I didn’t sleep last night…not for the usual wakings of our boys, but because of a disturbing event that happened at a movie I went to last night with a friend.
Our local theatre was basically empty, except for a couple in their 50’s, two young black women and my girlfriend and I. Halfway through the show, the woman in her 50’s turned around and yelled at the young women to be quiet! Not in a “could you please be quiet” tone, but “shut up, I came to listen to this freakin movie and I don’t want to hear you talking through the whole show” kind of tone.
Are you kidding?
Was that really the way to handle a situation like this?
It got worse….
We assumed this rude outburst was the end of the exchange…but as my girlfriend went ahead to the washroom, the older woman and the two girls got into a screaming match down the hall. I was completely surprised and shocked at the behaviour of the woman and, not surprisingly, her husband was silent…I took this to mean he was embarrassed by her behaviour. The next thing I knew…the woman was calling the two girls “black bitches” and “terrorists” (one girl had a scarf on her head) and throwing water in their faces!!! Completely appalled and shocked, I stood there silent, as one of the young black women grabbed the woman’s hair and pulled her around.
REALLY????
I was so stunned…but not for the reason you may think. I was so disappointed at my own inability to help defend these young women against these racist slurs. I’m afraid to say that it didn’t get any better. As my friend came out of the washroom, the ‘city chick’ in her jumped in and told the girls to “take the high road” and let the woman walk away. We walked up the stairs with two shaking, crying and degraded young women and told them that we were appalled and so sorry for what they had endured. It is NEVER right to resort to those words and to attack someone based on race or religion. Having black husbands and bi-racial kids, ourselves, we felt their pain as if they were our own family. As we hugged them goodbye, the woman raced by in her car with the window open, stuck her head out and called them “stupid niggers”. I hate to even type that word. I have never said it in my life, except to retell this story to my husband, but I hope that even by reading it, you will understand the impact of that term, feel the uncomfortableness of it and fell an ounce of what those girls felt.
Last night, I tossed and turned and couldn’t stop thinking about those young women and the impact that this altercation may have on their own feelings about themselves. While the ignorant woman will go about her middle class life in the ‘burbs, these young women will never forget the night they were called these racist names. They will never be able to erase that from their memory and never feel “safe” in their local community again.
Is it not 2011? This is still happening…that some people choose to attack another person based on their race, religion or culture? Would you stand up for someone who was the target of this type of attack?
I have to move past what happened, but learn from it as well. In honour of those young women, and for my own family.
What can I do?
I can promise not to be as silent as I was last night. I can stand up for what is right and be vocal on what is clearly wrong.
I can do my best to teach my sons to be proud and knowledgeable of their culture. We are really open in our family about the colour of our skin. We discuss it openly and celebrate it. We talk regularly about judging people on their own merits and not on how they look and embracing differences.
I can share this story with you…in hopes that you pass it on.
I can celebrate Black History in my own home, not just in February, but by enriching our lives on a regular basis with stories, songs and history from black culture.
I can ask my son’s teachers to read stories with characters of colour and discuss Martin Luther King’s birthday with the “I have a Dream” book my son loves to read.
I can promise not to forget last night or forget the fact that we actually still have a long way to go.
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February 2, 2011 at 1:46 am (13 years ago)That is horrifying.
I have two adopted children from Haiti, and I recently read Black Berry, Sweet Juice by Lawrence Hill about growing up as a mixed race child in Don Mills, the very white suburb I grew up in. I really want to read his brother Dan Hill’s memoir, as well. Have you read them?
It is disturbing to acknowledge how much racism still exists. Thank you for sharing this.
TJZMommy
February 2, 2011 at 2:30 pm (13 years ago)Thanks Louise…it hurts deeply as mothers who love children of colour….but we can still never really know how it feels.
Lisa
March 1, 2011 at 11:59 am (13 years ago)I had tears in my eyes reading this post. There are just no words to describe how reading about such racist comments and actions upset me. While you may have been silent for a brief moment, it was not out of fear but out of shock that another human being would actually treat someone in such an inhumane way based on something as ridiculous as their skin colour. Thank you for sharing your story and forcing us to think “What would I do if I found myself in the same situation?”. I’d like to think that I’d react differently but, given that I could barely read this blog without cringing, I’m embarrassed to admit that I would no doubt stand there open mouthed and in shock as well.