I AM A COWARD!

Yes I am a Coward. Or at least I am as defined by Eric Holder. I personally see no reason to discuss race in my daily life as it has no real bearing on what I do day to day. I have friends of all persuasions, including race, religion and sexual orientation, and my opinions of them as a person has nothing to do with their outward skin color.

The same can be said for my daughter. She is in third grade. Though she happens to be Chinese, as she was adopted from there, she is most undoubtedly American. But she has had to suffer personal attacks lately from the boys in her class. You see she has the physical Asian trait of height, or lack there of. So they call her ‘short stuff’, ‘shorty’, or ‘shorty pants.’ Even though she doesn’t like it, as adults we can see this for what it is; the typical games of young children in the initial throws of elementary school courting. In other words, the boys like her. What should be noted about this story is that the boys in question are Black and Hispanic. Race is irrelevant to the situation. The lesson learned in this observation of childhood attics is the omission of color as a basis for opinion about people. They have the innocence of youth, and as such, have not formed or been influences by the issues of race.

Imagine if these children could hold on to that innocence throughout life. Some people have argued that we should not teach (talk about as Holder would say) children about the racial atrocities of the past so that they do not develop impressions and stereotypes from that influence. Looking at my daughter’s class, there is something to be said for that. If these kids could grow up without the daily bombardment of government mandated thought and segregation by way of classifications, the blitzkrieg of sensationalized media stories trying to build ratings, or the historical opinions of the older generations from their parents on up, we might be able to actually break the cycle of racial conflict. Obviously, this is not possible, but it show where we could start.

Holder is missing the point. It is not that we need to talk about race, it’s how. Today, the authoritarian stormtroopers of political correctness have created a society of wimps. Whites are in fear of saying anything that can be construed as racially insensitive, in that they are immediately labeled a racist and sent to training camps on multiculturalism. Or worse, jail. Holder and his ilk are the reason WHY there is no conversation. It’s too dangerous. But if we really wanted to have those conversations, then the whole body of preconceived notions and racial stereotypes have to be on the table in a free and open roundtable, devoid of retribution.

Since Political Correctness makes that impossible, we are left with NOT talking. But that can be a good thing depending on how we do that. Look at government forms or applications. What if the Race field was removed or replaced with a single category, Human. What if we stopped talking about Hate crimes and started talking about Crimes. Murder is hate by definition regardless of black on white, white on black, or within our same race. What if we stopped promoting racial division in the media for the sake of the almighty dollar and what if everyone took a moment to unwind their internal racial sensitivity alarms, so that comments could be taking at face value before an army of incensed bureaucrats descended on the scene for political gain.

The comedian Chris Rock had a comment in one of his spoken songs I think we could all live up to. “If you go to a movie and someone steps on your foot, LET IT SLIDE. Why spend the next 20 years in jail, because someone smudged your Puma”. Mr. Holder, with his increased commitment to politically driven enforcement, is creating even greater division and mistrusted. If each race could take the time to look each other in the eye, shake hands and LET IT SLIDE, the destructive sectarian conversations from the likes of Holder would be moot.