Wednesday, February 4, 2004

Why always the race card?

I am a French-Polish-Irish-Anglo-Dutch-American (I hope I didn’t miss one of my decendants) and am writing in response to the letter by Mr. Foster.

Why is the race card always played when someone disagrees with another’s opinion? [Citizen columnist J. Frank] Lynch merely pointed out statistics that may or may not add up to what you agree with, so Mr. Lynch is branded a racist, even had his last name associated with the mistreatment of slaves by one writer.

Quit being so thin-skinned! It was an opinion, not an accusation.

You said you want people to coexist with others that they were afraid of before, but yet, the African-Americans, as you choose to be called, try to segregate themselves more than any other race. Case in point: Miss Black America Pageant, BET Network, The Black Yellow Pages, to name a few.

Before you say that that is the only way blacks have a chance to showcase themselves, let’s not forget Bill Cosby, Redd Foxx, Flip Wilson, Diahann Carroll, Lena Horne, many others, all on network television, watched by Americans of many colors.

Now, I’m sure you’re going to say I’m a racist as well. Don’t waste your time. I attended by choice school in the city of Atlanta system, which at the time was not known for its white enrollment! All my friends were there, I was an athlete, so I chose to stay put during the “white flight” of the 1970s. (We lived in College Park; my mother was a school employee; I could have attended an “all-white” school, in case you’re wondering).

Remember, you said in your letter that America is for all Americans. You didn’t use any hyphens. Let’s try to correct the problems of the past instead of feeding off of them. Political correctness will be the downfall of this country before anything else.

Joseph Clark

Fayetteville, Ga.