When the melting pot explodes
Straight out of a seminar on race, I walked into a live demonstration of xenophobia and hate on a train.
I love New York, and if there is the slightest chance of going there I will take it, but after the many reports of anti-Asian hate crimes my enthusiasm has cooled. Of course I would still go, but I’d be paranoid. This essay first appeared in Twisted Travels.
In 1999 I took a seminar on Ethnicity, Race and Migration in the United States. We talked about how immigration has been the feelgood story of the peopling of America. We talked about the myth of the promised land and the reality of exclusion. We questioned the validity of the melting pot metaphor. Other metaphors were proposed, including the tossing of the national salad, the popcorn popper, and the oil refinery. At the end of the seminar I got on the train to New York, and on the ride from New Haven to Grand Central the metaphor blew up.
We were three Asian classmates: Taiwanese, Japanese, and Filipino. We dragged our huge suitcases into the 11:55 train, piled them on a chair, and settled into our seats. The doors slid shut, and we were on our way. There were three other people in the train car: a black man who was muttering to himself, and two white men who seemed to be having an argument. And then one of them said in a loud voice, “These stupid people can’t even plan their trip right. I can’t stand the sight of them.” The other man said, “We should have the same thing they have in Europe, where there’s first class cars, second class, third class…”
He had been ranting for five minutes when it occurred to me that he might be referring to us, the Asians. I looked over at my classmates, but they were laughing about something. They probably hadn’t noticed anything. I myself wasn’t sure what the man was talking about, because he said, “These people can’t even speak English.” Surely he couldn’t have been referring to us, because we had been speaking in English the whole time.
To my knowledge I had never encountered racism, at least not directly. The possibility that I was a target because I looked different came as a shock. The timing was too perfect: read a stack of books on the subject, then experience it for yourself. I had thought that if it ever happened to me I would have seizures of indignation, but when it did happen I could not react fully because I was in denial.
The conductor came in and told us that we had to put our luggage in the overhead racks or in the vestibule. As we got up to arrange our bags, the angry white man let out a snort. The black man stood up and helped us. “It’s very heavy,” I warned him as he hoisted my suitcase onto the rack. He said it was alright, then he helped my classmates with their bags. We thanked him profusely, and he shrugged and returned to his seat.
At the next stop five people got on the train: a white couple with two small blonde children, and a black woman in her 20s. The couple and their kids sat in front of us. “Are we there yet?” the little blonde girl asked every 30 seconds.
The black woman was carrying a box of doughnuts and the New York Times. There was a Walkman on her belt, and the headphones were around her neck. I could hear Latin jazz coming from the headset. She sat beside me, opened the newspaper, and began to read.
A few minutes later the angry white man turned to the black woman and snarled, “Can you turn that thing off so we don’t have to listen to it?”
The black woman looked up from the Times and replied, “If you’d asked me nicely I would’ve turned it off, but since you’re yelling at me, I won’t.”
The angry white man turned several shades of red. “That’s what you people do! You come here and bother us…”
“What do you mean, my people?” she said. “You can’t yell at me, Mr Prejudice.” Her tone was calm and a little tired, like she had to put up with this on a regular basis. I would’ve shown the man my copy of Berlin’s Many Thousands Gone: The First Two Centuries of Slavery in North America, but it was in my suitcase and I don’t think he would’ve appreciated it anyway.
The commotion attracted a passenger from the next car. I don’t know if he was black or white, but he had a tan. He stood in front of the angry white man and said, “Mister, you need to chill out.”
At this point the angry white man was ready to burst a blood vessel. “This woman is disturbing us and being rude!” he sputtered.
“You’re the one who’s being rude,” she retorted.
“Mister, chill out,” said the passenger who’d intervened. “Or I’ll make you chill out. I was a U.S. marine, I’m not kidding.”
The white man continued to rage, and the black woman continued to insult him. “You’re full of shit,” she told him. “If you don’t like it in this car, go sit somewhere else.”
The conductor came in to punch our tickets. “Are passengers allowed to play their music on the train and disturb everyone?” the angry white man demanded. The conductor looked at him without expression and walked away.
“You’re not allowed to yell at me and insult me, Mr Prejudice,” said the black woman. Finally the angry white man realized he was not going to win the argument with his scintillating personality. Still ranting, though less audibly, he got up and moved to another car.
“Now that he’s gone, I’m going to turn the music off,” the black woman announced. The Latin jazz stopped.
The passenger who had intervened walked over to her. “I’m sorry this happened,” he said, patting her arm. “Don’t let it ruin your day, sweetheart.”
“If he’d asked me nicely I would’ve turned it off,” she said again.
The little blonde girl knelt on her seat and peered at the black woman. “You said a bad word,” she whispered.
“I’m sorry, sweetie,” the woman said, “I didn’t see you. If I’d known you were here, I wouldn’t have said it.” She smiled at the little girl. “You’re adorable.”
The train reached Grand Central Station without further incident. I think of that woman sometimes, and I hope she is safe and having a good life.