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I live in a city immediately adjacent to one of the statistically blackest cities in America. I went to school in said black city for most of my childhood. I work in that city and have lots of black coworkers that I get along with just fine. My take? They’re just people like any other. Some of them are assholes. Some of them beat their wives. Some of them are total nerds. Some of them are the kind and intelligent. Some aren’t. Just like every other skin color. Black people are just people.
And yeah, people assume a lot of shit about them as a group and make idiotic blanket statements. I have some of my own preconceived notions in my head, and when they pop up in my head I remind myself how dumb it is to carry those.
Isn't it terrible that my immediate reaction to this sentence was, "oh so you probably live in an extremely white area"?
That's kind of what I'm getting at. It's a constant thing that the human mind tends towards, and the best defense (imo) is personal experience. I always remember the gangbanger 19yo I knew, last I heard he was going to trial for an armed robbery, real "thug" type but he once confessed to me that he loved listening to pop music like Gotye and Katy Perry, but had to put on a real mean face when he was wearing his earbuds so his friends would think he was listening to rap. He wanted to open a barbershop and was teaching his little brother how to ride a bike.
You're right, people are people. And they're complex. Groups of people (race, culture, religion) are just complex groups of complex people.
I just wish people with no experience in a culture would take a step back and be a little less trusting of what they hear 3rd hand.