Notes From D.R. | Random Thoughts on the Passing Scene

Bostonians are still buzzing over “The Discomfort Zone,” an article published in the June 22 Boston Globe about perceptions of race and class in Boston. The story, written by Don Aucoin, profiled Tiffany Dufu, a former Seattle resident who moved to Beantown last August to take a job as a fundraiser at Simmons College. Accustomed to the cosmopolitan racial environment of her former locale, Dufu was surprised to see tremendous self-segregation and social unease in her new city. A lot of the racial tension is “under the surface,” Dufu says. “’And yet it’s so blatant, so obvious."

Internet message boards and talk-radio phone lines in Boston have been swamped since the story ran. The calls and postings break down into three distinct groups: whites who see the story as yet another example of the Globe’s unchecked political correctness, blacks who agree with Dufu and recount horror stories of racial injustice, and members of various racial groups who feel that, although their hometown is not perfect, they have had generally good experiences in the city.

I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve had people ask me if I think Boston is racist. And I can’t tell you how many times I’ve given the same answer: There is racism in Boston, just as there is racism in Massachusetts, just as there is racism in America. However, it should never be used as an excuse for failure or as a rationale for bad behavior.

I’ve experienced virtually everything Dufu has gone through during a lifetime spent in this city. Being the only nonwhite person in certain gatherings? Check. Detecting a sense of unease when I get on an elevator with somebody? Check. Being advised repeatedly that it wasn’t a good idea to visit certain sections of the city? Check. Seeing blacks with predominately black friends and whites with predominately white friends? Check. Having people assume I was an athlete, when the only game I’ve ever played had a Milton Bradley logo on the box? Check. Having cabs pass me by? Check.

Have I ever let this bother me, make me bitter, turn me into a disgruntled, negative, paranoid person? Never.

Have I ever let this stop me from achieving my goals? Never.

I was bused in the early-‘80s. I can still remember the controversy over the Charles Stuart hoax in 1989 and the anger over former Boston Celtic Dee Brown’s trouble with police in a Boston suburb a year later.  I can still recall watching news coverage of a fight between black and white students in South Boston in May 1993 (longtime Bostonians may recall that this was the fight in which then-Mayor Ray Flynn was hit in the neck with a rock) and raising my eyebrow when a white female student claimed in a WCVB-TV interview that the fight was started by the actions of a “colored” student.

What I haven’t seen, I’ve heard. What I haven’t heard, I’ve studied.

However, the mere fact that racism exists (in Boston or in America) cannot be used as an excuse for not achieving one’s goals, or failure to set goals in the first place. This clearly doesn’t apply to a bright, ambitious woman like Tiffany Dufu—but it does apply to “buppies” (black urban professionals) who still might be skittish about relocating to Boston, or to young people of color in this city who don’t think that they can realize their dreams here.

Black scholars Thomas Sowell and John McWhorter, among others, have lamented the rise of the mentality that blacks must somehow wait until every white person is nice to them before they can achieve anything of consequence. Sowell in particular has pointed out that there will never be such a thing as a racism-free environment—and that the best thing to do is to insist that blacks strive to succeed in spite of whatever racial obstacles remain.

In 1989, I was admitted to the prestigious Boston Latin School. Was it a culture shock? Of course-I had gone from the predominately black Martin Luther King Middle School in Roxbury, Mass. to an environment that was overwhelmingly Irish- and Italian-Catholic. I had never been in such a heavily white school environment, and in the early going, I definitely felt a strong sense of isolation.

A number of black students who entered the school with me that year were gone by 1991. Whenever I ran into them, I would ask them why they left, and I received the same stock answer: they couldn’t handle the pressures of an overwhelmingly white environment.

Despite my sense of isolation, I found that argument curious then, and as I’ve gotten older, my opposition to that argument has grown almost to the point of finding the thinking ridiculous. I never felt I had a choice to leave; it was a “sink-or-swim” deal—either you assimilate and acclimate yourself to that environment, or you were gone, consigned to a far worse school.

I managed to assimilate. I resolved that nothing would stop me from achieving academically. I would not accept failure in myself, and I would not use “isolation” as an excuse. And you know what? By the time I graduated, most of the kids from whom I had felt so alienated during my first days at Latin were some of my closest friends.

Refusing to be intimidated has its advantages. There will always be jerks—people who don’t like you because of your color, your religion, your age, your sexual orientation, etc. There are two ways to deal with jerks—become a jerk yourself (hey, it works for some people!) or make a resolution to yourself that “you won’t let the bastards grind you down,” that you will achieve your goals regardless of who likes (or doesn’t like) you.

                      

What would’ve happened if Jackie Robinson decided he was no longer going to play in the Major Leagues because white people booed him during his first season with the Brooklyn Dodgers? Robinson would not let prejudice, hostility, or “isolation” stop him from achieving his goals—and he certainly went through a hell of a lot more than either Tiffany Dufu or I. Robinson resolved that nothing was going to stop him—and became a legend in the process.

Dufu says her parents taught her that ”If you believe it, you can achieve it." Although she’s concerned about the racial climate in Boston and the effect that said climate will have on her children, I would suggest that her kids will turn out just fine if she passes that advice along to them. Will there be people who can’t stand them because of color? Sure. However, if she raises her kids to be ambitious, hardworking, fearless, motivated, and unintimidated by any social obstacle, will there be people who’ll admire them for those traits? Sure.

I’d tell Tiffany that she shouldn’t be afraid of raising her children in Boston. Teach them well, “train them up in the way they should go,” and they’ll turn out fine. Always will there be prejudice. Never should it intimidate you or your offspring.

(And about that woman who thinks bald black guys are sexy…do you have her number?)

UPDATE: More feedback on the Globe piece.