"The Secret Relationship"

Every Sunday from 8am - 10am they have a show on the local "Contemporary Urban" station here called "Express Yourself." This show has me laughing and cursing at the same time every week and ends up leaving me even more aggravated with society than I usually already was. (Luckily, I only catch it on my way to mass and am able to put my mind at ease once I get there.) The topics are some of the oddest things I have ever heard and the people who call in...at least 70% of them are surviving on street smarts alone. Last week's topic was "The Secret Relationship of the Black Woman and a White Woman"...as if to suggest that there is something unknown going on that could be the only explanation why the two would ever be friends. 99% of the callers agreed and basically said that there is a hidden agenda in any relationship of the sort and that the other is using the other to get what the other has. Most of the callers even believed that such a relationship isn’t genuine. WTF??? That’s insane. Needless to say, I had to turn the crap off because it was bothering me so much. At that point I thought, “You mean to tell me that ALL of the relationships I have ever had with white people aren’t real???” Come on, now…… It was disturbing to realize that there are SO MANY ignorant people out there, (even in our own city,) who just have no clue. None of those folks had probably EVER had any friends of the opposite race. But, I, on the contrary, have had many. 75% of my friends are white… (But according to the callers, those relationships aren’t real…) For as much as I was peeved, I can’t knock them for their ignorance. If anything, their only fault was that they were speaking on an issue they knew nothing about. (How could they say with all certainty that (basically) white people and black people cannot truly be friends, when they had never had a friendship of the like?)

I was totally disgusted. And as disgusted as I was, I did not have the energy to call in (nor thought it was worth my time) to bring a different perspective into the mix.

I actually felt sorry for them, amidst my frustration, because they have such a narrow minded view of the world. I think having relationships with people from various races and backgrounds has made me the open-minded person I am today. As I tell most people, “Call me colorblind.” If you are cool, you’re cool… If you’re not, you’re not. It’s that simple. I don’t care what you look like.

It’s so very unfortunate.

Cheers to all of my friends for recognizing that our differences are what make us such great companions!