Musings Of A New Southern Man

I am not afraid to state my views that the term "white privilege" should be erased from this and all subsequent debates about Caucasians and people of color. I do not hold a view that the racial injustices seen in multiple police incidents or the flying of Nazi or Confederate flags is not blatantly racist. What I am saying is that the term invites a reality that should be banished for all Americans, the idea that a person is judged and found guilty simply by the color of one's skin. The focus should be on the true causes behind such incidents: racial bias, racial discrimination, racial hatred, white nationalism, and other cancers on our society. Not all whites are biased, practice discrimination or hatred, but you can't talk about that with a group of white privilege believers. They know the guilty because they see skin color. Why do they stick so doggedly to such beliefs? It's easy. You don't have to know someone, talk with them about beliefs, and weigh

I am safely tucked away in my home, doing my part to beat the big, bad Coronavirus Pandemic. (It interrupts our lives in so many ways that it deserves capital letters.) My Deb and I know the value of social distancing because we're in both high-risk groups, being older than 60 and possessing health conditions. Not to sound melodramatic, but the entrance of coronavirus into our home has the potential to be a death sentence. I thus think and act differently. We often have groceries brought to our home, although I do go out to shop in rare instances. I made that most dreaded trip of all just yesterday, venturing into a Walmart. (Oh my!) I never shake hands anymore. The only person I hug is Deb. We don't get to see our grandchildren up close and personal even though we live about a 10-minute drive away. We see them via FaceTime. I was ready for this because of years of practice. In a way, I was made for this. One foundational plank in my makeup is that I can adapt to damned n

     I am always fascinated by Malcolm Gladwell's thoughts and analysis. I am increasingly interested in his observations on a tactic called priming that he examines in his book Blink. Here's a brief introduction to the concept.      A professor of psychology gave student volunteers a set of scrambled sentences. The professor didn't tell the participants anything about what the study was designed to do or what the sentences were intended to do. Here are some examples: 1.       him was worried she always 2.       shoes give replace old the 3.       be will sweat lonely they 4.       should now withdraw forgetful we 5.       sunlight makes temperature wrinkle raisins      The sentences are not meant to form a sentence or use words to form one. It’s to give indicator words to elicit an emotional response. What could be the object of such sentences? They all contain words that denote getting old.    There are terms such as “worried,”   "replace,"