Before I get into the second part there is a pertinent fact that bears mentioning. SGT Generic is a black woman.
Because I’m white, ed I am now obligated to spend a paragraph or so defending myself.
I don’t hate black people; I don’t think all black people are stupid. I have black friends, and coworkers. I understand that as someone who has light colored skin it is frowned upon for me to ever mention someone who is darker than me and any form of negative description. I am deeply and personally sorry for every single bad thing to ever happen to any person who happened to have more melanin than me.
Have I spent enough time on this to avoid racist accusations in the comments section? Probably not, but let’s move on anyways.
About a week after Part One happened we saw another story on CNN, this time about gay marriage.
She felt that it was sad and wrong that gay people want to get married. This in and of itself wouldn’t be noteworthy. Many people these days have the same opinion as she does. The noteworthy part is coming.
Being the way that I am, instead of just ignoring her comments, I asked if she really felt okay with the government telling people who they can or can’t marry. I pointed out that in our parent’s generation interracial marriage was illegal, and people gave pretty much the same reasons to justify that piece of discrimination as they give nowadays to prevent gay marriage.
She conceded that taking away people rights seemed wrong, but that she still thought gays shouldn’t be allowed to marry.
“Marriage is too special” she said. “They should make some other kind of thing that works like marriage for gay people.”
“So they should be treated equally, just kept apart?”
“Right.”
“So would you say ‘Separate But Equal’ is the policy our country should adopt?”
“Yeah ‘Separate But Equal’ is exactly how our country should opera—“
“NO!” Bellowed a very large, ticked off black Staff Sergeant who had been listening to our conversation.
YOU!” He said pointing at me, “You should be very ashamed of yourself. SGT Generic, please step outside.” And off they went, presumably for a crash course in the African-American Civil Rights Movement.
Follow
