What Are You?

This is the question I get asked the most because for some reason people (of any race) don’t know how to ask a proper question. My response is usually snarky (“Uh...I don’t know? Human? Female? A U.S. citizen?), before I correct them and say, “I think you meant to ask ‘What ethnicity are you?’”?

I remember getting asked this question by a girl in my class at recess when I was in 5th grade. The best answer my 11-year old mind could come up with was the truth: “Well...my mom’s white and my dad is Portuguese,” to which she replied, “So...that makes you a half brownie?” She laughed it off and it became a joke to her because she thought it was funny.

I stared at her not knowing what to say because part of me I wanted to laugh about it too. Yet, I stood there a little paralyzed with this twinge of anger in my heart. I stood there with a sadness about the fact that I couldn’t put words together to help her understand what she just said wasn’t a joke, because to me it was personal. Without being fully aware of it at the time, looking back I think I would classify that as my first real encounter with racism in my predominantly white/French-Canadian hometown. I knew racism had once existed in parts of the country from what we learned in our textbooks, but as someone who grew up "mixed" my brain couldn’t comprehend how or why something like that would even still happen in our country today.

Fast forward 15 years later... and here we are.

This story feels a little insignificant in light of the events plaguing our world today. These events are so much bigger than my feelings getting hurt on the playground, but whether you see this story or the issues at hand in our nation of racism or racial profiling, or police bias and brutality as big or small, the question of "What am I going to do about it" still needs to get answered. To be honest, as someone who has always felt loved and accepted by those around me I'm still trying to answer this question myself....and it's hard. 

We can try to answer it by tweeting all the things or going to all the walks and protests (helpful, but temporary solutions), but at the end of the day we have to accept that racism is an inherently evil characteristic that lingers inside all of us to some degree even if we aren't openly verbalizing it or acting it out. We have to recognize that we live in a systemically oppressive society that, as attorney Bryan Stevenson puts it, has a system of justice which "treats you better if you're rich and guilty than if you're poor and innocent". If you want to answer that question, get to the root of these matters. Challenge your law makers, government officials, and the rules and regulations in your state constitution that have been in there for over a century that have no place anymore (ex. Alabama still has a law in their constitution that bans interracial marriage. It was on the ballot about 5 years ago to get rid of it, and it didn't pass.). 

Instead of asking, "What are you?", just start by seeing people for what they are already: Human. Not plants or animals, not statistics, or a threat, or a danger to society. Living, breathing, society-contributing, God-made-and-breathed-into humans just like you who need grace, compassion, and your voice to speak up for them and to see them for who they really are not just what you’ve been conditioned to believe they are. The law of 3/5 of a person went out the window a long time ago, and it’s about time we start acting like it.