Things We're Afraid to Ask

I have a radio friend who is blind and functions in the seeing world with the assistance of his family, friends, and a service dog.  He hasn't always been blind; thus, he doesn't have the mannerisms of one who was born that way.  In fact, in just sitting and talking with him, an uninformed person would be unable to tell that he can't see.  Even those of us who know him well sometimes forget!

When I was still teaching, I would bring Bill to school with me one day per year to demonstrate his radio/communication skills.  (That's how I tied it to English.  It was a loose connection, I know, but the kids in my classes never forgot Bill Day!)  At the end of each class, we would open things up to questions and answers from the students, with my previous admonition to be respectful and not ask embarrassing questions--but you know kids.  Invariably, someone would ask one of the two most pressing questions on their minds:  "How do you go to the bathroom?" and "When you go to the store, how do you know that cashiers aren't cheating you out of money?"  Bill recognized that the questions were born of curiosity, not disrespect, and never took offense.  He answered them honestly.
At the end of the day, the kids were in awe of the fact that there are very few things that Bill can't do. It was a good lesson for all of us!

Some things have been going on in the world that have raised some questions in my mind.  I wish I had people I could talk to for answers without embarrassment because my questions--like those of my students--come from curiosity.  If I asked them on a forum such as Facebook, I would likely be labeled as a racist or a homophobe.  Nothing could be further from the truth; I just want to know the answers through the eyes of the insiders rather than guess due to my own limited knowledge of these things.

For instance:  I have a FB friend who is a former student of mine.  She has two perfectly adorable biracial children, one of whom is female.  The mother always had an eccentric personality.  In keeping with that, she lets her daughter's hair go au naturelle, resulting in a long, wild-and-woolly Afro.  It turns out that Mom gets criticized all the time for this from well-meaning people who say that the child's hair "needs attention".  But the criticism, it seems, almost always comes from African-American women!  I was shocked when I heard that.  How could black women criticize a mother for letting her child's hair be natural?  I learned that there is a whole culture of hair among the female black community.  Even the Oprah Show paid lip service to this once when Chris Rock (himself black) had made a comedian's comment about black women's hair...and got hate mail for it, as if women of color were trying to hide their trade secrets when it comes to nappy hair.  Huh??  It is what it is.  Why do there need to be secrets?

Then, too, I have recently become aware of something called colorism.  That is the term given to bias based on the color of one's skin.  It isn't racism but is a sort of prejudice that even pervades the African-American race: dark-skinned black folks have a lower place in hierarchy of status than lighter-skinned black folks.  (This isn't a new term.  I'm just now becoming aware of it.)  Did Caucasians create this?  Is it a sort of racism within one's own race that has always been there?  I would LOVE to sit down with some people of color to ask their opinions about this, but I'm sad to say that there aren't many black people in my limited circle of friends.  I wonder if would feel comfortable enough to ask without feeling like an idiot even if there were...

And on another point, now that free society is catching up with itself and gays are, more and more, being allowed to marry, I have questions about how to refer to folks in same-sex relationships.  The English language is gender-specific.  You are a he or a she.  If you are married, the male is the husband and the female is the wife.  Before same-sex marriage was legal, people in monogamous homosexual relationships were known as "partners".  But now that those partnerships can become marriages, do we need to find gender-neutral terms to refer to spouses?  (Actually, the word "spouse" is gender-neutral, but I don't see many homosexuals using it.)  My observations are that most (but certainly not all) gay relationships--meaning male--have two participants that seem effeminate. Lesbian relationships appear different in that one partner seems more feminine and the other more masculine.  So, when two homosexuals marry, is one the "wife" and the other the "husband"?  If so, what determines which is which?  Do THEY make a distinction?  Or is that just a vestige of old society's terms?  What is the politically correct distinction now??

I have a pot-full of former students who are gay/lesbian.  Some are married.  Some are not.  And yes, I do consider political correctness an issue that needs to be addressed, especially since I was/am a teacher of English--and, hopefully, of respect.  If you are of the Negro race and prefer to be called African-American rather than black or Negro, I'll call you African-American when it becomes necessary to refer to your race.  If you are a gay person in a marriage or monogamous relationship and want your partner/spouse to be called something else, I'll call him/her whatever you wish.  I just need to know what that is!!!  And whom do I ask without feeling like a dinosaur??

I have probably led a sheltered life, but I pride myself on the ability to see every story from both sides.  I'm not stupid enough to believe that prejudice will ever go away.  I merely wish I could gather people around me who can answer my questions without judging my intentions.  I just want to know!