Don't judge based on race; vote with an open mind

Editor,

I discovered years ago that we all carry some degree of prejudice within us. We all have something inside we don't want to face. Let's consider skin tones. Somewhere along the way, the color of skin became a social construct, and the light-skinned people decided they were somehow better than darker-skinned people. Lots of damage has been done with this mentality. Underneath the surface, we all have the same number of melanocytes, those little cells that help determine skin tone. If your ancestry is from an equatorial area, you will be darker for protection from the sun, and if your ancestors moved to cold, dark climates, then you are lighter to absorb more sun.

This past Saturday at one of the farmers markets something else happened. I was wearing my Barack Obama T-shirt when one of the Hispanic produce sellers asked me how the debate turned out. I said that Obama did a brilliant job. He looked at me and said, "You know all those black people in those churches ... well Obama sounds just like them." I tried to explain that Obama was an intelligent, articulate, amazing young man, but he rudely waved me off and turned away. I stood there, shocked. This man probably had to deal with prejudice when he was younger or maybe even now. I grew up in New Mexico and heard as a child horrible slurs directed at Hispanics as well as other minority groups, and I was as outraged then as I am now at such insults.

I worked with a lovely African-American nurse years ago who grew up in North Carolina, and she said that in the South she knew where she stood, but in the North discrimination was very subtle. A white woman on TV news the other night bowed her head as though embarrassed, and she said she knew many people were hesitant to say the real reason they won't vote for Obama.

In this highly contested race for president this year, think deeply and vote with an open mind. As Robin Williams said a while back on the David Letterman show, "Obama is just a tan Kennedy." If there is something you don't know about or don't like about Obama, then ask around and find out the real answers, but please don't close your mind because his skin is a different tone.

America needs to move forward and find more tolerance for others on various levels: religion, politics, color, sexual orientation, etc. It is wrong to brand people by the color of their skin or call them evil or the Antichrist before you know them. I've seen discrimination against people, but I've also seen where it works. Europe seems to have grown up. Sit at a café table in Paris and you will see all types of people walking by: black and white, white and white, black and mocha, mocha and white. They're laughing, joking or holding hands. We need to grow up too.

Patricia Fordney

UNM student