[Guest M]

Being a racial or ethnic minority has a way of making it even harder to be individuals with unique, diverse interests. Marginalized communities appear to me to "double down" on the subtle stereotypical mainstream expectations so that they are almost caricatures. Men aren't just a little jockish...they're "macho" to the point of looking ridiculous. I feel so much sympathy for many other black people I have met who never felt like they belonged in the black communities or weren't "black enough." I've met so many of them now it has convinced me that we're all actually internalizing the same message, but it's not reflective of the truth at all. For some reason, we keep reinforcing the cages we're held in by allowing ourselves to be isolated in our unique interests, and believing that's what's expected of us. it takes a lot of strength to forge our own way. It kind of grates on me that Christianity is the supposed expectation for black people, and that they perpetuate the same superstitions and anti-black prejudice toward religions that their own ancestors practiced. Talk about internalized hatred! I do hope much of that and so many other things are changing with the rise of the Information Age, where we can connect with others not bound by time and location.