A true story. Listen carefully.
In 1999, when I first started working here (police department), they brought in a Black guy who'd given them quite a chase. He was shackled, and when I heard the chains rattling, I became sick to my stomach and almost passed out.
My boss, a White man, wanted to call an ambulance, but I assured him that there was no need for that. I spent some time in the women's room until I could get my emotions under control. He later told me that I turned as white as a sheet.
Afterwards, he made a rule that no shackled prisoner was to come through our section. I didn't ask him to do it, he simply saw how much it distressed me and took it upon himself to spare me the sight.
Would I have had the same reaction if the prisoner had been White? I don't know. If my boss had been a Black man, would he have made a similar ruling? I don't know.
My reason for relating this? To show that I don't believe all Whites are racist, that some "get" it right off the bat, and that the pain felt by Blacks is real and needs to be acknowledged.
Very touching. Somehow that means that Vick should be given leniency for his abuse of animals?
I think the pain you feel is real. I think that desrves its own topic. However, I simply think you've misplaced that pain into issues where it doesn't belong--in holding someone less guilty simply because they're black.