Things that CHANGED me

I came across a story I had written over seventeen years ago that I totally forgot I wrote. It’s a story about prejudice and how I viewed myself. I am going to write it verbatim so my writing skills may have been a little rough around the edges but here goes. The story is titled:

Am I Prejudice

It’s really hard to understand prejudice when you’re white and from the south. I always thought I understood. I had black friends, I was never mean to black people and I always treated black people as I would like to be treated. I did hear black jokes that I thought were funny but I would never tell one. “It’s just a joke anyway”, I would think. But I ways always taught to treat people the way you would like to be treated. This is the way I was brought up and this is how I viewed my life. This is not just extended to black people but rather to all ethnic groups. Now you must realize that I was a white girl from a nice neighborhood and went to a nice all girl catholic school. A school which, out of 250 girls from 9th to 12th grade, were all white with the exception of 1 black girl in each grade. The question I ask myself is “Am I prejudice or did I even have to deal with it?” Oh yes, I almost forgot, we did have one Chinese girl and I am not even sure if she was Chinese. She could have been of any Asian decent, because I certainly had no idea. I was even less educated on my Asian ethnic backgrounds. I thought, “If everyone is nice to non white people then there is no prejudice. God was I dumb! Realization of prejudice never really hit me until I moved to Hawaii.

When I first moved to Hawaii in October of 1990, I was loving life. I walked off of the airplane into the airport and into the fresh scent of flowers everywhere in the air. A lei was wrapped around my neck, followed by a small kiss on the cheek to show aloha. This was the life. I had a job, a place to stay, a whole month off before starting work and a small wad of party cash. I was set for adventure.

My first month there, I did it all. I went to see Don Ho, the Polynesian Cultural Center, Germaines Luau, jumped off the rock at Waimaia and numerous other tourist activities. I started work in November and all I did was work and relax for a while. Then some newly acquainted friends and I decided to go to the state fair at Aloha Stadium. We were going to ride a few rides, eat some junk food and waste some money trying to get junk stuffed animals at some game booths. As we were walking to the entrance of the fair we were jumped by a group of locals. They were all laughing and screaming, “get the blonde haoles.” They proceeded to let our friends with the darker hair go and only attack my friend and I. Why you might ask? Because we had blonde hair, of course. We finally got away from them and took off running to the entrance of the fair. Both of us were pretty shaken, bruised up and had bloody noses. We were both clueless as to why this happened to us. We called the police and made a report, however, no one was arrested. By the time the police got there, the group of locals was gone. They asked us for a description but I couldn’t tell them much because they all looked alike. Years later, I could have given a description, but then I could not have.

The following day at work, I was telling my coworkers about what had happened at the fair and none of them were shocked. They informed me of the prejudice that some locals had towards the haoles. I was just floored by what they were telling me. Why did they not like me? I never did anything to them. None the less, they did not like me due to the color of my skin and the color of my hair. I just had to accept these things, learn how to avoid these situations and deal with it. This had to mean that many of the black people that I knew had to go through the very same thing. Knowing where the right places to go are when you are people of color; me, white Allison, a person of color. Go figure. There were just some places that you did not go as a white person in Hawaii. PERIOD! And all because of what some white people did to the locals a hundred years or so ago; before I got there.

Years have gone by and I have come to realize the ways to survive as a white person in Hawaii. Now, I don’t mean to insinuate that evil locals are lurking around every corner of this island, but rather to express that there is a certain amount of prejudice here. Anyone who has lived here a while knows what I am talking about. There are just some places and some things that you just do not do. So I alter my life to avoid confrontation.

This all brings me back to the beginning of the story. Is simply being nice to people that are different than you, not being prejudice? If a local person does not take part in slanderous remarks about white people, but finds the remarks somewhat funny, do they consider themselves prejudice? If I don’t tell a racial joke but listen to one and find it funny, am I prejudice? I guess what I am trying to say is that we are all prejudice in one way of another if we entertain these types of behavior. We don’t have to be wearing KKK clothing and be burning crosses in people’s front lawns to be prejudice. When you say something about someone that they cannot change, to do nothing more that to hurt them, you are prejudice.

Would I have learned this had I not moved here? I can’t say for sure but I doubt it. I came to Hawaii to live in paradise, work and live my life as I would anywhere else. I guess I am realizing that had I not moved here I would have never known this side of prejudice. These things do not happen to white girls in Louisiana because I am part of the majority. I am not longer the majority here. When I return to Louisiana one day, I am sure I will be returning a changed woman. I have felt prejudice because of nothing more then the color of my skin. This should be a lesson for some people I know of all colors everywhere.