Unsure of how to handle racist remarks
Carolyn Hax is away. The following first appeared Nov. 26, 2006, and Jan. 12, 2007
DEAR CAROLYN: How do you deal with a friend who occasionally makes you feel uncomfortable with her use of racial epithets? She is otherwise a great friend who is always there for me and others. My discomfort with this has increased because people in my husband’s family have married outside their race — and I must add, to very wonderful people whom I have gotten closer to recently.
Is it worth confronting my friend on my feelings, or should I just accept that she has a bad habit of being racially insensitive in her conversations and overlook her comments?
—S. DEAR S.: Eating too many Twinkies is a bad habit. Biting your nails is a bad habit. I think anyone who has been on the receiving end of an epithet will tell you that using them is not a “bad habit.” It’s the release of linguistic toxins into the air, and it denies anyone who comes in contact, even secondhand, an opportunity to breathe the clean air of mutual respect.
It’s ignorance, fear and injustice.
I’m glad your rainbow of wonderful in-laws helped stir up your sympathies, but even if it were a rainbow of despicable in-laws, your duty would be the same. Whether they are wonderful or despicable speaks to their character, remember, not their race. That’s why epithets are so ugly.
You say she is a good friend to you. Be a good friend to her and point out — when she uses them in your presence — that these terms disturb you. There’s always a chance she doesn’t quite know what she’s saying, in which case you’ll save her from dropping more bombs. And if she does know, then you’ll have made it clear that not even friends are safe havens for hate.
DEAR CAROLYN: When my soon-to-be fiance and I were first dating two years ago, I was a little insecure and he was a little overbearing, and I told him a little white lie about my educational history.
He is somewhat annoyingly obsessed with educational credentials, and I felt he was breathing down my neck. Rather than be mature and tell him to get over it, I was a wimp and lied. We barely knew each other, and I never suspected we’d be together long-term. Lesson learned. Now we are planning to get married, and I feel horrible about this. My boyfriend abhors lying and is very sensitive about trust issues. Moreover, he has forwarded my white lie on to several people, while I cringed. How can I come clean but do some damage control? I really love him and have been honest with him otherwise.
— Penitent Pinocchio
DEAR PENITENT PINOCCHIO:
Shuffle, backpedal, dance, bob, weave, cringe, tiptoe-tiptoetiptoe. You must be exhausted.
He “abhors lying”? And the rest of us, what, dig it? A control freak by any other self-important, self-righteous name still smells as ... controlly.
You know what I mean. But this doesn’t need to be about him. If you’re still so fearful of his disapproval you can’t tell him an awkward truth, then your entire relationship is a white lie. Tell him. Face the damage.
I believe the right person for you will forgive your insecurity — as long as you admit to it, no excuses — and do some soulsearching about his own heavyhandedness. If you believe this, too, then you need to find out whether he’s really the guy you want to marry. He either responds warmly and lifts the weight of your secret off your shoulders, or punishes you and the weight of a smug, unyielding mate is off your shoulders.
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