{"id":4755,"date":"2012-09-04T07:00:22","date_gmt":"2012-09-04T13:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.brickhouseracing.com\/?p=4755"},"modified":"2012-09-04T07:00:22","modified_gmt":"2012-09-04T13:00:22","slug":"race-relations-and-cycing-in-the-greater-memphis-area","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.brickhouseracing.com\/?p=4755","title":{"rendered":"Race relations and cycing in the greater Memphis area"},"content":{"rendered":"

First off, yeah, I’ve been bloggingly absent for a while. Isht happens, and sometimes I just don’t post. I’m sure you all understand.<\/p>\n

This post is mostly about a revelation I had while riding with the guys from 901 Racing on Saturday.<\/p>\n

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If you’ve never lived (or spent some appreciable time in) The South, this might make it sound like everyone here is racist. We aren’t. However, The South has historically been a hotbed for racial tension in the United States. Warning- broad generalizations ahead: Because of this, the relationship between Caucasians and African Americans has an undertone of “us versus them.” It’s as if every person of one race defaults to “do not trust” until someone of the other race proves themselves to be “one of the good ones.” It goes both directions, and, in Memphis, is why there is a large amount of voluntary segregation in neighborhoods, churches, political districts, restaurants, and the like. As a (continuing) broad generalization, one group just chooses not hang out with the other one.<\/p>\n

What my revelation?<\/p>\n

Well, as a cyclist who often times trains on the road, I see my share of a-hole drivers. I’ve been yelled at, had things thrown at me, and, occasionally, someone threatens to hit me with their car. The people who do this are (whenever I can see the driver) white people. Also, as a cyclist who often times trains on the road, I’ve encountered some very kind people. While stopping for a water break, I’ve been offered breakfast, received invitation to join a church service, offered a ride when it was cold and rainy, and waved to\/ cheered for by kids. All of those nice things? All black people.<\/p>\n

Why? I have no idea. I didn’t post this to make speculations, I merely thought it was a very interesting observation. I like traveling out of The South because I like going to places where ethnic background is an afterthought when going through everyday life. I try to be that way wherever I am. I guess I wanted to post this because it makes me feel warm & fuzzy that when I ride my bike, some people’s kindness makes up for the abuse that other people see fit to dish out.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

First off, yeah, I’ve been bloggingly absent for a while. Isht happens, and sometimes I just don’t post. I’m sure you all understand. This post is mostly about a revelation I had while riding with the guys from 901 Racing on Saturday.   If you’ve never lived (or spent some appreciable time in) The South,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":151,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":[]},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa8Uq-1eH","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brickhouseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4755"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brickhouseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brickhouseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brickhouseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/151"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brickhouseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4755"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.brickhouseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4755\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4756,"href":"http:\/\/www.brickhouseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4755\/revisions\/4756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brickhouseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brickhouseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brickhouseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}