Comments on: Watching Aversive Racism

By: Amanda Fogelman

Amanda Fogelman — Sat, 17 Dec 2016 06:41:50 +0000

This bagel shop seems to be representative of the progression of your town. Someone who was not white was sitting with you which made people curious and skeptical. If Pedro were white, nobody would have looked over at your table. This reminds me of Why All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria. The moment Pedro was sitting with a White family, he was given looks. It is no wonder then that people of color are often times more comfortable sitting with people of their own race. It was great that you could reflect on what you have learned in class to your home town, and to your favorite bagel shop from a new perspective.

By: Taylor Beckman

Taylor Beckman — Sat, 10 Dec 2016 17:59:23 +0000

Pedro was not white and automatically seen as “other” at your bagel shop. I think the demographic of a community has a lot to do with how they handle diversity. In a city as diverse as New York, people from all kinds of backgrounds walk into bagel stores and they probably will not get looks but this also does not mean that they will not experience racism. I come from Hunterdon County, which is one of the few counties in New Jersey that went red in this election so I can understand how people of color have different experiences when they enter a place of business. I used to work at a tea house on Main Street that had more problematic tendencies than I am willing to go into at the moment, but most of the patrons were white. If a couple or family of color would come in for lunch, I remember my boss always making comments about who would get those tables because it was likely that they would not tip well. I was disgusted by my boss’s comments, but there was an employer/employee relationship that I did not feel comfortable breaching. Until we can stop making blatant assumptions about others, people like Pedro and the patrons of color at that horrid tea house will continue to have ostracizing experiences.

By: Jenna Gainsboro

Jenna Gainsboro — Tue, 15 Nov 2016 23:09:18 +0000

I also reflected on my experiences in my hometown after reading this. I’m from a small suburb of Massachusetts. There are findings in the police blotter every week about people “seeing a person of color and calling the police, etc.” It makes me sad that people still make these associations, even now.

By: Haleigh Jacob

Haleigh Jacob — Fri, 11 Nov 2016 08:10:19 +0000

Michael, reading your post really made me reflect on my experiences in my own hometown. I’m from a small town in Pennsylvania’s coal country where everyone knows everyone else. The demographic in my hometown is comprised of mostly white, blue-collar people whose families have lived in the community for generations. Unfortunately, I grew up hearing a lot of racist remarks and seeing a lot of confederate flags. I attribute this /partially/ to many people in my hometown not traveling outside of the bubble of the community (or not having the opportunity to), and therefore having very limited experiences with people who differ from themselves. I imagine if I had the same experience in my own hometown that you did with your parents and Pedro in the bagel shop, the reactions from others would be the same. You ask whether you would get the same reaction from others as Pedro did if you were to go with him to his own bagel shop, and I can’t answer that definitively. But interestingly, I have had experiences in which I’ve entered spaces that were occupied entirely with POC and gotten strange/confused looks. I think the reasons I got some funny looks may differ entirely from the reasons Pedro did, and I’m not completely sure what those reasons are, but I think it’d be really interesting to unpack that at greater length.