Extreme Confusion

“Why is it that the images of Black people in popular culture and mass media are so often reduced to a racial stereotype? Where did this “Other” as object, as exotic, and as spectacle for public consumption and amusement come from?” Through this quote, Coleman seems to reduce everything that has been going through my head into a few short sentences. For most of my life, I have maintained (not deliberately of course) a child-like ignorance about racism. All I really knew is what I saw and heard about. I went to a private school and most of my peer interaction was with white kids. My friends that were black were very much, like me. I was ignorant to “black culture” and this “other” that Coleman references. I have always felt very hesitant about addressing racial issues in anyway because I was ignorant of them for most of my young life. My mind could never fully wrap itself around the socially perpetuated idea of white people as “better” in any way. From childhood, if we are not taught, we derive our conclusions through what we see and hear. Coleman writes a lot about the various facets of oppression in mass media, the very real manifestation of black stereotypes and the public’s “continued embracing of racist imagery.” I continue to wrestle with this and will not hide behind the two terms which plague me most right now which I cannot confuse with one another: innocence and ignorance. I apologize for not really pertaining to our topic. I'm just trying to stack up the building blocks right now.