I remember it as if I had just experienced it all over again, 30 seconds ago.

It was my first day as a freshman, and I wasn’t sure if I’d have to dress out. I was walking to the Green Wall to grab my P.E. bag. Most people were already in their classes, and the surrounding area was nearly desolate, save for myself and the tall blonde boy in my path. I didn’t think much of him until he brushed past me and loudly said it. The n-word. I slowed my walk and I looked around. There is no way he could be talking to me. But no one else was around…and I’m Black.

“There’s no way,” I thought to myself, and I kept walking. I had to keep walking, because if he was willing to say that to me, who knows what else he would do if I said something back?
Though this happened more than three years ago, it’s always in the back of my mind.

How is it that somebody could just not care about other people? What do they gain from it? And how is it that I brushed it off, kept walking and told myself I couldn’t care less? Is apathy a defense mechanism for some and a weapon for others?

Throughout my high school experience, there have been numerous incidents in which I had to not care – the person on the offensive obviously didn’t care – because that’s the only possible way I could fathom someone saying such ignorant, racist things. Some people know that the people they hang around are saying slurs and are just on the border of supremacists, but they stay there, hanging around those people. Those people who–and it would never be admitted out loud–don’t actually care or respect the ones who won’t say anything.
To those people: Do you think that just because they say racist things about other people, they don’t think those things about you? That’s not the case, speaking from experience. I’ve been called dramatic for cutting whole groups of people off because they said something more than disagreeable. I don’t think it’s fair for me to be called dramatic because I want to go throughout my day without feeling threatened.

I always do, though. Feel threatened.

There have been several situations throughout my 18 years of life in which a non-Black person has felt compelled to say something out of pocket. And they do it so casually, too. Casual racism is subtle and indirect and is often hidden in small off-handed remarks such as “your hair actually looks really pretty today,” or jokes like “I bet you want to sit at the front of the bus.”
In the small farm town my parents and I frequent, where people don’t look too kindly at me but don’t say anything; it’s in stores when I can feel the eyes of an employee following me as I put things in my cart. Then there are some less casual situations like the time my 8th-grade history teacher said that Black History Month shouldn’t be a thing because “history is for everybody,” but she had no problem with the numerous patriotic holidays that occurred throughout the year. This same teacher said that slaves were not as miserable as depicted in our textbooks because they were housed on plantation grounds, had clothes and food. History classes are a whole other conversation that would probably be another long story if I were to go in-depth on my thoughts.
However, I will say that while, yes, it is important to study slavery and the Civil War, what I’ve learned in school has often been misleading. The bad side of some white American heroes and idols is conveniently ignored. Tip-toeing around America’s long history of mistreatment and the nearly unspeakable is mis-educating and harmful to the memory of those who suffered before us. How can we learn from history, if it isn’t taught correctly?

So what? After hundreds of years of rebellions, riots and protests, it seems hopeless to keep fighting. Hate crimes, lynchings, murders and unjust incarceration will not stop. I’m scared that one day I’m going to end up as the wrong statistic. Writing this article is an effort to put the experience that so many people of color have into perspective for people my age who are maybe on the offensive side. I hope I can humanize myself to the people who ask me how I could be a competitive swimmer if “black people can’t swim” or if my favorite foods are fried chicken and watermelon.
While I fear that the damage of systemic racism in this country might be too far gone, there always remains a flicker of hope for those of us who suffer and experience it first-hand.