The Ineffectiveness of Fences in Modern America, Pt 1

 I grew up in an isolated, semi-rural smaller town on the outskirts

of Tampa. Access to the Big City, but not a lot of influence in my 

daily life. We lived in a lower middle-class subdivision filled with

fairly average Floridians of varying degrees of 'Country.' My mother's

family were literally farmers and cowboys. Both parents had been poor. 

So when I moved to a small, rural, Southwest Georgia town...I really 

thought I was prepared for what to expect.

I had never been more wrong in my life.

And that ever-alarming wake-up call was being received before the 

events of a black man being elected President for the first time...

Before he was re-elected.

Before it looked like a woman might win the highest office in the land.

Before a hurricane decimated the town.

Before the housing market imploded.

Before social media became the dark corrupting force it is today.

Before meth addiction crippled the area.

Before our economy and job market died..

Before right-wing fascism exploded onto the scene unapologetically.

Before "Black Lives Matter" and "Defund the Police" were a thing.

Before people started questioning the legitimacy of elections, even as

they attempted to steal them for themselves.

Before a global pandemic hit even the sleepiest corners of America.

Before violent insurrection was attempted at our country's seat of power.

Before we had a fully-imbedded media circus that could convince half

the country no such event had occurred.

Each and every one of those developments increased the challenge

of living in an area that is hospitable only in the brochures and when they

desire your dollars. But now a once-tolerable challenging area has become

another beast all together. Open hostility, targeting folks for abuse, allowing

injustices: These are standard descriptors for a small town where the ruling

majority have political ideations that don't bode well for the rest of its residents.

As a gay man, I have faced plenty of obstacles and outright hatred 

living in the South all my life. The Bible Belt's emphasis is on "Use the 

Good Book to justify your prejudices and small-mindedness," not on

"Follow the word and life of Jesus as a guide for how to live YOUR life."

I never thought that my sexual orientation would still be an issue 5 decades

later, nor did I imagine that my political or religious affiliations would be 

used as justification for severe mistreatment, targeted abuse, or willful

withholding of services.

But you live...and you learn.

 

"I'm NOT Racist!"

Even the mention of the word 'racism' brings about a
twitchy, nervous reaction in most Americans.

Doesn't even matter on which (of those infamous 'many')
sides you fall on in the equation, either.

Conservative, liberal, middle-of-the-road, or unconcerned...

Possessed of dark skin, light skin, or orange skin...

Upper class, middle class, the ever-increasing lower class...

We all share a history of not only having witnessed the way
that People of Color have been treated , but what gets said 
when those same folks are not present--the American
tradition of a schizoid approach to the matter.

We are all racist, to some extent. All white-skinned people
have had it ingrained in them--consciously, subconsciously, and 
all points in-between. We saw it. We were influenced by the words 
and actions of our parents and guardians, the police, neighbors,
family, classmates, movies, television, and every other form
of experience we went through in our formative years.

Invisibility and being side-lined are also aspects of the overall
issue, so every time we were alone in a room for a special
purpose and there were no faces that looked 'different from us,'
there was some kind of subliminal acknowledgement that "Oh,
I guess this isn't something black folks can/want to do," however
subtlety it may have etched itself on our consciousness.

Everything we do has impact on our understanding of the world,
regardless of whether we're interpreting it correctly. Exclusion
by proxy or by default is still exclusion, and our minds are used
to 'filling in the blanks' and playing detective as to how and why
things are the way they are. (This 'figuring stuff out on our own'
business is how most intentional racists get where they are; They 
did some bad work 'filling in the blanks' for themselves.)

But guess what? While all of us who are not 'People of Color'--
or at least not obviously so--are experiencing the big and small
indoctrination of race-preference in our upbringing, folks who are
black and brown are also experiencing it.

And regardless of whether or not you're actively on the receiving 
end of the lesson, you still get exposed to the gist of it. Black folks
get schooled just like the rest of us as to how they're supposed to 
feel about black folks. And that ends up being internalized as 
both self-hate (and low self-esteem, and depression, and illness,
etc.) as well as dislike of one's fellows.

When I was a teaching assistant at an elementary school in 
southwest Georgia (where I still live,) I saw all kinds of horrific
examples of teachers and staff sending very clear messages of 
racism to kids all day long. Not overt. Not actionable, usually.
Just definite preferential treatment of one race (take a guess!) 
over another, and a superlative knack for giving serious attitude 
(micro aggressions) to deliver the point home to the 'unwanted'
child.

Children are, as anyone who's read a psychology or parenting 
book knows, highly impressionable and absorptive little creatures.
You don't have to beat them over the head with directness, like, say
a 'NO COLORED ALLOWED' sign at a bathroom door. You can
raise an eyebrow or turn your lip up in disgust and send a very
clear message as to your opinion of them. 

Children, ever-ready to adapt and please their care-givers, will 
respond. And they're too young to know when they're being 
groomed by a malicious spirit who isn't concerned for their welfare.

So, when people readily defend their honor by screeching the
phrase "I'M NOT RACIST!!!" we have to look beyond that reaction.

First off: Of course you are! You really can't help but be if you 
were raised in this still-new, angry, scared little place we call
America. It's just the way it has been for so long, there's no escaping
it. (That's not defeatism: Of course we have to struggle to engage
in 'doing better.' But we have to deal with The Reality of 'how 
things are' before we can hope to change them.)

Second: We are all guilty of having passive, subconscious actions
which can be racist without even being aware of it. Looks we give,
comments we innocently make, bad ideas we have never reexamined
since childhood that we cling to still. It's instilled in us. It's a sleeping
beast, and even if we don't mean to, we are all at some time or
another, guilty of sleeping in its cave.

The Past is Doomed to Repeat You



"I GOTS you!"

The South--like too-close families or relationships past

their prime but not yet pronounced dead-- is like quicksand.

Once it pulls you in, you ain't going nowhere.

And on the off-chance that someone pulls their

sorry, soggy, sauna-ruined behind from the bog

and sets themselves free, they'll be endeavoring to

escape from the grainy residuals and crumbs that

stay cemented in your nethers for a lifetime.

The stinking, sickeningly sticky mantra of your former

fellows coming back to you from the verge--

"You can't get far. I will always be with you."

(That Southern specialty of curses buried in

hospitality and concern.)

Such is the haunting and the burden of the

specialized forces who are reluctantly Southern.

***