The N Word

Please help me understand. Please explain this God-forsaken, backward, racist, twisted society we call America. Or maybe it's humankind.

A child gets on a school bus, on his way home. His bus is commonly referred to as the "ghetto bus" because all the black kids ride it. The black kids get on the bus each day, hollering "What's up, nigger?!" to everyone--black, yellow, green and white. The student claims they say this to any shade of boy--as a form of greeting, term of endearment, casual hello, salute. When this child, though, says it in return, he gets pushed down in the bus aisle and kicked. His backpack is thrown and ripped open and he's in jeopardy of suspension. Why? Because he said "nigger" and he's white.

I am so angry and disgusted. What has happened? We are afraid of each other. No one knows anyone anymore. Everyone has their face in an Iphone and their ears plugged by music. This weekend at our local mall (I feel like my grandmother), the young adults (do I dare call them students??) were walking around with their pants below their private parts, the zippers to their belly buttons and their tattoos, earrings, foul language and overbearing, invasive, entitled behavior assaulting my senses and my children. Jacob looked horrified. Steve looked worse.

What has happened? How did the bus--with all its American history steeped in civil rights--become racist itself? My child, my white son, is afraid now to get on his bus because he's not a "nigger." He can't say it, he can't even acknowledge they're speaking to him. He has to sit and take it and hope he's quiet enough no one notices.

Hmmm. Sounds like angry racism to me. Thank you, Mr. President, for breaking all the glass ceilings. The shards are falling on your very own children.