Something that doesn't get a lot of attention about depression is how it affects your memory. Rather than just being sad, your mind kinda shuts down and refuses to do anything. Recording details included. Because of this, medication, and good old fashioned repression, my childhood memories are pretty much just a series of broad strokes.
However, the memories I do have tend to be pretty damn vivid. They're things that stick. In example, I want to tell you the story of “The Nigger Taste.”
My parents like to have get togethers. Family, friends, friends of family, they're all over, they're all laughing, eating, dancing. It's generally pleasant if you can avoid a panic attack in such situations.
At one such get together, I think I was maybe 12 or 13, my mom invited a coworker and her family to come by, and I met her son. He was a couple years younger than me, but we got along nicely. We liked the same movies, I showed off my action figures, it was a classic preteen buddy meet.
That is until the time came for jokes. We were sitting in the basement, which due to my Dad having collected an Arcade Machine, 2 Slot Machines, a Shuffle Board, and a Pinball Machine, was where the kids liked to hang out. At this point the basement was packed with kids from my church. All of them teenagers from Camden, New Jersey. Mostly Black, a couple White, and boisterously cracking the kind of rude, college humor jokes you would expect in a situation.
My new friend, clearly unsure of his place in a room full of city kids, decided he wanted to give it a shot. So, he raised his hand.
“I've got one.”
Ready for anything at that point, the room urged him on.
“Why does a dog lick his butt?”
“I don't know. Why does a dog lick his butt?”
“To get the Nigger taste out of his mouth.”
The room was silent for a while. Pretty sure everyone assumed they had misheard. So, they asked him to repeat it.
“To get the Nigger taste out of his mouth.”
Nope, we had it right the first time. Some one said I looked like I was ready to punch him. I wasn't. I've never really known what my face was doing, but I remember all I was thinking was, This isn't going to end well.
I was wrong, of course, though some in the room got pissed off, others took control and lead the conversation. When asked where he heard that joke, he said his brother told it to him.
That was it. He left and went upstairs. The room discussed a little more, but I was done with the whole vibe, and headed upstairs to go get some food.
The party was mostly wound down. My parents and their friends were in another room, but my Brother and his Girlfriend were there.
He asked what happened. Said he saw the kid come upstairs looking upset. So, I had to tell him the “joke.”
“…To get the Nigger taste out of his mouth.”
When the party finally ended, my brother, sister, and I told my parents. Again, having to repeat the “joke.”
“…To get the Nigger Taste out of his mouth.”
And here's the real thrust of the story.
A few days later, we were coming back from church, and my mom was talking about how she had spoken to her coworker, who swore that that “wasn't how they spoke at home.” They had “No idea where [their older son] learned such a thing.” They punished him by taking his XBOX away.
That's it.
I'm sure that really taught him a lesson on race relations.
My point in all this, is that this is how racism spreads. It's not all Klan hoods and Jack boots. More often than not it's “jokes" between friends. Little brothers trying to be like their big brothers. And it flourishes in cases where the people in question have no access or experience with the people they deride. The people they dehumanizing.
To this day, I harbor no ill will toward that kid. He clearly didn't know what he was saying. Either that, or it was the worst case in history of reading the room.
It's not like it was the first time I had heard someone say Nigger. Shit, by 13, I had been called Nigger more times than are worth counting. And that, right there, is the major difference. To that kids big brother, saying Nigger was funny because he had no exposure to what Black people experience daily. To that kid, who was only a year or two younger than me, he had the luxury of not knowing the meaning of the word. But, not me. Not anyone in that room that night. Not my parents.
I repeated that “joke" about three times that night to tell the story of what happened. Now, I've typed it more than I would have liked to. But, I don't have that luxury. That kid didn't know any better. But, in an age where we carry the world's collected knowledge in our pockets, there's no excuse. The information is there. The access is there. But, I still have to watch videos of unarmed Black men get shot to death, and armed White teenagers get taken alive (or ignored) after they've murdered people on camera.
What kind of taste do you think that leaves in my mouth?