In the aftermath of viral the video dubbed “BBQ Becky” many comments on the video combined with social media stalkers have charged me with being racist. Why? Because I mentioned race in the video.
In one case I had a white man who I had thought was a social media friend enraged with me because he felt the term “Becky” was racist. All he heard was people making fun of the alleged woman in the video, Jennifer Schulte. The comments about raisins in potato salad and seasoning in barbecue became insults in his eyes that he felt targeted him as a white man.
I was surprised the man could not understand the video considering we had become friends online talking many hours about bay area hip-hop music, which is mainly black culture. What was even more surprising was, he had never taken the time to watch the video or read any articles on the incident. All he cared about was what was said on Twitter.
The fact is, I did not make those comments. I did not make the video about race on purpose. I only said what I was thinking, and manipulated the woman away from the two men the only way I knew how. She had taken one of the men’s business card out of my hand intending to report him and harass him further at his job. The fact that I had told one of the officers, and immediately left the scene once I was asked to as I watched the officer take the business card from her.
None of these details matter and I could not believe someone who claimed to be a friend would attack me and believe a stranger on a video. It took some thought, but I realized that this friend was someone who I only knew online, I never met him in person. It was not a problem to block him and remove him from my life. I also reflected on how lonely he was in a town away from most civilization in which he lived in with his family all of his life. He did not know anything else. He did not see himself as racist and could never understand how offensive his stance had become, blaming me for all the online attention and remarks that I could not control.
So I decided to make a video where I describe a story from when I was in high school. I realized that I had lived in the same town most of my life. I was born in San Francisco and taught about many different cultures from my dad. He took me to museums and taught me to respect different cultures. But as my dad moved to Texas when I was ten, I had spent most of my life living with my mom in Pacifica, CA surrounded by many close-minded people who did not care to understand anything more than what society expected of them. The people I grew up around were bullies, materialistic, and the community would not accept you if you did not fit a specific look. Thin with European features wearing the latest fashions was the only way you would get true acceptance.
I started to believe that I would learn so much more if I surrounded myself with different people. So I enrolled in a school, Westmoor High School, in Daly City, CA. The difference in history classes was what opened my mind. At Westmoor, I learned about colonization instead of just learning about this colonies.
Systematic racism is supported by lack of education in the truth of American history and maintained by a white code of silence. A good example of the deceptive history that has been taught in our society is the Daughters of the confederacy who created literature for schools and helped put up confederate statues which instills a fake narrative of confederacy being a prideful white heritage.
If only everyone was learning about our full history, we would be a lot wiser in America and racism would not be such a problematic issue as it is today.
