Justified Rant

One human trait that I think gets in the way is this need to categorize everyone. It starts young: are you a boy or a girl? Then becomes more complicated: what race are you? are you gay or straight? are you religious?

I understand being able to identify folks as "one of us" can be helpful when building rapport. However, it seems to be more often used to separate folks.

My office is located in a busy area of down town. There are several businesses that have been located in this area for 10, 20, or more years. And, we have a couple of office spaces that seem to constantly rotate businesses. Like the space next door to my office.

Most recently, a new business has moved in. They are still in the process of setting up, so there hasn't been normal business over there. They have got their window lettering up. And, the woman who owns the business is a black woman from NYC. Her window lettering style reflects that she "ain't from 'round here." But, she seems perfectly nice and has a surprising fondness for John Wayne movies (that what was playing while she was moving furniture around yesterday).

As I was packing up for my evening meeting, one of our long established neighbors made a bee-line out of her office straight to me. My office has been here more than 10 years, and this woman has spoken to me exactly 4 times in those years. She launched into making fun of our new neighbor's window lettering. But, she was using that tone of voice that made be believe that the style wasn't what she really was commenting on, but the business owner's race. She was totally doing that "we're both white so it's safe to be racist" tone of voice. (Boy would she be surprised if she knew more about me!)

I, at first, tried to ignore her. I didn't want her to think her attitude was one I welcomed. After about the 5th time she repeated her statement, I looked at her and as deadpan as I could said "I don't know what you are talking about." She pointed to the window and repeated herself.

I made an exaggerated look to the window and read it as it is written. And, then glared at my neighbor and said "you're reading it wrong." Only then did the woman realize she not only was stupid, but had outed herself as stupid.

I returned to ignoring her as I finished putting things in my car. For the record, it is never okay to play the game of "it's safe to be racist, sexist, or randomly mean" with me.