Anonymous wrote:Me: I think I have pneumonia. I'm going to go to the doctor.
Mom: Don't go there! The nurse is crazy!

Me: I'm going to go to a financial advisor.
Mom: Don't do that, they'll just take your money!

Me: I'm going to the eye doctor.
Mom: Don't do that! Just buy glasses at the drug store!

Me: I'm going to have lunch with a friend.
Mom: I wouldn't bother with her. You need new friends.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My mother was visiting the city from her upper-middle class suburbs in which she's lived for 40 years (she is about 60). We are white, and in a car, at an intersection. A black man carrying a long (non-fold up) umbrella strides across the street in front of us.

My mom: Oh, there are a lot of those where we live.
My sister and I: A lot of what? A lot of black people?
My mom: Black people carrying assault rifles down the street, yes
My sister and I: In your GATED senior community of upper-middle class people?
My mom: Yes
My sister and I: Dad, do you find this to be the case?
My dad: No. I have no idea what your mother is talking about.
My sister: Mom, that was an umbrella, not an assault rifle
My mom: well, it looked like an assault rifle
Me: Mom, have you ever seen an assault rifle in real life?
My dad: No she hasn't.

I feel like it'd be a bit of an understatement to say my mom's a racist.

this cracked me up.

Anonymous wrote:I was venting to my mother about my infertility woes. To comfort me, she then told me of a woman she knew who had IF, took her friend's child's baby and raised this child as her own, when the child was a teen, the truth started coming out. blah blah. This went on and on.

Finally, I interrupted her and asked who this woman is. She would be my mom's age and I'd be sure to know her, or at least the daughter that was raised without knowing her bio-mom.

She tells me its from XYZ soap opera. She does this all the time so it's hard for us to figure out if the stories she tells us are of real people of soap opera story lines.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

My mom is also an old-fashioned not-a-racist. She thinks that hiring a person of color, having a polite conversation, or admitting that people of color can be hardworking and pleasant, all make her not-a-racist. Of course, she's the one who, as you heard about on a previous thread like this, said "It's so nice to see a black man taking care of his children!" Loudly. In a public enclosed space. As I dragged her away in mortification, she protested "What? I said it was NICE!"

Confession: I have very little exposure to black people and thus, most of what I "know" comes from tv, and that one black girl who was my college roommate for 2 months back in '94. So I could see myself thinking/saying something like that. The majority of black people I see are 1. security guards standing outside Marshalls or Ross or outside the bank, 2, black guys unloading boxes of food in the supermarket, who, if I ask if they know where Wheat Thins or something are, won't make eye contact and mumble,or 3 the clump of black kids on the trains talking loudly to each other and cursing a ton.

So I'd be thrilled to be exposed to and have the opportunity to become friends with black people who are ... different from those people.