Jim is part of a very diverse cultural group, his racial make up includes a number of different races. In this group are Caucasians, Spaniards, Native Americans and Blacks. Although the original ancestors of any given racial make up, in Jim’s background, is long gone, over two hundred years, if you look closely, you can see traces of all theses races in Jim’s features. Jim is a composite of all these races but he has brothers, sisters and cousins who look more White, Black, Spanish or Native American and they all get along fine. They all rejoice at being a part of the big melting pot called America.
In this group of relatives you have some who have masters degrees all the way down to a few on welfare. Some are doctors, lawyers and successful business people while others are average everyday workers and laborers and some, down on their luck, are on some type of government assistants. It’s a complete sampling of the American story of today.
Being from such a racial make up, Jim has been subjected to racial bigotry from both black and white but to be fair, he has also found love and acceptance from other blacks and whites. It would be normal for someone of Jim’s racial composition, and living in America, to take notice of certain situations going on regarding race.
Jim has been driving a friend back in forward to work at a blood bank located outside of Chicago, Ill. for a number of weeks now and something just popped into his mind that, he thought, you may find interesting.
He thinks giving blood to help society is a noble thing to do. The only problem, in his mind, is today people aren’t necessarily doing it for the right reasons but he believes, when all is said and done, any reason is a good enough reason.
What he is specifically talking about is in today’s economy many people are desperate for money and find selling their blood is a way to get quick cash. This is true most of the time but even more so today. And who is most likely to be in a position to have to do his? Lower income people, of course. And who, unfortunately, do those lower income people happen to be?
Most days he gets back to pick his friend up a little early, sometimes as much as an hour. While sitting there he noticed what seems to be the normal pattern at this clinic. A car will drive up and park and a load of people will get out and all head to the clinic, car after car will do this. Sometimes there is only a couple of people in the car, other times there may be five or as many as six people so this is a pretty busy blood bank. You would have to think that the same thing is going on at all the other blood banks around the country that are paying for blood.
What he had noticed is the majority of the people are Black, he’d say a full 90%. If this is a small sample of what’s going on in the rest of the country the vast majority of the blood supply is from Black donors and the other 10% is mostly Hispanic and a small fraction from Caucasians. It’s nice that Blacks are giving America a healthy supply of blood, it’s unfortunate that they are forced into giving because of a lousy economy but all- in- all it is a good thing for anyone who is in need.
Here’s what he’s getting at, if 90% of the blood supply in America is Black and you, a Caucasian, need
blood, it should follow that you have a 90% chance of getting Black blood. If you do, I certainly hope it saves your life. The best thing for America, however, is that you can no longer claim to be fully “White”. Now, you may argue that you had a 10% chance of getting the blood of a White donor and you’d have a legitimate point, except the majority of the that 10% is Hispanic.
Let’s go a little further with it and check with your parents. Has your father ever needed blood, possibly from a war injury or a motorcycle accident or some ailment before you were born? Yes, there is still a chance he could have gotten the”good stuff” but let’s say your mother also needed blood at some point before you were born, how about your grand parents or great grand parents?
If you take into account that this is probably the way it’s been since, at least, world war two it’s not likely all those folks got Caucasian blood when they all had a 90% chance of getting Black blood, even if you knock it down to 50% its almost assured, some body got some Black or Hispanic blood.
As goes the the law of the Jim Crow era, you’ve gone way pass the “one drop” rule! Dude, your Black.
The only thing left to figure out now is your kids, are they 50% Black, 30% Black, 25% Black?
Welcome to multiracial America, brother!
Take heart, don’t worry, you’ll still be you. You just won’t be as white as you thought you were, absolutely nothing else in your life will change, I promise. Except maybe your attitude!
