Racism

Living here in the middle of a community of people that participate in a cult, I have experienced what felt like racism.  They are not a race, they are a culture, but it felt like what people call racism.  I don’t believe in race anyway so the term does fit my experience.

I felt racist towards them.

    They all dress the same, have the same hair style, and drive the same vehicle so its impossible to tell them apart.  Occasionally, as I have stood in my yard, one of them will roll by and yell something aggressive at me and the children on my front porch.  It feels really uncomfortable to have someone yell as they pass my house.  I feel powerless because I cannot tell who it was, there is no way to identify the individual.  So I just hated them all.  Even the friendly ones that roll by and wave, I felt hate.  Just the sound of their vehicle would produce the body response that comes from being yelled at.  Tight chest, shallow breathing, I am afraid, I feel I need to defend myself against the whole lot of them.  Maybe its just been the same two or three individuals from the community that have been yelling, I have no way of knowing.  But I know that when I saw any of them I felt hate and fear and defensiveness.  A few people in their community have behaved aggressively towards me and I felt aggression towards all of them, each of them, as a group.  

I imagine that is what people mean when they say racism.  Somebody had what they interpret as a bad experience with another person.  The bad experience was with a person that is easily identifiable due to their skin color being different than the majority of humans around that particular neighborhood.  So the person with the majority skin color starts to hate all the people with the different skin color, just because they had a bad experience with one person of that color.  That’s what happened to me.  I get it.  Its not cool, its not ok, but I get it.  

It was just easier to hate all these people that cruise up and down the road past my house.  Feeling vulnerable due to the actions of a few was numbed by hating all of them.  I did not want to feel vulnerable, so I felt aggressive and defensive against all of them.  That was the easiest thing to do.  It made me feel safe.  They could not hurt me if I already hated them.  They could not reach me if I had already pushed them away.  I wanted control.  Hating the whole community gave me what felt like control. This was unlike anything I had ever felt before.

      I recognize that I am a white girl who grew up in upper-middle class midwestern small white town America in the 80’s.  My life defines what people call privileged.  But I also got the liberal bug quite early, much to my father’s dismay, and railed against racism.  I loved black people, I dated Jewish guys, I was naturally attracted to anything that was outside of the typical United States culture.  My freshman year anthropology class in college made it obvious, to me, that there is no such thing as race anyway.  Racism is a stupid word.  As my spiritual beliefs and practices evolved I could feel that humans are one and Love is all there is.  

Then I moved here and started to experience exactly what I had been hearing about all these years.  I became a Racist.  I judged these people in my mind, telling horrible stories to myself about them.  I spoke poorly about them to anyone that would listen, telling and retelling the things they had done to hurt me.  I was openly rude when ever I got the chance to be, not waving or looking at them as we passed each other on the road.  I was aggressive with my vehicle towards their vehicles, not turning my brights down at night, passing as close as I could get with out hitting them.  Oh it feels awful to tell this stuff but I want to write about racism.  Its a real thing that I experienced first hand and I do not like it.  It made me feel powerful but in a superficial, vulnerable kind of way.  I prefer the genuine, solid power that comes with Love.  Thank God for Love.  It really does conquer all.

I also experienced what I think of as reverse racism.  Living in the middle of this community that dresses the same and drives the same vehicle made me stand out quite a bit.  I was the barefoot, bare arm girl that lives at the Wilson place.  Any one of them could cruise past my house and know exactly who I was even though I had never seen them and had no idea who they were.  It reminded me of what I imagine it was like for a black person to move into a white neighborhood.  All the whiteys would know who the new guy was and he would not have any idea who they were.  Its not a comfortable feeling, especially when a few of the whites might roll by and yell something aggressive.  Again, I felt vulnerable because they knew me and I did not know them.  I stuck out and they blended in together.  

None of it is right, none of it is ok.  I am just so glad this all happened in my life so I could get a real taste of what people are talking about.  And nothing bad came of my experience.  Nobody was physically injured, no charges were pressed against anyone.  For me, only good came from this walk in my crazy life.  I feel equipped to understand another person’s struggle with racism and I like to understand people.  I love humans.  Maybe I could help someone get over their racism as I have gotten over mine.  I learned so much about myself during this process and I am grateful it all happened.  

I stopped at one of my neighbor’s places the other day.  He has a sign by the road that said “Harness Shop”.  I wanted for our calves, a halter that was one size larger than the small one we have.  The neighbor was a bit short with me, he was in the middle of unloading something from his friend’s truck.  I kept my peace and pushed through and we made a nice exchange of money and halter.  I asked him his name and he told me.  I told him my name but he already knew who I was, and he knew my child’s name too.  This was the first time I had ever met him, looked into his eyes.  Maybe I’ve seen him pass by on the road, I have no way of knowing.  But it was fine.  It was a pleasant interaction and I feel appreciation to have a shop like that just down the road from my farm.  There are many things I do not appreciate about this community of people that I live in, but I love them all.  I love them because they are humans.  They are doing the best they can and they are individuals, even though they all dress the same and have the same haircuts.  Each one of them is unique and I am safe.  I am not vulnerable.  No one could ever do anything to change that.  My safety and my security come from my faithful relationship with God.  Love is all there is.  Racism helped me learn the truth.