(Wrote some more after seeing Breonna Taylor news): I was watching the PBS Asian American series. A few comments pops out in my mind: I did not realize there is discrimination against Indian American before watching this. Then an Indian American commentator said: basically the new immigrants wanted to be seen as “white”, or as minimum they want to be in between the white (I guess the ruling class), and the black (African American). This reminds me Joe Biden once commented on Barack Obama (this guy is clean). I know Joe likes to put his foot into his mouth, but what does mean?! Maybe Joe just said “politically incorrect” thing in a lot white people’s mind? Also please note Obama is mostly raised by his mom (white) and his maternal grandma (and grandpa, both white). || So my point here is while the United States always like to criticize other people / other countries’s human rights record, what about the African Americans at home?! Caging the immigrants children is another level.
(Original) I wrote about this a while ago in Chinese.
In light of the Ahmaud Arbery’s killing, I like to add more. 2 or 3 minutes read below.
Years ago I was in Rolla, driving my first car, a run-down Toyota Celica 1984 black, my American friend (graduate student, caucasian) joked I could be pulled over by police because of my car. He said his good old American Buick or Pontiac would do fine with police. I did get pulled over a few times, some are my own fault, such as my tail light was not working, or I did not drive straight (I was new driver, they think I was drunk). But I agree with some of things he said. Then in 2006, I talked to my roommate (young professional, caucasian too), and I said John Edwards may have the best chance break out from the Dems presidential primary because Hilary is woman, Obama is African American, and people here are not ready for them yet. I was wrong: I still remember the election night Nov 2008 I was on the way from Little Rock to St. Louis, I took the delta flight transfer in Atlanta which is unnecessary because the Southwest has direct flight. At Atlanta airport it looks like Obama was going to win (McCain is a good guy though).
I also remember Eric Holder (Obama’s AG) said he got pulled over from state highway patrol for no reason. I think things changed somewhat after Ferguson, black lives matter, but obviously took a step back in recent years too. I can see similar kind of racism in China too (against Africans live and work in Guangzhou).
Overall, over the time though, I do see two things: 1) Majority of people are decent, and they can tell right or wrong, and be on the right side of the history (in the US, that means civil war, women’s voting rights, the civil rights, etc), in the current pandemic they believe in science, wear facemarks when needed, and respect the frontline workers, and when possible, support the less fortunate. 2) In tough times though, we also see both the best and the worst of human beings, for example, I can see people calling Bill Gates the globalist (elitist), call for punish China or incite violence in Hong Kong, the armed militias storm the state capitols etc. Those are on the wrong side of the history, and they are minorities.
A bit off topic, the bottomline is racism is stupid and has no place in our world… (now you know, you don’t want me to say something 