How do you respond when you see people treating other people badly because of their race?
The following excerpt comes from my friend Chris Baron, who is white and of Jewish descent and married to a Filipina –and the dad of two Hapa kids. But from his blond-haired, blue-eyed surfer looks a store cashier might have made assumptions about what was okay to say.
Today at my local Vons, I watched a Filipino woman struggling with the little card machine as she tried to pay. I watched the cashier roll her eyes. After the Filipino woman left, the cashier began to complain, “how hard is it to read the questions on the little machine? Sheesh”
“I don’t know?” I said.
I did my transaction, and she said, “see, it’s not that hard, you just read and follow directions..I don’t know what is wrong with some people.”
I paused, “What if someone does not read English? “ I asked.
She looked at me, surprised, “Then they shouldn’t be shopping here,” she said with conviction.
“Do you really mean that?” I asked.
There was a dramatic pause that shook the line, “sort of,” she said.
I looked at her, “You should think that through that a bit. Night!”
So…should there be further steps taken? Please tell me what you think.