The Personal Side of Bias, Prejudice, and Oppression

When I was in my late teens, there was a corner store that my cousins and I went to. We were not the rowdy type of teens, we were taught to always be respectful and conduct ourselves as though our parents have eyes everywhere. When we walked into the store the Asian man behind the counter yelled and told us to hurry up and buy. We looked around to see if he could possibly be talking to anyone else but it was only us who were in the store at the time. We decided to ignore his comment/demand and continued to look through the store for junk food. The man was eyeing us very hard. He told us to hurry up or get out of his store and we better not steal because he is watching us and he will call the cops if we give him any trouble. At that moment my oldest cousin was getting angry because we did not deserve the way we were being treated. We never cause trouble but we get treated as if we steal and/or do worse. I told my cousin to lets not spend our money here and leave, but before we could my cousin being the outspoken person she is told the man that because we are Black does not mean we will steal or destroy and she said it again in Chinese which shocked the man. He looked confused and we left the store.

Making the assumption that everyone that is Black does wrong is wrong. I do not like to be judged by the color of my skin and I think it is unjust to treat anyone the way they do not want to be treated. As far as my feelings were concerned, I was bothered by what was said and how we were treated. I started thinking about my mom, dad, and grandparents and knowing they may have been treated worse when they were my age. Sometimes incidents like that make you a stronger person.

For an incident like the one I experienced to change, the Asian man does not need to make assumptions based on skin complexion. If he wasn’t quick to pre-judge us he would have gotten our service. It makes me wonder how he has treated others that have come before and after us.