By Selwyn Duke ——Bio and Archives--March 21, 2013
American Politics, News | CFP Comments | Reader Friendly | Subscribe | Email Us
She lost her BlackBerry in a biology lab at Villanova and Facebooked all the class members she could find, "wondering if you happened to pick it up or know who did." No one had it. There was one black student in the class, whom I'll call Carol, who responded: "Why would I just happen to pick up a BlackBerry and if this is a personal message I'm offended!"Huber explains that Carol assumed Susan targeted her because she was black and for a long time thereafter gave Susan the cold shoulder. Here is what Huber didn't have the guts to say: such paranoia is the result anti-white bigotry. It's just as when a person is irretrievably biased against someone in his personal life and then sees the individual through colored glasses. Every innocent misstep is then interpreted as a malicious act: "Why, that's just the kind of thing he would do!" is the thinking. With whites, they're always "racist" because that's just the way they are. And this has consequences. It's easy to justify hatred of and discrimination against people whom you believe are inherently biased against you, and whites suffer as a result of this phenomenon all the time. Oh, Huber won't talk about this, and it is why, if you want the truth, forget his article. Read the comments under it. For while the anonymity of the Internet enables some ugly talk, it also encourages expression of some ugly truths. Just about a year ago I investigated a racially motivated fire attack on a 13-year-old Missouri boy named Allen Coon, who was one of fewer than 20 white children attending East High school in Kansas City. During the course of extensive interviews with parents and students, I learned that Coon and other white children had been subjected to severe racial harassment not just by classmates, but also teachers. One teacher called the tow-headed Allen "Casper" and encouraged other students to participate in the teasing; other times students would initiate the harassment and the teachers would chime in. I also spoke with two sisters, ex-Texans, who were verbally attacked in front of their class by a teacher who said, "Everybody from Texas is ignorant rednecks" and that all white people were responsible for a 1998 attack upon a black man in Jasper, TX (the James Byrd killing) because "[their] skin is white." And similar ugly truths are revealed in "Being White in Philly's" comments section. There's the white poster who said that in fifth grade in his primarily black school, the teacher would purposely ask him questions too difficult for his grade level and then, when he couldn't answer, make him stand in front of the class wearing a sign reading "White Dunce." And here are a few other examples (edited for punctuation and grammar), with respondents identified by screen name:
Of course, we'll now be told that these testimonials are invalid because, well, you know, these might not even be real people. It's always nice to have full names so that those who dare speak truth can be scorned, ostracized, condemned, and fired from employment. As SaraEdward45 put it, "No one wants to [air these problems] out loud because you are automatically labeled as a racist and your experience is invalidated, leaving you to feel bullied once more." But, hey, it's great that we're having this conversation.White kid in blackgradeschool
I was targeted daily throughout my childhood because of my race --that was made explicitly clear (verbally). Even teachers in my school were unsympathetic and would look the other way. And the manner in which race was spoken about in an all black school really inflamed students to the point where everything done to me was completely justified in their minds because, as a white person, I was finally getting mine, and some of the teachers I know felt that way too. Under the bus I couldn't open my mouth in class without half of the kids shouting "Shut-up, white boy," or many similar things. ... [T]he majority of my teachers just looked the other way, and many, though not all, black teachers seemed to support it. SaraEdward45 The demographics at my daughter's school suddenly changed one year with black children becoming the majority, and she became a target. Xena I attended a small elementary school in Georgia. ...I was bullied daily by black kids. Several loudly expressed that they hated white kids, yet could not articulate WHY. JenB [T]here was the black librarian who joined in with the [black students'] bullying. I had never experienced a teacher who was openly hostile to the white students. ...I had to sit there surrounded by the librarian's favorite black bullies, while she bullied as well.
View Comments
Selwyn Duke, follow him on:
• Gab (preferably) or
• Twitter, or log on to
• SelwynDuke.