Us and Them

Living and working in a neighborhood reflecting a vibrant cross-section of the world, (and its corresponding racial/ethnic/income/class divides), I have come to believe that we process "Us" and "Them" as a kind of default setting. We sort out information from the time we first begin to take in the world, categorizing the world by comparing everything new and unknown to the already familiar, to our comfort zones. Even in suburban strip mall America, people from all over the world are living their lives alongside others whose default settings may at first – or perhaps forever - seem illogical, abnormal, different, leading to all sorts of uneasy encounters.

My own racial and ethnic biases reveal themselves inopportunely, and more often than I would like to admit. Hidden biases give lie to my "open-mindedness." It remains an ongoing challenge to be willing to follow through and do the work to change my own buried assumptions after they reveal themselves. They are so insidious, when I remind myself that "others" have may not have had the same opportunities or advantages as I may have had, I am forgetting even how arrogant this thinking may be, depending on the circumstances.

As an example, when I lived in the Middle East and could not (legally) drive, the compound bus drivers who took turns chauffeuring us to the souks and other markets came from many countries: the Philippines, Eritrea, India, Ethiopia, Sri Lanka. To navigate the streets safely required considerable skill. With some drivers, I was alert, ready to dive into a protective stance. Others were steady, calm, reassuring. One of my favorites was a Filipino. I wish I could remember his name. For months I assumed he was, like many of the men working far away from their homes and families, desperately poor, without other options, living on tea, khubz (pita bread), hummus and ful medames (fava beans). Many men from all over the world worked for years in oil-rich countries, packed at night into non-air-conditioned rooms they shared with other men, saving most of their money to send home.

Although the driver's English was pretty fluent, he spoke it hesitantly and his teeth were in bad shape. I always tried to tip him well, pitying him. Over the months, as I learned more of his story, I learned how wrong my first assumptions had been. He had come to the country as a petroleum engineer, with advanced degrees, and had been working there, between visits home, for more than 20 years. After a few years in the sand and sun, he decided to look for work where he could sit in air-conditioned comfort. The bus-driving job was his second, just for extra cash. He was looking forward to his retirement, having saved enough over the years to have bought enough apartments and other investment properties to live out his days in comfort, sitting in a villa surrounded by extended family members in their villas, all in the compound he had built for them by the sea.

Wow, did I feel ignorant.

Today, much as I like to think I have a better understanding of "other" people and cultures (and awareness of my own biases), when driving in some Seattle neighborhoods, I often find I have to fight the urge to check the car doors, to see if they are locked. The impulse is there, before I am really aware of it, when a dark-skinned youth or man walks near the car. What if his skin color were shades lighter and not associated in the news (and in my imagination, if I am honest), with violence and crime? Would it even occur to me to lock the doors?

I have to calculate the damage done if I can't help myself and lock the door, just as the car passes him, our eyes locking. How often has the same scenario played out for him? If he were my son, how would I feel? What would I tell him about how to respond, how to process that repeated experience? How many times in his lifetime has he heard the locks click just as someone has driven by?