Race relations have been and will be the Achilles Heel of the United States of America, at least for the foreseeable future. I hope that I am wrong.
We are still limping around misguided and misdirected even in 2013.
I grew up in the segregated South. Any of us who came of age in the ‘50s and the ‘60s know about sitting in the balcony of theaters and participating in demonstrations. I went to an all-Black elementary school and an all-Black high school.
I had all White teachers (they were nuns) at the Catholic elementary school that I attended. The environment created by the nuns was wholesome and caring. We didn’t feel unwanted or disliked by them. Some of my classmates and I have had discussions about what we experienced at the Catholic School in Winston-Salem, N.C. We enjoyed ourselves both academically and socially. I never heard my parents speak negatively about the school and I stayed there until I graduated and went to high school. I can honestly say that my thirst for learning was made during those early years.
However at the same time we were in elementary school there were marches and racial tension. We saw it and we felt it so my early experiences with race made me conscious of the problem. I owe it to my parents for giving me the insight and wisdom not to judge everyone the same.
I have been very fortunate in my life to have met Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Reverends Andrew Young and Jesse Jackson, Attorney Morris Dees and Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm. All these people and many more have been at the forefront of social justice issues involving racism, sexism and economic disparities.
Despite the heroic efforts of many, America still finds itself in and out of racial confusion. Jim Crow laws were around for many years and some of us thought he had died. However, it seems as though some of Crow’s relatives have come on the scene and won’t go away.
