It’s November 12th, 2007, and my first thought when I enter my new middle school is, ‘Why in the name of God am I here? What are these kids gonna be like?’ I step out of my mother’s car, my backpack carrying two folders, paper, and a load of pens. I transferred here to get out of the boring rut I call home school.

As I cross into the gate and into the office, I’m sat in a chair and tested for my schedule. In my boredom, I look over through the window and see a sea of heads, none of them sharing my ethnicity. I ignore it and get to work. I finish my testing and manage to get to second period before it’s over. I head over to the PE area.

The first thing I notice is that there is one other white kid sharing my hairstyle of long unruly hair sitting in my new PE period. Every one else is either Mexican or black. I talk to the white kid and his friend, who is black. They adopt me into the ways of the school and what it’s like there.

In less than three hours later, besides sitting at a table in which the kids were over-hyped on the subject of sex, I hear someone say, “Hey, I’ve never seen that cracker’s mug before. He new?”

I didn’t know what he was saying, and in my stupid and creative mind I thought he was talking about a new brand of saltine crackers, and I never associated it with me until I told my dad what he said. Everyone treated it like such a big deal, I started thinking it was a big deal, too, which led to unnecessary fights. What a way to start out middle school.

In my opinion, I really don’t know what the big idea is behind racism and people’s reaction to it. All they’re saying is just words out of some idiot’s mouth. Before America, I’m pretty sure racism didn’t even exist. Sure the basis of it had been around since BC and before, but racism wasn’t.

Look at Greek and Roman times. The people that were enslaved were of the same ethnic descent as their owners. You can’t call them racist, because the slave and the slaver are both white. The difference is their social status. And the Romans crucified Christians and put them in the Coliseum where they would be eaten by lions. That’s not racist, it’s based on their religion, which I call ‘religiouscism.’ And the Egyptians enslaves their own kind from either Northern Kingdom or Southern Kingdom. Because of the region, their skin color was different, but that wasn’t the reason they were enslaved. It was because they were the defeated side in an opposition. And what about the Africans and the Native Americans enslaving their own kind? Well, that was because of different TRIBES, not color or race. The list goes on and on.
Racism, in my opinion, my father’s, and my uncle’s, both of which who are renowned history teachers, started pretty much during pre-Civil War America. Slaves had no rights, and that’s accepted. Slavery has always been like that throughout the millennium. But in that era there was this unwritten, mental law that said, ‘The only people that should be enslaved are those people from Africa.’ Before this happened, there were whites and immigrants working right alongside them, commonly known as indentured servants. Just a fancy way of saying slave, and trying to humanize what they called their servants. But during the times of abolitionists and pro-slavers, indentured servants didn’t exist, and slaves did. There were slogans about the people captured from Africa like “Black Gold for Sale,” and the like. Dehumanization, and the basis of racism. It stuck for so long that even after the abolishing of slavery, it carried on throughout the century until the civil rights movement finalized everything in 1965, with Martin Luther King Jr, who just might be my favorite black guy. The Little Rock Nine also deserves credit for the society of equal treatment, for staying in that all-white school and making it through. Power to you, guys.

But is the society of America really all about equal treatment? No, it’s not.

Nowadays, from what I see, society has completely flipped upside-down since the 19th century. Whites used to beat down on blacks, well now in Soviet Russia, the blacks beat down the whites. That goes for every race. As a teacher, my dad can’t say (not that he would) anything deemed ‘racist’ to a kid. He can’t call a black kid the n-word, or a Mexican a ‘beaner’ or anything else like that, or he gets sacked. BUT, here’s the catch. A black teacher can call any white boy a honky, and no matter what the kid says, no one’s going to fire him. Why? Society feels like it needs to pay some sort of reparations for it’s past.

It’s okay to feel sorry for what your ancestors did, but that doesn’t mean you turn a blind eye to blatant disrespect towards anyone of any race. Society isn’t about equal, it’s about trying to apologize to the other races by the wrong means.

Now, what’s the big deal about racism anyways? It’s just another difference in which humanity exploits in order to suit their needs for whatever reason they deem necessary to employ it. Some idiots at my school say (and mean it) “You’re doing this to me just because I’m Mexican.” Okay, so you’re Mexican. If you were white, I’m pretty sure the teacher wouldn’t care. Back before I heard about racism, in elementary, the big deal was saying fat jokes. But people don’t care about fat jokes anymore. Watch ‘Married With Children’ and you can hear Al Bundy rip on the fat women until the cows come home. But this is extremely offensive to the overweight ‘big-boned’ people who ‘just can’t help it,’ isn’t it? If someone calls someone else fat, do they get fired? No, they don’t.
People are just so hyped up on this issue because, like I said before, they believe they can use it to their advantage or to differentiate themselves in some way. Stereotypically, Mexicans hop borders and are stupid, black people like fried chicken and are self-glorifying, white people play golf and are Nazis, and Asians are perverts. These are the bad stereotypes, but the so-called good ones go along with these: Mexicans are soccer junkies, black people can dance and do sports varsity status, white people are never targeted as crime-doers, and Asians are super smart.

Well WHO CARES? We go on and on about racism, and ignore all the other ‘mean jokes,’ like blonde jokes, fat jokes, and homo jokes. Impartial equal society my freaking butt. And plus, these stereotypes force people into thinking they have to do this because of their race, and they ignore the talents they’re born with in order to satisfy society. Here’s the rundown of the people I know as a disclaimer to the stereotypes. I can dance, like Jerk and Shuffle, and so can another white kid names Justice. We dance like the black people are SUPPOSED to, but my friend Sean Wilson thinks that that kind of dance is stupid. But if he’s black, shouldn’t he like that dance? No, it doesn’t. Mexican food is my favorite type of food and also my best friend James’s food as well, but our friend Ismael Cervantes isn’t partial to it, and can’t dribble a soccer ball. Anime club, a club about Japanese graphic novels, is filled with white people, Mexicans, and some black dudes, but NO ASIANS. So everyone else is the pervert at my high school, not the Asians.

So really, it doesn’t matter what your race is anymore than it matters if you’re fat, skinny, homo, or straight, but race is the target for some reason of this generation. I personally don’t care about race, nor do I let it affect my decision of my friends. You can check the wide variety yourself of the people I get along with. As for racist comedy, if you really are going to take offense to that, let’s take offense to fat jokes too. As long as you make fun of everyone, it doesn’t even matter. So, readers who are tuned in, I can’t make you change your mind if you don’t want to, but chew on this for a bit. Is it racism really what it’s all hyped up and exaggerated to be?