Just would like to pass

[heaven05]

a couple of experiences I've had concerning two people women who are AA who got rides from me in my capacity as a ride share driver.
Both women over the course of a month and one half had been run off the road on the same expressway, trumpland territory, by 'good old boys' in their souped up dodge rams and ford 350's with the mad max crash bars on the front of their 'beasts'.

One telling me her experience was close to tears in relating her story because her young child was in the car. She was injured, but not badly, but car was pretty messed up, her words. The other dumb fuck ran her off the road but also miscalculated and ended up rolling over himself...she made a police report when they arrived, he got injured enough to be transported, according to her, yet nothing legal has transpired yet. She had retained a lawyer.

Just a heads up people. I remember my parents warning me that when I started driving to be aware of my surroundings, AT ALL TIMES. DRIVING IS A FULL TIME JOB, that from my driver training instructor. In the old south if a then negro had a car they ran the risk of this happening. Evidently, if you have an Obama sticker, HRC sticker or are AA this racist behavior is back. Be careful.

[sheshe2]

1. After my tailgating experience...

you suggested I take my stickers off and I did. I don't know trucks, I just know it was bigger than my car. You know that message on your side view mirror...'objects are closer than they appear'...that being said, I could not even see his front grill. I have become more aware and have also taken to locking my car doors...when I remember.

I am glad your friends are safe...that had to have been a terrifying experience.

[Quayblue]

2. It's crazy up here in upstate NY

I'm ready to move.

"Unpresidented" banners, blue lives matters flags and bumper stickers. I just may have to uproot us for the sake of kiddos. My kids grandparents have a bitch-made flying a confederate flag and an "unpresidented" flag 5 houses up the block.

I recently had an optometry appointment and brought them with me. They got started on the dude in the white house and my heart started racing. Mind you, they're 9. The office staff got really quiet. I paid my copays and got us the fuck up outta there.

It fucking sucks to live in defensive mode. I found my first streak of gray hairs today. It was a whole goddamn patch of em lol!

Which leads me here...minorities of any color, gender, religion, sexuality... We need to start protecting our mental health. We have been tried and will continue to be. As long as America chooses to be slow on acknowledging the bullshit that has us where we are today, why wait to make ourselves whole.

Get a lawyer, then find a therapist.

This is a long war.

[heaven05]

4. unprecedented times and

I really am worried. Especially after watching the orange clown in Europe. He's is a bully boy-potus, NOT respected by any of those he bullies.

[Kind of Blue]

3. My experience this past fall was being profiled by a white street person.

We were at a street fair in my old neighborhood that holds the largest fair in SoCal. A very, very diverse neighborhood from Africans, African-Americans, Latinos, Asians, and Europe-Americans and the fair attracts everybody up and down the state. It's so huge that it's a 2-day weekend affair.

It's hot and I lose my mom and sisters in the throng of people. I decided to sit on a bench and just watch the masses parade up and down, figured eventually I'd spot my family. Soon, an old bum sits down, too, with huge plate of food. He's dressed in a completely soiled shirt and suit. We exchange greetings. Then he says, "You're a fine figure of a nigger." I decide to ignore him and he continues to ramble growing uncomfortable trying to explain himself. I ignore him. Then he gets agitated and then angry and laughs nervously. I ignore him. Then two white police officers pass. The bum sets his plate down, jumps up yelling, "Officers! Officers!" He catches up to the cops on the corner, continues talking and pointing at me.

I can't hear what he's telling them but now I'm stunned. Actually petrified for the first time that all the cops have to do is believe him and I'm in trouble for doing NOTHING. The cops are looking at me, assessing what to make of me. They decide to leave me alone and walk away from the bum, I'm almost positive their gestures reassures the man to contact them if I give him anymore trouble.

The man spins around. He watches as I pick up his plate of delicious smelling food and toss it into the trash bin.

[heaven05]

5. "fine figure of a n*****"????!!!!!

damn. Sometimes you just have to walk away, if you can. I really do expect some kind of social upheaval, don't know if it will be racial or class oriented.

[Kind of Blue]

6. Yeah, I honestly decided to ignore him because, after all,

he is a street person. But this was the first time in my life of many incidents with supremacy did LBJ's words knocked me upside the head, "If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man..." And I'm not saying I'm the best PoC but the power that any of them have to upend our lives is undeniable.

A social worker friend of mine, an AA female, told me the other day that she's experiencing an increased level of outright racism on the job since 45 took office, just blatant shit that even the lowest hid before that she didn't know was in them.

I don't know which upheaval will come first but I think it will be social and not racial, which has been the trend when we come to rally with white allies in the past, always failure. We'll see.

Thanks for posting, heaven05. These incidents are so normalized that I even forgot about it a few days later.