Racism, it may not look like what you think.

I have gleaned from social media that after the Montreal Canadiens beat the Boston Bruins in double overtime, with the game winning goal coming from P.K. Subban, that he was called names based on the colour of his skin. I'll be honest here, I was actually quite surprised. Why was I surprised you might wonder? I was surprised because his skin colour had nothing to do with their win or the Bruins loss!

I believe that because these "low brow" Neanderthals just had nothing else to blame their defeat on, they picked the lowest hanging fruit possible in their anger. It's hard to say if these cretins are like this all the time or not, but a couple things of note are 1. we can often say things we don't mean when we are emotional. And also contradictory  2. We often show our true nature when under the same emotions.

That being said, let me tell you a story of a hate crime perpetrated on myself due to racism. I was best of friends with an native individual in elementary school, until our last year. We would sleep over at each others houses, spent lots of time together, and I even spent time with him on their reservation. We had a great time together, or so I thought, but that all changed in our final year. The thing is that I hadn't changed over the summer, and I thought our friendship would pick up where it left off, but apparently I was no longer "worthy" of being his friend. Apparently now my skin colour was vile and loathsome to him and his new "friends", and they made it known to me in no uncertain terms one day. I got off with just a few bumps and bruises, but what hurt the most was not knowing what I had done to deserve being treated like that. Trying to figure it out as a 13 year old was not easy, and it took me years to understand that it wasn't anything I had done, The change was all in my one time friend, who now hated me for nothing more than the colour of my skin.

Sure minority groups have been oppressed and targeted in the past, but as personally I found out, Racism is not limited to race, creed, religion, or colour. Racism is a learned behaviour, whether actively taught, or through observational learning, it is being passed on, and it needs to stop. If the colour of someone's skin, or where they come from bothers you, you are probably one of the aforementioned cretins (which goes for everyone).