Jury's Still Out

On Black. White. that is. I wonder what would have happened if Bruno and Carmen had been dropped into Beaumont society in their black personas. Bruno's certainly not "getting it" when it comes to his observations of how the African-American community often gets treated by the majority culture. His goal seems to be to show his counterparts the 'better way' to deal with the racism they've experienced throughout their lifetimes. He's just waiting for someone to use the n-word, so he can be a role-model. How condescending?! !!! (You can tell I'm not impressed by Bruno?) Carmen also seemed to be stuck in expecting certain stereotypical behavior. To me, both ended up looking like fools.

I was intrigued by the observation Brian made that whites are more curious than blacks. At some level, that too is probably a stereotype; however, several of the staff at the children's center seemed to affirm that observation. We had what is now an amusing experience at the church. We have long suspected that someone has found a place to live inside our huge 3-story building, and those suspicions seemed to be confirmed by some apparent door-slamming noises on the 2nd floor.

My secretary and one of the child care workers were upstairs at the time. Both vacated the premises fairly quickly. My secretary, who is white, wanted to find out what was going on. The child care worker, who is black, didn't care about the why, she just wanted to be safe. (Not a bad desire, btw) Ironically, the show Black. White. and this observation came up in the discussion of this incident. The varying reactions to the mysterious encounter were lifted up as culturally typical. So I wonder what led to the lack of curiosity (although I can probably guess) and how it ultimately affects the black culture in its continuing endeavor to break down the barriers to advancement.

The other two things which stick out in my mind about the first episode were: Brian buying shoes at the golf course in his 'white' persona and being astonished that the salesman actually took his shoe off his foot and put the new one on for him with a shoehorn. Intellectually, unfortunately, the fact that no shoe salesman had ever done that for him in his lifetime was not a surprise to me. What saddened me is that, even in California (which is supposed to be a racially progressive state - talk about stereotypes!), such petty slights still exist between the races.

The second thing which stands out was how sensitive the teenage daughter Rose was to the situation. You could tell she has great respect for her counterparts and the experiences they've had, and doesn't want to betray them in any way. I think she was really wrestling with the moral issue of being white while passing herself off as black. Kudos to Rose!

Guess I'm gonna have to watch next week and see where it goes from here!

P.S. The 'mysterious visitor' happened to be a door which had come loose in the mechanical room and was randomly banging because of pressure shifts in the a/c system and the wild winds we were having that day. No ghosts! Nobody seeking a safe place to stay! Just a door. *chuckle*