[b said:
Quote[/b] ]I was probably on my way to being racist when I was young.
All kids born to racist families were. I was when I was really little, because I WAS really little and didn't think for myself or have my own mindset or opinions then, so naturally, I copied the thoughts and opinions of my grandparents. I even despised our neighbor's daughter's boyfriend because he had a pickup truck with big mud tires, just because that was why my grandmother despised him. It's hard to imagine, me hating someone on the grounds that they had a truck with big tires. Dude, I'm GETTING one when I turn 15. But I was a little kid and didn't know any better than my grandmother's opinions. Now I have an independent mind with my own opinions and somewhere along the road I chose an open mind and chose not to look at a black guy and think "black guy", but to simply think "guy". Believe it or not, being raised to think a certain way doesn't actually have that much effect on a person's life.
As for the black/African American thing, it really depends on the person, whether or not they want to be called a certain thing. Some black people would rather be called "black" and some would rather be called "African American". I mean, I don't call myself Scots-Irish/Irish-Cree-American. But If they want to be called a certain thing, then whatever.
I am as proud as anyone to be Southern, but that doesn't mean I'm racist or stupid. Northerners have always had a preconceived notion about Southerners. But we're not all stupid and we're not all racist. There are just as many stupid, racist people in the North as there are in the South, and that is all. This
country has a problem with racism, not just the South. High-class melodramatics have a preconceived notion about rednecks, using the word in a derogatory way, assuming that we're all hillbillies, we're all stupid and we're all racist and homophobic. I will get extremely hostile over this, as I have done so many times in the past. So many people have preconceived notions about everybody else. My grandmother thinks black people, among so many other things, sound retarded because they "talk funny". Yeah, well, screw that, because the same amount of white people talk just as "funny"! They just do things different than
her, therefore they're wrong in her eyes. She's also prejudiced against most genres of music that aren't what she listens to. Tim McGraw did a duet with Nelly and released it on country radio stations. To her, that's wrong, just because it's a rap/country song, and "that n----- music has no place in country". Look, I listen MAINLY to country, but I do not HATE any genre of music. I don't even look at a country song and a rap song as different in genre. It's all MUSIC and music is SIMPLE. In my opinion, genres and classifications in music shouldn't even EXIST! I listen to EVERYTHING, except maybe classical, but only because it.. bores me. I'm not a rap FAN or anything, but I don't HATE it. I like some rap songs. I think the current rap/country mix trend that's going down is great. Gretchen Wilson and Big & Rich are country artists belonging to a group of artists known as the MuzikMafia, which also consists of a bunch of other artists you've probably never heard of unless you're a MuzikMafia fan.. anyway, the MuzikMafia mixes all genres of music. It's like... it's it's own genre. They know no prejudice and look at music as simple and don't complicate it into genres and classifications. The first track on Big & Rich's CD is called "Rollin' (The Ballad Of Big & Rich)". It's technically labeled "country", but it's really a simple mix of rock, rap and country that some narrow-minded people despise, but many open-minded people follow like a revolution. Download it if you can.