My favorite comedian duo, Key and Peele, once joked that “‘Racist’ is the N-word for white people.”
While this phrase is highly problematic, as there is no white N-word equivalent, I can’t think of anything I could say that would piss off my white friends and associates more than to call them racists.
Call someone racist, and they’ll clutch their pearls and pull out a rolodex of friends of color who can vouch for their “wokeness.”
They’ll explain how they’re not voting for Trump, how they love diversity, and how they cannot stand to stay in the room when they go home for Thanksgiving and their old Great Uncle Jack gets to talking about the problems with “the coloreds.” They’ll admit they have older racist relatives, but they won’t dare have you thinking that they are anything like those relatives.
This reaction is pretty understandable. Other than proud white supremacists like Great Uncle Jack, who really wants to be called racist?
But many people are racist without even realizing that they are. This is because many of us have a skewed image of what a racist looks like.
Everyone tends to picture an older generation of folks who are card-carrying members of the KKK from the deep south who proudly wave confederate flag, still use the N-word, and keeps mammy figurines in the window sills of their homes.
We think of these folks as the small percentage of the population that is dying out.
They may not enjoy wearing white hoods and publicly promoting white supremacy; however, there are several types of racists can be just as dangerous as, if not even more dangerous than, Great Uncle Jack.
Here are 3 types of racists that are even more dangerous than the typical image of a racist.
Do you fall into any of these categories? Read more at Everyday Feminism.
Hey Fam. I originally published this article on Everyday Feminism. You can enjoy the rest of the article there.
Photo courtesy of The All-Nite Images via Flickr.
A Woman's Worth 