Let me give you a little bit of background information before I begin. Ever since the 5th grade the Miami Hurricanes have been my favorite football team and lately I've been excited about the hire of their new head coach, Al Golden. I've always believed that in order for you to be passionate about something you have to be knowledgeable of it so I was trying to read up on coach Golden. I ended up coming across a story in The Miami Herald that was discussing some of the changes that have taken place within the football program since Golden was hired. After I read the story I scrolled further down to read the readers' comments like I always do. The comments were mostly positive ones until I got to the twentieth one or so. A black man, around the age of 50, responded to a white fan's comment and began to rant about how Randy Shannon (Miami's previous coach) was not given the opportunity or the tools to succeed by Miami because he was black. Of course, as soon as someone pulls out the race card the other party immediately defends themselves and says that the accusations are ridiculous. While this was a rather bold statement to make, it did force me to do some thinking. Is it racist to accuse other people of being racist? Webster states that racism is a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race. Therefore, if you accept this definition then you are also accepting the idea that the black man's comment was a racist one. No, this does not mean that he hates the white race. Instead, by saying that blacks are not given the same opportunities as whites he is also inferring that blacks are inferior to people of the white race. Which makes him, by definition, a perfect example of a racist. Most people don't think that way though. I'm going to move on from this topic now before I have people getting upset that I'm only discussing black people.
When it comes to racism white people are the biggest hypocrites. They will claim to not have any discriminatory feelings about blacks and a lot of times they have even themselves fooled. Prime example: Let a white man have his 17 year old daughter come home from school one day and explain to her dad how she is dating a black guy. I bet in most situations those discriminatory feelings that he swore he didn't have will surface more times than not. I will never claim to be a perfect man but one thing I will be is an understanding man. In all seriousness, when it comes to other people, race should be the LAST characteristic you use to judge someone. I hope I'm alive to see the day that society as a whole starts judging people based off of actual important aspects and traits such as honesty, loyalty, trustworthiness, etc instead of the color of someone's skin.
You know what the biggest similarity is between white people and black people?
We're all people...
