My Slap-in-da-Face Encounter with Racism.

Story time! My one of the slap-in-da-face encounter with racism.

My half-Puerto Rican half-White ex told me that Latinos marry up and he doubted if we were gonna get married or have kids because they’d have a hard time fitting in the part of California society he was from. That’s what the Latino boys told each other growing up in that part of California surbubs.

His Puerto Rican grandmother(woman of color) loathed Blacks so much that he would leave me at the mall in her neighborhood when he went to visit her. I never got to meet her. When his mother(woman of color) found out that we were spending Christmas break together in Puerto Rico (where he was doing his schooling because it was a cheaper good engineering school than in the Mainland) she cut off his allowance, banned him from using the new car that they’d gotten him and wouldn’t help him fix the old one he was using. The relationship obviously wouldn’t last.

Surprisingly the dad who is White clearly endeared me. Maybe because he felt like an outcast too as alcoholic and hippie as he was. He would text and check on us. We remained in touch even after things ended.

Fast forward, after me my ex hooked up with a very pale, blonde long hair woman from the Netherlands. She was welcome at their California home, eventually they moved together to the Netherlands where the said ex is now based.

What I learnt was that some people of color could be even more prejudiced that White people.

It helped me understand that shared Blackness doesn’t mean kindred or acceptance. Some people of color and Black people are really trying to get as far away from their skin and Black struggle and gain access to Whiteness through amassing wealth, status and of course- MARRYING UP.