He Can Speak Well...

While driving to school this morning, I was listening to a segment on NPR that really caught my attention. It was titled “The Questions People Get Asked about Their Race” and, basically, NPR asked participants on Twitter ‘What’s one of question you’ve been dying to ask another race but never do because of the impending ‘THAT’S RACIST’ aftermath?’

Here’s a link to the segment, I highly recommend taking a look at some of the other questions/comments people posted. They are a bit alarming, to say the least!

Anyways, one comment, tweeted by J. L. Reed, caught me way off guard…

This comment is just SHOCKING. First off, the use of the “exclamation point” implies how surprised this person was that a “black guy” could speak well. You wonder, why is he so surprised?! Well, he is clearly making a generalization that all African-Americans are incapable of speaking “well”, whatever that even means, and extremely ignorant considering that we do have an African-American president. This claim just continues to support how Americans have not progressed towards achieving racial equality.

But what is most frightening is the second part of the comment, “Do you have any white in your family?” This person automatically assumes that if a black person is able to speak well, than it must be because of the influence of a white person, basically implying that, he thinks, African-Americans are inferior to whites. AGAIN, highlighting the lack of progress America has made towards attaining racial equality.