I can’t remember his actual first name, but “Baby” Wade was a small cocky little bastard with a huge attitude. His buddy, Roy Woodton, was a physically big more mature guy built like a fireplug. Between them they devised a scheme to intimidate usually the smaller shy white kids to hand over their lunch money each day to avoid getting beat up. “Baby” Wade was the mouth and Woodton was the enforcer. I just tried to avoid them as much as possible.
Ronald “Butch” Boyko was a big white kid. A bully himself. I don’t know how Butch and I started to hang out together but we did. One day on the way to the school cafeteria, Butch and I went into the Boys Room. The only two other guys in there were “Baby” Wade and Roy Woodton apparently just hanging around looking for opportunities to expand their protection racket. Butch and I ignored them at first and went about our business. But soon the little punk, Wade, made his pitch. “Hey white boy, gimme your lunch money or we gonna kick yur ass”.
I replied, “Don’t have any lunch money”, but Butch told them “Yeah, you gonna kick ass and take our money? Then come and get it”. And it was on, Boyko with Woodton and me with “Baby” Wade. I really wasn’t a fighter, but I had no choice; too late to talk our way out of this. Boyko was getting the upper hand with Woodton and when I got in a good shot to the midsection Wade winced and doubled over, they both quit fighting and made a quick exit from the lavatory. I thought it wasn’t over though and we would surely be ambushed on the way home from school that day. But no, we made it home without incident.
However, about a week later after gym class when I went into the locker room to shower and change into my street clothes there was a whole group waiting for me including Woodton, Wade and about six or seven others. I knew I had an ass kicking coming my way, so I just covered up and let it happen. The gym teacher heard the ruckus and a few minutes later came into the locker room and broke it up.
Once I cleaned up, he took me into his office and tried to get me to explain what was going on in there. I told him nothing was going on just a little misunderstanding, that’s all. He kept up the interrogation, but I refused to tell the whole story. I just clamed up.
The next gym class we had wrestling. I was matched with a white guy about my size and weight and was waiting on the sidelines for the bout to begin. Wade and Woodton came up behind me and started to give me tips on how to take this guy down. Suddenly they were my newest best friends. I don’t remember how the match turned out – I probably lost, but the advice from my two new buddies was well taken.
Afterward I reasoned that since I didn’t squeal on these guys about the ass kicking in the locker room, I earned their respect, or something. Anyway, I didn’t start hanging out with Wade and Woodton, but I didn’t have any trouble with any of the badass black kids after that. And no one ever approached me for my lunch money again. Honor among thieves, I guess. I was starting to learn how to deal with these guys. Mouth shut, ears open, a keen sense of situational awareness and become the master of the art of slipping away at the first signs of trouble. Once I perfected it this skill served me well in adulthood when I started to travel extensively outside of the US to some pretty unsavory locations.
I also learned another thing during those years in junior high. The students, primarily the black kids, but some whites as well, were well armed. I never saw a switchblade knife until I entered the seventh grade and what in the hell was a gravity knife anyway? A gravity knife is a switchblade without a spring. The blade is exposed by flipping the knife with your wrist, so it locks open. These knives are for one purpose only, intimidation as a prelude to knife fights. The first time I ever saw an actual pistol was in a kid’s locker in that school. I quickly determined that after school detention was to be avoided at all costs. It was like an armed camp in there! You could get into serious trouble in a heartbeat.
Whenever I misbehaved, I mean seriously misbehaved, which was fairly often in my grammar and high school years, my parents would always chastise me and try to scare me straight with the same idle threat, “If you don’t behave, we’re going to send you to reform school”. Funny thing is I already regarded this as reform school, especially Junior High. I mean how bad could reform school be compared to this kind of bullshit?
The Talk – John Derbyshire – written after the murder of two young British tourists in Sarasota, Florida.
The essay was written by a journalist for the National Review. In this day and age of hypersensitive political correctness he was deemed a racist based on the ideas he put forth in this essay and was fired for publishing this piece. I won’t pass judgement on that aspect, but I will say the essay is a pretty accurate representation of my personal experience in junior high and high school. And I’ll add that I’ve followed his guidance, especially the points outlined in items 10a thru 10i, in my encounters with people of various ethnicities and backgrounds in my travels where I’ve frequently been in the minority. I’ve survived unscathed thus far and so regard it as sound advice.
NOTE from Jill Johnston – I have not included the excerpt here due to the radical views within the piece and do not want to spur any connection between this post and John Derbyshire, however, if interested, the actual article piece can be found here.
When I was at my first full time job at Heller Machine, an old toolmaker I worked with told me a story that described his take on racial issues. The truck driver for Heller Machine Tool company, Fritz LaRue, was a Hattian immigrant. One day I mentioned to the old toolmaker that Fritz seemed like a pretty good guy. He said, “Yeah he’s a good guy when he is around here, but I wouldn’t put too much stock in that under other circumstances.” I asked, “Like what other circumstances?” He then told me the following story. He said, “If you’re in a situation where it’s you and a black guy, that black guy will bend over backwards to be friendly. If a second black shows up that friendly attitude will be cut in half. And when the third one shows up, they’ll start telling you what to do.”
I hadn’t thought much about that tale for many years, but recently here in Fernandina Beach, Florida I went down Main Street some distance out of town to buy some new clothes, a shirt and pair of shorts. I didn’t have a car at that time, so I took the Trolley that makes a circuit around the island. It was a brutally hot Florida summer day so after I purchased the clothes, I went to the adjacent park to sit in the shade of a small Gazebo and wait for the trolley. As I was sitting there, and older black guy showed up and sat down near me. He smiled and we exchanged the, “How you doing today?” courtesies. We had a short friendly conversation and just sat back and enjoyed the shade.
A few minutes later a second old black guy showed up and the two of them started talking and I was basically ignored. We briefly made eye contact and I smiled and gave a friendly nod. It wasn’t returned. That was okay with me. No harm no foul.
A while later a third black guy approached on a bicycle. An old fat tire bike that was pimped out in a garish fashion. It had more lights and stuff dangling off it then you could shake a stick at. It reminded me of a pimpmobile. Well he got off the bike and engaged in conversation with the other two black guys and completely ignored me as now did the other two. Which was okay. But as time passed, the environment became increasingly tense.
There was a feeling that came over the Gazebo that was hard to describe, a certain tension in the air. I finally decided I better not stay any longer, picked up my package and wandered out to the street corner to wait for my ride. Fortunately, it came a few minutes later and I left. On the way back to the Marina, I thought about that conversation with the old toolmaker at Heller Machine and Tool nearly fifty years ago. I also thought about Derbyshire’s rules no. 4 and 10e.
Rule No. (4) The default principle in everyday personal encounters is, that as a fellow citizen, with the same rights and obligations as yourself, any individual black is entitled to the same courtesies you would extend to a nonblack citizen. That is basic good manners and good citizenship.
Rule No. (10e) if you are at some public event at which the number of blacks suddenly swells, leave as quickly as possible.
Some might think of me as racist for the strategy I employed that day but they would be wrong. I’ve followed Derbyshire’s rule No. 4 in many encounters in my worldwide travels as my first reaction, or as he calls it the default position, and it has served me well. I also follow it with the southern rednecks I encounter here in Florida all the time. So far so good, it’s kept me out of trouble this far.
My Take on the Talk
This essay by John Derbyshire, particularly in today’s hyper politically correct environment, was widely viewed as a racist rant. I personally didn’t see it that way. From my experience, it is perceptive observation and practical advice. However, I do take issue with some of his points that reek with British sarcasm (items 13, 14 and 15) and I have no references for mean intelligence cited in item 11. I presume these are the items that provoked the most ire from his critics.
An Engineer’s Take on Racism
A few years ago, I read an interesting non-fiction book by Tracy Kidder titled “The Soul of a New Machine”. Kidder, a professional author, observed a group of engineers for a full year at Data General Corporation as they developed a new state of the art supercomputer. Data General assembled a team of top engineers to develop the breakthrough technology. The group consisted of hardware and software specialists and was comprised of both males and females and also reflected a diversity of ethnic backgrounds.
The group included Caucasian, Asian, East Indian, and Afro-Americans. The group wasn’t selected for diversity but for their individual capability. During the year it took to complete the project, Kidder made an interesting observation. He drew a comparison between the engineers thought process with their product development and relationships with each other with the binary computer language they were working with. He imagined the binary language as an accurate reflection of the engineers’ thought processes; that is zero and one, or on and off. Correct answers equaled on and wrong answers equaled off. When individual members of the team consistently got right answers they were fully accepted and maintained their status as valuable members of the team. But if they got the wrong answers they were excluded from the team without exception.
I’m not a software engineer, but from my experience as simply an engineer his observation was accurate. As Tracy Kidder correctly pointed out, engineers, by instinct and training, have a very strong inclination to regard all things in binary fashion, forming our opinions based purely on logic. We judge both ourselves and others this way. If others consistently come up with correct answers about things that we have previously considered and thought through, they are highly regarded. If they come up with wrong answers, they are disregarded or ignored. This characteristic, for better or worse, is our primary criteria. It’s not dependent on race, color, creed, religion, nationality, feelings or any other of a myriad of social differences. It’s a judgement based purely on reason and logic. This principle applies to all kinds of behavior, not only mathematical and scientific questions. It applies to what is generally regarded as acceptable and normal patterns of behavior as well.
On my final annual review the year, before I retired from Air Products, my boss gave me excellent marks for on the job performance but also told me I had one problem. He said that when I tell someone something and they don’t listen to me I never speak to them again. I stared back at him and said, “So what’s your point?”
I thought about his comment afterward and had to agree. I’ll generally talk with anyone and I always try my best to be cordial and polite, never rude. But if I judge they are not open to a rational discussion, just want to argue for the sake of arguing, are totally illogical or otherwise generally a pain in the ass I won’t waste any more time. I follow my dog’s example. She takes a shit, kicks a little sand over it and moves on.
Good luck, so long, and have a nice day.
Long Story Short: A Collection of Stories by Hal Gunardson 