Say Something

 "I believe that every single event in life happens in an opportunity to choose love over fear."-Oprah Winfrey 

 

It was hard. I don't know why. I am standing around the hardware store, waiting for my paint to mix, and I hear that old song again. It glorifies the old days of slavery in the south with lyrics like "the night they drove old Dixie down, and all the bells were ringing...but they should never have taken the very best"...

I am all for free speech and art, but I'm thinking- this song must come off as hostile to a black shopper, here in the USA. I have HAD it with that song, as well as with those Dixie flags I see on people's cars and apparel. No, it does not mean love for your home place, it means racist hate, pure and simple.

Who does your music, I ask the paint guy. He doesn't know, but I complain about it to him anyway. Getting no response, I go over to the cashier and wait to ask him. 

 

As I wait, a black man walks up to check out. This is a pretty white area so I marvel at the coincidence and take it as a sign. Go ahead, I'm waiting to complain about the music, I tell him. That song must come off as hostile and racist to a black person, I say to him, as we wait, and he affirms to me that it does, indeed.

He checks out and leaves, and I take up the matter with the two cashiers, who tell me this is a Sirius feed, but they do not offer to do anything about it. I wonder if you can order the non racist feed from Sirius. I ask for a manager. All around me all this time in hearing range are ten or so white guys, each with their manly hardware items, but no one says anything to me about it. No one says anything at all.

 

The manager strikes me as a kind and wise fellow who listens and thanks me for speaking up. I tell him to complain to Sirius and that the music was hostile to black shoppers and that it made me uncomfortable too. I thought it should make anyone uncomfortable! 

But it is even more uncomfortable for me to speak up.  I get shaky and sweaty and my heartbeat gets going all fast.  But I'm glad I did it. It helps when we speak up for others, like when men protest in favor of women's rights. Even as a person of the most common color in my neighborhood, (pinkish-orangish), as a person of gender, (guess!), I still found it so hard to get up the courage to say something. At least at this time in that place at least, no one was willing to publicly defend racist lyrics. This is some small progress. No one argued with me, but their silence itself said something.

 

I can only imagine how hard it can be for members of whatever group that are being attacked to complain. And I am filled with admiration for the bravery of all those people in the world living under oppressive regimes who could be killed for speaking up, but do so anyway. If they can, so can we.

"As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world – that is the myth of the atomic age – as in being able to remake ourselves." - Mahatma Gandhi