She loves me, her family can’t
Christian J. Collier,
Chattanooga, TN.
Hapa: but always the wrong half.
Chattanooga, TN.
I’m half Japanese and half white. In Hawaii, where I grew up, mixed race people like me are called “hapa” or “half.” Although I feel most at home in the primarily Asian culture of Hawaii, I also felt like I stuck out physically because I was tall and had fair, freckled skin. But, when I moved to the mainland for college, I didn’t fit in there, either. People ask, “What are you?” “Do you have foreign blood?” But sometimes they also say, “I never thought of you as anything but white,” and that hurts just as much.
Married black woman. Out of will.
William David Jones,
Chattanooga, TN.
I found out after my father died that he had taken me out of his will when I, a white man, married a black woman in 1996.
Come on, pick a side already.
Sophia,
Chattanooga, TN
Growing up biracial, I never knew where I fit in outside of my home. Two cultures, two religions, two completely different lifestyles. I did not want to be Arab most of the time. I wanted to fit in with the majority of my school, who were white Christian Americans. It was an everyday battle; concealing one side of myself, and picking the other.
No Problems for Private School Kids
Alissa Hodges,
Chattanooga, TN
There is a common misconception in my city that white, middle class, private school kids have no problems. In actuality, there is a large community of kids like us who have been through multiple traumas, abuse, and tragedies.
My race doesn’t affect God’s Grace
Percy Rolleston,
Race In American Art,
Chattanooga, TN
There is nothing that will hold back God’s love and grace from you or me. Not our hair color, nose shape, shoe size, achievements, failures, or skin tone. He loves us because he loves us, that is it. The God of the universe is madly in love with you just as you are. That is how we should see others and ourselves, through the eyes of our creator.
I am not a gray area
Jacqueline Jade Milan
Chattanooga, TN
I am black and I am white. I am mixed race. I want a category(name) for that.
Prayed God would make me White
Amber Price,
Atlanta, GA.
I was raised in Chattanooga, Tennessee. I grew up ashamed of my Blackness. I heard the n-word for the first time in elementary school. I prayed every night for God to make me white. At the age of 17 I was told to go sit with the rest of the Blacks by the people I grew up with. The Blacks had only arrived in my school system after rezoning enable more minorities to attend. I only embraced my color in college. The only time I feel really American is when I am abroad. I hoped that my children would grow up in a better world. They won’t.
Little white kids have it hardest
K Russell,
Chattanooga, TN.
As a little white kid growing up, I was constantly harassed by black boys for no other reason than I was white- and small enough not to be a threat (I only weighed 89 lbs by eighth grade.) Luckily I had a great friend that was also black that saved me from quite a few bathroom poundings. I was told once in high school I would be killed by the end of the week. Two days later, as my dad was reading the paper, I saw my would-be assailant’s mugshot. Luckily, he got to someone else before me. I had a gun pulled on me in the hall one day, then the guy told me he was just kidding and walked off. My wife (who did not go to the same school) was molested by young black boys during middle school as she developed faster than other girls.
There is a paradigm in a very prominent subculture of the black community that says white people are bad simply because of the color of our skin. Whether it is stated outright or not, kids pick up on their parents’ sentiments and go to battle in schools across the country. Those of us faced with this model pushed on to young black kids growing up had it harder than most overcoming racism. Often, if not given ample opportunity to overcome it, unfortunately, many give in to the nonsense.
Until this paradigm is admitted and stopped in young kids, racism on both sides will only increase in an ugly and incredibly vicious cycle. With the strong and inciting rhetoric in the media today, I can only imagine the hatred being played out in elementary, middle and high schools today on both sides.
Neither I, nor my wife ever told our parents of the threats and harassment we received. Maybe we bought into the idea we were receiving what we deserved.
Gimme a break! Live YOUR Life!
Don Rackley
Chattanooga, TN
I know “minorities” who have succeeded as well as anyone on the planet. I also know white people who have failed miserably. It’s not about the Race; it’s about the Culture you choose to accept. I was part of an “interracial” marriage for 13 years, and I got to see how “they” act around “us”, and I got to see how “they” act when they think none of “us” is around. It’s very different, and it’s a CHOICE!
I was taught that God made man out of dirt. There is brown dirt, yellow dirt, black dirt, red dirt, tan dirt, and even white dirt, but we’re all just dirt, and we all breathe the same air.
And yes, we ALL struggle with SOMETHING!
Just now figured out I’m Southern.
Samantha Guess
Chattanooga, TN
Born in the South, raised in the South – NEVER considered myself “Southern”. But at age 25 – I have found that I AM SOUTHERN and there is no turning back and that’s okay. I am who I am.
White people marching for black voter registration
Susan Kosciolek
Chattanooga, TN
Many black American’s were being turned away from registration places for a variety of reasons in an effort to keep them from voting in the 1972 Presidential Election, especially in the South. As a young white woman in 1971, I marched arm and arm with black Americans in Cairo, Illinois as we walked to guarantee their right to register to vote.
