Why does Black History Month offend you?
Why does Black History Month offend you?
No one is forcing you to celebrate BHM, so stop complaining about it.
“Why is it a month long? That’s just excessive,” she said, flipping her hair and turning back to her computer.
I closed my eyes, sitting at my desk across from this white lady and begging my ears to not let this Black History Month snipe travel to my brain. It didn’t work. My ears were tattletales. My hands started shaking. I just couldn’t believe that this woman had the audacity to yell this out for not only me to hear but for a couple of black folks in the next pod to overhear.
I swiveled in my chair, patiently trying to explain to her the significance of Carter G. Woodson. Instead she zeroed in on Negro History Week and said, “A week is fine. It should’ve been left at that.”
I gritted my teeth, stared at her and wondered how much I could say without getting termination papers. I finally settled on, “This conversation is over,” put my headphones on and tried unsuccessfully to go back to editing. Twenty-four hours later, I was still furious. We ended up in Human Resources. She learned the lesson the hard way.