Neighbor says, “She doesn’t look black.”

Nicole Smeltekop,
East Lansing, MI.

At Michele Norris’s talk in East Lansing last night, a woman said this to me as Ms. Norris came on stage. The prevailing assumption that as a white person, white people can comfortably make racial comments they most likely wouldn’t say to anyone other than another “obviously” white person is frustrating. Equally frustrating is that I never know what to say back.