"I don't see color. I was raised to treat everyone equal, Jane Elliott doesn't know what saying"

[Sgent]

39. I was raised like this by my parents

I even dated (briefly) someone who was black in my younger years while still thinking this way.

It wasn't honestly until Obama ran that I finally started to understand why what I was taught was well meaning, but wrong. I heard someone give the response to this that we can't just be not racist, we have to actively be anti-racist. I got the concept of individual racism -- and I nor my parents were individually racist -- I wasn't the one telling racist stories at the campfire, or refusing to allow black members of my fraternity. I had black friends at birthday parties -- and my parents actually took flack from neighbors for it (although I didn't know it at the time).

However, I never got the concept of institutional racism and systemic racism until the last decade or so -- even after being a member for a while of DU. It didn't fully sink in for me until Mitch Landrieu started taking down the confederate statues in New Orleans that had been erected by the Daughters of the Confederacy to drive home the lost cause narrative.

People can learn but you have to give them a chance.