Rough Encounters with Blacks Taught Me Racial Differences

This is part of our continuing series of accounts by readers of how they shed the illusions of liberalism and became race realists.

I spent my childhood in the Upper Midwest, where there were very few non-whites, and never thought much about race. When I was a teenager, some of my family and I moved to the Deep South, a place I knew little about, except that “we” had beaten “them” in the Civil War.

Although the South certainly has more blacks than the Midwest, I didn’t meet very many of them — at first. My high school was largely white, as was the Southeastern Conference college I attended. Whatever Northerner prejudice I might have had quickly disappeared. I fell in love with Southerners: their kindness, humility, gentleness, warmth, and wholesome values. I was so glad to have found this misunderstood people, and to become part of them myself.

At the end of college, I moved into a black neighborhood. “Why not?” I thought to myself. It was very affordable. And besides, I believed in equality and racial justice. When I first toured the property, there was a big crowd of black teenagers running around in the parking lot playing ball. “No worries,” I thought. Once I moved in, my attitudes about race got a wakeup call. The black tenants were often intimidating and unsettling. One time, a group of black men started following me for no apparent reason. After that, I started worrying a lot about my own personal safety. It was not uncommon for me to hear people screaming and shouting at each other through the walls. I breathed in fumes of marijuana smoke seeping through the walls on a recurring basis. I would stuff towels at the bottom of the door, and open the windows, but it didn’t make a difference. When I finally called the police about it, they did nothing. When I’d pull up to park at my own building, the kids loitering about would glare at me. One day, a brick smashed through my apartment window — it wasn’t even dark out, this happened in broad daylight. I knew I had to get out. I handed a letter to management to let me terminate my lease early. “I’m not welcome here,” I wrote.

But leaving didn’t end my negative experiences with blacks. Another time, I was walking through a poor black neighborhood and some black teenagers started following me. They were riled up and angry for no discernible reason. Then they attacked me, punching and kicking me. It was a whirlwind, and I was knocked to the ground. They kept beating me all the same. Plenty of black adults were outside when it happened, but they just watched. Nobody intervened, even while I was shouting for someone to call the police. By the end of it I was bleeding, my clothing was torn, and my glasses were broken in two. One of the old black men who had seen everything walked over to me, helped me stand up, and gave me a hug. As I started walking away, I shouted back at my attackers. One mentioned something about them getting a gun. The old man who had helped me warned me that I better get going, “or there ain’t gonna be a tomorrow.” Finally, the police showed up and escorted me away.

Another time, when I was out West, I was sitting at a bus stop, reading on my phone, and a black guy walked up to me, and said, “I’M GONNA STAB YOU!” I quickly got away and dialed 911. The officers came and questioned the two of us separately, then said to me that they couldn’t do anything unless I wanted to press charges in court. Funny thing: before my interruption, I had been reading on my phone about the uproar over a Starbucks employee calling the police on two black men in Philadelphia. “No, thanks, I don’t want to be famous,” I replied.

Soon after, I asked myself, “How many more times will I find myself near some unhinged, potentially violent black stranger?” I decided to research black crime statistics, and that’s how I found Jared Taylor and American Renaissance. The data I found on AmRen did not surprise me. I still have no desire to be “racist” in terms of being mean to people based on their race. I’ve always tried to be nice to blacks. But blacks often seem predisposed against me just for being an intelligent and principled “white boy.” It’s extremism to deny significant differences in violent crime and intelligence between whites and blacks.

AmRen helps keep me sane, especially the weekly podcasts. Listening to them always gives me quite the mix of emotions: anger, amusement, and astonishment. They also remind me of the importance of my plan to get ready to leave America.

If you have a story about how you became racially aware, we’d like to hear it. If it is well written and compelling, we will publish it. Use a pen name, stay under 1,200 words, and send it to us here.