Black and White

Can we be serious for just one goll-durned minute...?

How many...now be honest here...how many minorities do you count among your friends?  How many have been to your house for dinner?  How many have you had a drink with recently?

I ask because I was struck ("I was struck" is a phrase used by pundits to seem erudite...OOOOO!....erudite, indeed!...to seem important.  Baloney... if, "at the end of the day", you were to ask me...) the other day when I was watching a commercial on television, by the casting choices.

There were several white women, one Asian, one Black and one Hispanic.

A lovely, interracial bevy to be sure.  But, seemingly, a departure from what I expect is the norm in our society.

I realize that I write from a White, European, American perspective.  That is the society I have come from and in which I grew up and now live.

I know that other societies are different and, therefore, the perspective would be different.

Someone who came from, and grew up in and now lives in, a Black, Asian or Hispanic environment would probably say the same thing.  They probably don't often socialize with people from other groups either.

I think it's true, however much we may wish it were otherwise, that "birds of a feather do flock together."

I was recently in a cafeteria at a major corporation and the above notion was in full display.  The Asians were all sitting together, as were the Blacks and the Whites.  There was very little commingling, if any.

Furthermore I think that racism is prevalent in our society, as a whole.  People tend to throw off on the "other", regardless of what the characteristics of that "other" is.

Yes, we have a Black President.  Yes we've had a Black Secretary of State and Black generals.  Yes we have an Hispanic Justice on the Supreme Court and Black Mayors.

But do we have an truly integrated society?  I think not.  The only people, save a precious few, who really care about Martin Luther King Day are Black people.  Obama's color was very much a part of his victories in many ways.

Columbus Day is for the Italians (but not the Native Americans...forgive me Sweetheart.)  St. Patrick's Day is for the Irish and the drunks.  Christmas is for the Christians and the shopkeepers and Passover is for the Jews and those who love a full bodied, yet somewhat precocious Manischewitz.  Etc., etc,, etc...

So the TV spot I watched didn't seem to reflect any reality that I am currently aware of.  Again, I ask you.  How many lily White women in the 'burbs sit around their living rooms discussing the latest advances in douche technology with their Black, Asian and Hispanic friends?

Not many I'm sure any more than their lily White husbands stroll the golf courses of our great land in thrall with the latest musings about erectile dysfunction, all the while patting the backs of Jamal, Ming and Jose.

So the PC police have succeeded in creating no real progress in the area of race relations.  What they have done, however, is create more opportunities for minority actors.

Yo!  Action, amigo.  ACTION!!