Jackie Robinson

[hardblue]

"I cannot stand and sing the anthem. I cannot salute the flag; I know that I am a black man in a white world."

-- Jackie RobinsonIt is a statement that is harder for being expressed in his mature years, rather that an utterance of youthful passion. It was sometime ago, too, perhaps 50 years ago. As one of the best baseball players of today, he

Comments

[cinnamontoast]

I can't get used to "colored" being an acceptable way to refer to a person. It still makes me wince reflexively. Same thing happens when I hear someone refer to a Japanese person as a "Jap" - It makes me think of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and want to cry. It was a word used to dehumanize them. Words change meaning so arbitrarily.

Being wealthy, no matter what your race or gender, has always made life far easier. It gives you choices that poor people don't have. A lot more. Jackie Robinson had it easier than his most of his contemporaries - He had more money and respect, but he still lived during Jim Crow and that sucked.

[hardblue]

I can't get used to "colored" being an acceptable way to refer to a person.

What do you do? Do you always say "African Americans and Latinos and Muslims"?

[cinnamontoast]

Mostly I try to keep my mouth shut. "Colored" is what people used over the water fountains in the old south. It's what they used to keep black folks from participating fully in society. It's a term that should be retired and not applied to people. No one's skin color makes anyone special in any way. It makes me really uncomfortable

[hardblue]

It doesn't make you uncomfortable to see it used again?

I have never known it not to be in use. I think racism is still a real problem, and it seems to me that to refuse to acknowledge the difference and not discuss it is to deny the problem, and therefore to help the problem to persist.

As for religion vs. race, I have read you argue this before, but, seriously, what percentage of Muslims would you say are white?

I'm not trying to be provocative, by the way, in case this reads that way. I more than respect your thinking process, but we probably do think differently sometimes.