an ocean of racism. It's the human milieu.
My first trip to Denmark in 1972, the Danes were proud of not being racist. I looked at these Nordic faces and believed them. We were all naive.
In 1986, I went back to Denmark. There had been an open door to immigration for many years. I made home visits with a Danish nurse. "I'm not a racist," she told me, "but these people come here and don't learn our language and don't learn our customs. They need to learn."
We stopped to check psychiatric medications for an Iranian immigrant. He wouldn't open the door. A neighbor, also Iranian who spoke some Danish, knocked on the door for us. When the patient let us in, he looked shattered. He was frightened. He didn't speak Danish. The nurse spoke to him harshly, impatiently. I understood her as a nurse. She had a lot of people to visit. She didn't have time. She shook the pill bottles at him and we left.
"I make appointments with them and I never know if they will show up," she complained.
In 1995 I was back in Denmark and I met a niece of my cousin's wife. She had fallen in love with an Iranian-Dane. He spoke Danish like a Dane; he had grown up in Denmark. Danes sometimes told him to go home and once he was spat upon. The Danes had lost their innocence.
Look at Kenya in 2008. Okay, everyone is black, so it's not race, it's ethnicity. It's "You are one of the others, get out of here or I'll make you get out of here."
Anyone who thinks they aren't a racist hasn't been living shoulder-to-shoulder with someone who has completely diffierent ideas about how to live. Close, so if one of you moves, the other feels it.
When I was in China from 1998 to 2001, my Chinese students proudly told me, "There is no racism in China," and they really believed it. I traveled with a Uyghur woman, a member of a Muslim minority group in China, and we were often refused a hotel room because she was Uyghur.
But I'm getting ahead of my story. That's what I'm leading up to, about what happened when I Ran Away to China. That's a book I've written, and I tell that story in this blog.
This is just my personal opinion, but I really dislike the phrase, "lost their innocence." Much of the time, it really isn't true.
But I like your blog a lot. Sometimes there is no picture, but probably that is deliberate. You have a nice way of writing in short, sharp sentences. It really works.
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Reva,
This entry makes the most sense to me of all your entries. You are surely setting the scene for your fascinating story and I find myself intrigued by the idea that "nobody is a racist" I have thought about this a lot in my own life and in my reactions to others.
Keep it coming!
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This is perhaps my favorite entry to date, Reva. 'Great stage setting. 'Appreciate the commentary on the Danes' encounter with profound cultural differences and their difficulties and struggles to find respectful ways to interact with those who are different. I believe this may help some readers understand a bit more about the scope and nature of racism.
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