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Matters of Race. Essays
That
was the first time I had seen riot horses, with their faces shielded
and the man on top wearing a bulletproof vest. We stood on the corner
of Grand River and Michigan Avenue, and watched the seething crowd,
pulsate with barely contained fury against the iron fence that had been
erected to protect those meeting on the lawn of the courthouse. I was
very small at the time, but when the horse walked by I felt miniscule.
The policeman riding it looked down and nodded at us as he passed, guns
at his hip. My mom tried to explain to me what they were and why they
were needed.
"I don't get it," I said.
She was quiet for a minute. "Neither do I."
And then we turned around and walked the short block home. She didn't
think it was safe for me to be at the courthouse when the Ku Klux Klan
was there. I could still hear their shouts above the angry crowd. As
we walked my mom tried again to explain what was happening. She told
me how some people were full of hate and fear for those that were different
than them. They thought that the color of you skin determined who you
were. Now I was at the age where I was still learning that if you mixed
blue and yellow you made green, and that red and blue made purple. And
I had watched my older cousins lay outside in the sun, trying to turn
brown. And more than anything I wanted my parents to paints the house
rainbow, because I didn't have a favorite color. I liked them all. The
idea that people could hate colors was appalling to me. My mom explained
to me that the reason there was a big gate around the courthouse and
police everywhere downtown was to protect those people who hated everyone
but whites. The mass of people around were very angry that the KKK could
stand on the courthouse lawn and shout about how black people and Jewish
people and everyone else were not, nor ever could be, as good as white
people. The crowd was protesting what the KKK was saying, and some of
the protesters might hurt them if they could get to them. Most of the
protestors were white, like everyone else in the town where I lived.
"Remember the little girl in your brothers class? Kayla?"
said my mom when we had reached the corner by my house. Kayla had the
most beautiful skin I had ever seen. It was a beautiful dark shade,
exactly like chocolate.
"Well, she is probably staying in her house today, away from all
this."
And that really made me mad. Really mad. I still didn't understand
why people hated colors, but I did understand why the crowd was so angry.
I didn't think it was fair that Kayla had to stay in side like she was
grounded, when she hadn't done anything. And I knew that when I was
old enough, I would try to do something about it. Kayla should not have
been afraid to step outside of her own home to play, the riot crowd
shouldn't have felt so infuriated that they would be dangerous, and
no one should hate something as beautiful and as pure as color.
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