Ruzious wrote:I apologize that I worded my response to Etan's piece poorly - and in a way that could sound racist. There's no perfect answer to this situation, unfortunately. If I offended anyone, I apologize.
I don't know how anyone else feels about your post, but rereading it I don't see anything whatever to apologize for. I take you to be making the point that a woman might find a large, physically powerful and imposing man threatening in such close proximity, no matter his skin color, and that would be a legitimate feeling.
Etan addressed the situation with a little less imagination that would have been ideal -- he sort of assumed that the woman's reaction was about him as a black man -- although, in his defense, he did *ask her* about that. And, then the woman didn't respond all that well either.
There's no "perfect answer" to racism, and there's none to the millenia-long ill treatment of women either. But, "this situation" could have been handled better by both of the people involved in it.
OTOH, it was brief, just a flare up, and no big deal. For better or worse, it's the kind of thing we all have to live with -- and struggle against it too.
