Can We Get Over Ourselves?

News article regarding racist's plot against Obama

Okay, so I am getting pretty fed up with the ignorance still so prevalent in the world today and I can't seem to get it off of my mind, and why should I? There are large groups of people who can't simply choose to forget, so why should I be able to just set it all aside? I was at a dinner a few months ago when I actually heard someone talking about Obama by saying that he wasn't going to vote for a "N..." I imagine people wont have trouble filling in the blank there. I also just received forwarded spam mail from someone saying that we should "vote for a person with a nice Irish M-C name and a hot wife, rather than a Muslim terrorist." There have been death threats, talks of KKK rallies, and other ridiculous things on the news as well. I also had someone tell me that they had a conversation where the person told them if they met Obama they wouldn't shake his hand. Really? A person who is a Harvard graduate who is most definitely smarter than most of the people I know and this person doesn't feel he has proven himself enough to shake a hand of a white person? Ughhh... It's skin pigment and I just don't get the point of this vacuous garbage that seems to be a black hole in the logic of normally coherent people, as well as some less than coherent people. All of this, beyond the issues of politics, has shed some pretty serious light on human behavior and the stunning lack of progress we have made in terms of discrimination. I am honestly baffled and fully exasperated by the racism that continues in the world, despite the fact that we have long since passed the days of the Civil War and the work Abraham Lincoln and others started to do.

So, once again I was listening to the This American Life podcast this week and was inspired by the messages, which were somewhat neutral, showing both sides of Democratic and Republican supporters. I think what is most fantastic about this podcast was the truly realistic view they give regarding the racism the Obama supporters experience. It's maddening and sad, and I know what that sadness feels like from having personally gone door to door for Obama, knowing that racism is still an excuse people use for not voting for Barack. Having grown up in a household where I cannot remember race ever being an issue, I have been enlightened during this campaign. I have had my eyes opened to the amount of racism that surrounds me each day, that I was barely aware of before. Who knew? I certainly didn't and I am really sad about it.

Anyway, I wish I could play this podcast for the world because I think a lot comes from just hearing the student who plays a video on his cell of Obama turning into a monkey which makes the Obama supporter pretty upset. Or from the union member who is an Obama supporter that brings up a really good point: If people are religious, how can they be racist? If Jesus was alive, would he care about the color of people's skin? Especially considering what part of the world Jesus was from. People tend to build their reasoning around what is most convenient to their beliefs and apparently it's convenient to judge people rather than looking inward. Anyway, I am truly saddened by this...so I am here to say "Enough already, let's move on please." I don't know who said this, I think it was Mahatma Gandhi, but "We need to be the change we want to see in the world."

This American Life Podcast