Quote:
Originally Posted by TrudyM
And some people still hold those feelings even if they act politically correct in public. I was in the waiting room of the doctors office waiting for my hubby and a older white man came in and sat down to wait for the doctor to squeeze him in as he didn't have an appointment. He started talking to me about all the things going wrong with the country. Kept saying I know I shouldn't say so but... and then said and now there are not enough real white people being born with all the intermarriage. I turned and said boy you really have caught a bad case, I doubt the doctor can cure you of such ignorance. At which point my Hawaiian/ Japanese husband came out and we left. The guy is in for a big shock as the doctor on call was Dr Lee.
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People are definitely influenced by their past experiences.........
Often, even if nothing untoward occurred to them, they are a product of their generation or their parents' own prejudice toward other races......
WE had neighbors (now deceased) who were like the man you describe.
Otherwise, they would do anything for any neighbor and had hearts of gold. They had been born and bred in Vermont which used to be the whitest state in the nation.....our town was mostly Irish and English and then the French Canadians........
They were obviously prejudiced because they hadn't been exposed to much other than an insulated very small town..........where people worked and rarely left the town......until we people from N.J. and L.I. N.Y. started moving up to Vermont.....in the early'70s (after the hippy invasion of the back to the land movement......the flower children and earth people).
Once, when we had come back from two weeks in Florida (younger, in our 30s) my husband had been doing some yard work and was sitting to rest at the back picnic table.........our above mentioned neighbor, with the heart of gold, called me on the phone to tell me "Oh.......oh.....you better look out your back window........there is a big black man sitting on your picnic table). It was my Polish husband with a dark "tan" from Florida.
That's when we used to sunbathe.......ha ha.
I knew he didn't mean any harm.........it was just his generation.
Our N.J. cousin had been "beat up by black kids while a teenager in high school" and up until his own daughter's wedding several years ago, had a terrible prejudice because of his experience as a kid............then, he had to tell off his own mother and mother in law who hadn't been warned that the bridal party (all friends of the Swedish German groom) were going to be the ushers and bridesmaids.......the guys from his basketball team in North Carolina.........) The two grandmas were not mannerly shall we say when they saw everyone walking down the aisle......but loudly vocal.
So, it isn't just Paula Deen.........it's generational. They are dead now.
Our cousin had a change of heart when , after a long time coming, he realized they were really good friends to the couple.....and nice folks.
His wife changed her biased ways after getting a job in a community college where the majority are recent immigrants.......from all over.
Again, state of New Jersey. Had been raised in insulated, isolated Polish Catholic school through high school and neighborhood.