People of Color

Time to get some blood a’boiling.

i have a complaint.

i am almost positive it will upset most who read it. It will also produce some outrage, disagreement, and maybe exception from those who misinterpret my concern and use my thoughts incorrectly to support something like racial inequality, prejudice, etc., which is exactly opposite of what i intend to convey.

But what the heck. i’m going for it.

Why does a group of people who don’t like some collective label, or someone else in an effort to be politically correct and helpful, come up with something that is inaccurate? The government even got into the act, changing the names  for “race?” (or dancing around even that on their forms). What does it matter? Oh, i know: data.

Among several other terms i won’t mention here, i’m talking about the term “people of color.”

What the hell does that mean?

It seems it was meant to mean any person who is not caucasian.

i think it means i don’t have any color. i beg to differ. i’ve got more color than almost anyone. My arms, due to exposure to the sun most of my life, and the thin skin older folks acquire bringing about frequent cuts, blood, and scabs gives me more color than most. My body has gone from baby paleness to Tennessee summer brown except for the shorts-hidden area and now with a myriad of colors, including the baby paleness returning to the sun screen protection required of old age. My face, and especially my practically bald head is blotched. My neck is…well, i guess you could call it “red,” but i think it’s more rust colored: lots of golf sun, you know, but still “redneck.”

To tell the truth, it doesn’t bother me when someone calls me “paleface” or “redneck.” They are being relatively accurate.

But “people of color” takes inaccuracy to new heights.  And i would add i am definitely not “white.” i don’t look like a sheet. i don’t think i’ve actually ever seen a “black” person either except for this one in Papua New Guinea. But that doesn’t count. One of the marriage rituals for the cannibal tribes at the time was for the bride to paint her entire body in black pigment (i have a postcard with a photo of a bride like the one i say, but that’s a different story and not one to be told here).

i think we need to quit messing around with this stuff. And why do we have to differentiate? There are so many variations of racial mixing, we really don’t know anymore. For example, Barack Obama is the only person of whom i am aware who is really an “African-American.” Folks don’t call me “European-American.” i did meet some “European-Africans” when i was in Africa over thirty years ago.

If your family has been here for more than 100 years, then i think we should just cut all that out and call you an American. Of course, we could start  calling all  folks by their country or continent or both. So i should be labeled “European-British-American-Southern-Californian” or something. Some bright and lazy crown could turn it into an acronym (EBASOC).

Now don’t get me wrong, i think we should all honor our heritages and not denigrate other races, heritages, home of our ancestors, etc. But i’m getting a little tired of people getting wrapped around the axle because someone called them a name they didn’t like.

i acknowledge and accept previous comments by my dear friend, Dr. Kathy McMahon Klosterman about being aware of others’ sensitivity (or perhaps “sensibility” is a better term here). She’s right. Furthermore, i have not experienced the degradation, the debasement, the injustice, and all of the other things i don’t know about because i haven’t experienced them.

Perhaps i’m just too simple to grasp the concept.

But to be perfectly honest, i wish we would just drop all of that “color,” “race,” and all other means of separating us.

How about calling us “souls?”

2 thoughts on “People of Color

    1. There is only one race of human beings: homo sapien sapien. We can differentiate by ethnicity or continental origins. But we are all members is the human race different from the feline family or rhino 🦏 ‘s

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