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On the show, "Black and White", the white guy's name is Bruno.(What an appropriate name).
He denies that racism exists. He says blacks bring it on themselves, seeing stuff that doesn't really exist.
He has a superior attitude. He knows what the problems of blacks are. He harbors every negative stereotype ever created about black people. It's all their own fault. They need to get over it. He loves saying the word "nigger".
The second episode was a true eye opener about such people. Bruno is willing to participate gleefully in everything that reinforces his racist view of black people. When he finds himself in a group discussion where blacks are exhibiting moral values, his head explodes, "I can't take this, I gotta get out of here." He avoids looking at anything about blacks that interferes with his stereotype. Never sees the good, but exults when he sees the bad.
Anyway, watching the meltdown of his wife was interesting. Bruno and his wife, all made up in black face, go to a redneck type honky-tonk bar. The wife experiences the bigotry first hand. She sees the hateful stares. The bar tender asks for her credit card before giving her a drink. That's never happened to her as a white person. She's starting to see.
Bruno, on the other hand, dances up the night amongst the hateful stares declaring that he was treated just like a regular guy. White people aren't racist. It's a figment of black people's imaginations. Black people are looking for something that isn't there. He simply ignored the hateful stares (denied he was getting them) and that makes them all go away.
The wife starts to see how hardheaded Bruno is. "He won't let go of his pre-conceived beliefs" she moans.
Later in the episode, Bruno, made-up as black, accompanies his wife who is not made-up as black, through a section of a popular park where blacks gather to beat drums and socialize. Naturally since he is perceived as a black man bringing a white woman into their space, he gets hateful stares. This time he sees them. He sees them because these are now black people hating. He loudly pronounces that he has never experienced such racism and hostility in all his life. The show person kinda points out to him that since he was made-up as a black man, what he'ssaying doesn't make sense. He's forgetting now that to them he's a black man too. He refuses to see that it's because he has brought a white woman there. His wife gets it though. She's starting to see how this stuff works to the point where it brings her to tears as she starts to understand that black people have to go through the same dreadful feelings she is experiencing, every day of the week. Not just for a little while in black-face. Everyday. She cries as she contemplates what it must feel like to be hated just for the color of your skin.
What ticks me off about Bruno and his attitude, the show didn't do it right. Bruno thinks whites don't have any problem with race. As a white man in the presence of the real black man on the show, Bruno asks a white stranger if he has any problem with interacial dating and whatnot. Of course the man says no, and Bruno is satisfied. See that proves it.
But the show didn't quite do it right. When Bruno went into that honky-tonk bar mentioned earlier, he should have went in as a black man with a white woman, just like he did when he went through the park.
I'd like to have seen what would have happened to him if he'd gone in there the same way, dancing and laughing in their faces, putting up a good time ignoring them. He and his white woman. I can hear him now hollering, "I'm not black", "it's shoe polish see". "Stop, I'm a white man."
Anyway, at one point in the show, Bruno's bigotry is explained. He tells his wife in front of the cameras that when he was in high school, he was the best basketball player on the team, but the other four black guys would never give him the ball.
And I thought, what a metaphor. Bruno thinks he has gotten over that. "Moved on, that's how you deal with it."
But what's brutally clear is that Bruno has not "moved on." He still feels the same way. If you level the playing field, if you let the blacks play the game of life too, he, Bruno, will never get the "ball".
Then his wife makes the most poignant point to Bruno. Okay, let's say it's true what you experienced. You're the only white guy on the team and the black players won't give you the ball. Can you imagine how a black person feels being the only black person in the room...
Bruno is so thick this goes completely over his head. "You get over it and move on, just as I did, that's how you handle it." It's all too clear that he never "got over it."
I'm waiting for Bruno to get his crucial come-uppance. In the first episode they sent him as a black man to a car dealership, and he bragged about how he was not treated any differently than a white man. That pissed me off because anybody who has ever had to buy a car recently knows that car salesmen are so desparate to make a sale, they'll kiss anybody's ass.
I'm waiting for the episode when he tries to get a job or that nice big house over there in that exclusive neighborhood.
No doubt he'll find some reason to blow it off. Racism doesn't exist anymore (unless it's blacks hating whites). Black people are just too damn sensitive and see racism where it doesn't exist.
It's amazing though to see how he makes sure he keeps his racist attitude. He ignores all the good one can see in black people, in fact he literally runs from it.
Anyway, sorry for the long rant. Don't be a Bruno.
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