Embracing "racism"

A weird thing happened on a recent afternoon walk in the section of my neighborhood that is half local industry, half residential:

I passed a black guy straddling his bike on the sidewalk. He was wearing a grey wife beater and had well-built arms and thick fingers. He did not seem to be in an anxious rush to get anywhere, but his eyes were still narrowed crossly, in what may have been his resting facial expression. As I walked past him, I explicitly thought something innocuous like, 'oh but he is a black guy, so whatever....'

Further down the street I passed a more handsome version of myself: a man with a nicer build and wearing nicer clothes. We did not make eye contact--he was zoned out listening to his earbuds—but for the first time in my life I did not feel animosity or jealousy or inadequate self-consciousness as I compared myself to this man's alleged money and objective good looks…instead I felt an inexplicable camaraderie, as a finer reflection of me.

Another man walked a few paces behind him. He was older, somewhere in his fifties, overweight, with thin, grey hair. Possibly on a lunch break, his baggy t-shirt was dusty and rumpled, his fingers and forearms covered in work dust. Although he was not listening to earbuds, we did not make eye contact, but I still knowingly studied his lips and face, and detected a faint, peaceful smile, at once familiar and comforting….with his wise, wistful eyes focused straight ahead, he seemed to be saying something to me, like, ‘I know how you feel…everything is going to be fine…’

But why?

I’ve seen—and worked—with thousands of fat, loud, white blue-collar men in my lifetime, known—and despised--thousands of white douchey yuppies in my lifetime. (I don’t mean to brag, but I am neither type.) What made this moment special was this unpredictable pleasant new feeling of being associated with these average strangers as a fellow average, straight, white man.

My neighborhood is mostly Muslims and Hispanics, with a light sprinkling of blacks and whites. 60 years ago, whites were the neighborhood’s only ethnic group, subdivided by various European nationalities; ‘American’ was the uniting common denominator among them. Today, whites are the undisputed minority, and trending towards extinction as childless yuppies and aging second-generation families that never fled for the suburbs make up the majority white population in my neighborhood. New white families, if they exist, are the smallest minority.

Muslims and Hispanics (and their large families) are not American. They may be American by an unfortunate technical, legal definition, but they identify first as Muslim and Hispanic. They are not culturally American, and can never be truly American, just as I can never be truly Lebanese or Ecuadorian. (Blacks may be American, but they are not white, and their differences in culture are just as noticeable as that of Hispanics and Muslims.)

It is in this context as a minority in my native land that I find a new appreciation for the undeniable primal comfort I feel when around people that resemble me, a comfort I took for granted when growing up in my racially homogenous town. I took for granted that my city—and my country—are the same as my hometown.

‘White Power’ is cringe, but it is not evil. It is normal for any racial or ethnic group to be proud of their ancestry and heritage. (So long as they do not destroy others for being other.) As I recognized myself for being ‘just another straight, white male’ I felt a humble pride, satisfied and grateful for the circumstances and fortunes of my ancestry, heritage, and (once great) nation.

Furthermore, seeing men that looked like me in my own neighborhood, and looked like what I would become (fat, old, mediocre) inspired me to reach this white standard of normal, a standard that for so long I felt guilty for having the privilege of attaining. Without realizing it, these normal white men set an example of hope for me, that I too could be satisfied, proud to be an average white man.

But just as quickly as I felt this swoon of average white male pride did I lose it when I spotted an emaciated douchebag with shoulder length pink and black hair, too old to be wearing a graphic tee of his favorite band, and too pale to be wearing cutoff jean shorts, with the undeveloped arms and legs of a middle school twerp and covered with ugly, alternating tribal and cursive tattoos. ‘Pathetic faggot’ I thought with explicit venom. 'What is he compensating for?' (He was probably Jewish.)