Eric Starnes

When i came home form college this summer i discovered something i never knew about my father the woman he married. They are both racists. At least they are if Mexican is considered a race. Whatever you call it it is unacceptable. The last 3 weeks i have heard almost daily derogatory comments about mexicans.

For example they are trying to sell the house right now and whenever one asks the other if anyone has looked at the house while they were gone the other makes a comment something like "not really just some Mexicans." WTF i always thought my father was a open minded and enlightened kind of guy and now this.

I feel like i dont know anything about anyone any more. I mean if i dont figure out my father is a racist until i am 20 how can i trust anything that i think i know about my friends and family?

TollHouse

Man, that shit is whacked.

I know where you're coming from though, I love my dad a great deal but from time to time I hear him carry on about Jews and queers. I usually challenge such views but then I'm viewed as the "kid from the ivory tower" who has no "street-smarts".

I think it is largely a generational thing though, our parents where raised in a different world.

Sakpo

Ouch, that's got to hurt. It's a sad fact that we never can fully know people, even those we think we're the closest to. We can't access another person's mind, fully live in their head. We construct our worlds, and to some degree we invent personalities and full sets of characteristics for the people we think we know... we fill in the blanks, and often times we're wrong, or we just don't know about entire sides of people. On top of that, people change. So the people we think we know, we don't fully know, and they're often in a state of flux. It's good and bad. People can suprise you in good and bad ways. All too often we don't even know ourselves as well as we think we do (if the self even exists...), how can we know others?

We can have a functional understanding of people that works most of the time, and we ought to allow ourselves to build people up in our minds... I think to some extent we need to do this to function. But we always have to be prepared to be reminded that we don't really know people as fully as we like (or need) to think we do.

Daleth

I found out when I was 19 or 20-ish that my mother is terrified of black people, especially men. I can't remember how it came up in conversation. But as it turns out, she was aware of her prejudice and made an effort never to let her children see it. I was simultaneously shocked to be learning something like that about a person I thought I knew so well and incredibly proud of her for having avoided passing along the prejudice.

Well... that's sort of a tough one for me, personally. But the fact is, you've got to start out with the understanding that you can never know everything about another person and the no one is perfect. You can love what you do know about someone. You can be honest and open yourself to encourage others to be the same so you can get to know them better. But finally you've got to accept that there will always be something you don't know, and that the 'secrets' -- even the really ugly secrets -- do not have to negate all the things you know and love about them.

Ah, corniness. It's after 4 in the morning, so it's allowed.

Dal

meritocrat

People will censure me for this comment, but it's your parents 'right' to be racist. They're entitled to their views aren't they (which is the only real basis of any right to be racist)?

Nonetheless, I despise racism and I wouldn't know what to do if my parents were racist.

Would they stop you from having Mexican friends or dating Mexican women (or men if your female)?

FoE

Can your parents really be considered racsists? They certainly sound prejudiced but i don't think "Mexican" counts as a race.

I worked at a gas station with this guy once. Really great guy, good worker, but one day he stretched his arms and he had a fucking swastika tattood on his arm! All day at work for months i was chatting with a fucking Nazi and at night i was out protesting/brawling against the local Nazi groups.

DMB

I don't know what your society is like. Is it possible that Mexicans are usually poor and lower class? If so, it could be that what they are suffering from is a class prejudice, rather than racial prejudice. Perhaps they doubt that Mexicans would be able to afford the house and so discount them as probable purchasers. I know from my own experience of selling a house that one can get very fed up with "tourists" who just want to be nosy and look round the house without having any serious intent of buying.

My 89-year-old mother is racist and anti-homosexual. I have argued with her about this for the past 50 years. My arguments have had no effect. We have a line drawn in the sand between us. Neither of us will normally raise questions about race or homosexuality, but if either does then we can have an argument.

The thing I find most irritating in my mother is her conviction that on these questions I am completely out of step with the rest of the world. She therefore has no inhibitions against sounding off at length to my friends.

scigirl

Wow that sucks, sorry to hear that, Eric.

I don't know where you live, but here in Denver there's a lot of prejudice against the mexican immigrants. My brother is living in Phoenix, and he says it's even worse there. According to him, a lot of the crime that goes on is caused by the illegal immigrants, so while "racism" per say isn't justified, it's at least a little bit understandable in a border town.

Here in Colorado, the legislation just dropped all legal immigrants from medicaid. Even if they are working, and paying into the medicaid file. I do understand being frustrated with illegal immigrants, from any country, but sheesh, that's just plain wrong!!

scigirl

braces_for_impact

My children are visiting me for a few weeks. Their mother and I are seperated and have been for some time. When we first got to our home and I told them they could go out and play, my children informed me that their mother told them not to "play with those Mexicans, because they're bad people."

I was livid, but as usual with their mother's "quirks" I didn't let it show. I informed them that just because your a certain ethnic type does NOT mean you're a bad person, and I insisted they go outside and play with them. They returned and told me that they were fun kids to hang around with.

Now, I'm off to do more deprogramming...

Godless Dave

The two are usually intermixed here in the States.