RESPECT

Sorry I haven’t been writing in awhile. I’ve been sick. Just a cold, so that shouldn’t be an excuse. I’ve been lazy. Not respecting my craft by giving it little effort. So I’ll write about RESPECT.

We all know the song. Aretha wails it R.E.S.PE.C.T, find out what it means to me. I never remember any of the words to the song, but I know Ms. Aretha wants and gets her respect. I think respect for ourselves and others is lacking in this day and age.

Exhibit A: The Slauson Swapmeet.

So, I’ve been trying not to judge others (as much) lately. Many of you have heard me say “there are many ways to live a life”. And its true. There are many ways to live a life, and until I walk in someone’s shoes, how can I know their motivations, how can I look down at their choices… But a trip through the Slauson makes it hard to maintain this perspective.

You all know the people that frequent it. Women with trails of children lingering behind them, girls with gold that looks like it will break their earlobes, men selling women, men selling drugs, men just trying to sell something. I hate the racist classist structure of the swapmeet. Black people buy buy buy from Latinos who are selling, while Asians are profiting. And while I can’t be mad at anyone getting their money, I just wonder this: How come no one ever looks anyone of the other race in the eye at the swapmeet? Where is the respect for the consumer, and deeper than that, where is the respect for a common humanity?

I walked through numerous sections. The Latinos who were on the floor were more interested in talking to each other than to me, who was clearly interested in spending money. They walked around like they owned the place, half answering my questions and talking in that tone that says buy or leave. I thought they were the owners. Until I walked to the counter. Ming!! Ming! The Latino girls screamed. From seemingly across the Swapmeet an Asian woman emerged. “You buy?” No hello, how are you… she was staring at my wallet but not looking at my face. Before I could say yes she started ringing up the goods, and at the same time, screaming into the phone. She only looked up to tell me the total.

I handed her a $100 bill. She inspected the bill like she had lasers in her eyes, before she rang it up and handed me the change, then walked off. Just because I’m buying cheap clothes doesn’t mean I’m not human, but at the Swapmeet I guess so….

Exhibit B:

 left to get my nails done on Gramercy & Manchester. $10 pedicures, can’t beat it. I was practicing looking at the sights and sounds in non judgement, trying to push the word ghetto out of my head, when BAM, a woman falls on the floor. She is screaming, and can’t hoist her 300 pound frame off of the rough linoleium. I’ma kill these muthafuckin bitch ass Asians! She screams! I’ma kill them. So much for Respect, huh? The woman is visibly in pain. However, NO ONE STOPS. No one stops to ask her if she’s ok. Does she need help, not even to pat her back. NO ONE STOPS. 20 black women in the shop and everybody, just staring, laughing, texting and saying girrrrl I can’t believe it. I can imagine what they were thinking about her (many of these things I overheard… “fat bitch, black bitch, middle aged bitch, ghetto bitch, every kind of ignorant bitch who would come to this ignorant place and act ignorant type bitch…” And even if all this was true, she was still a mother, a daughter, a sister, a friend to someone in the world. But no one saw that there. No one respected her, black or Asian, and just like in the Swapmeet, no one looked her in the eye. One girl, not even a teenager, started videotaping it for Youtube.  Others just laughed about “the bitch who was tryna come up on a lawsuit”. But though she sat on the floor for over 30 minutes, screaming, no one stopped to help her.

Where did our respect go? When we look at each other only for what we can buy and sell from each other, when we don’t even look each other in the eye, when watch each other get hurt and made fun of? Finally, after realizing that no one would help, the woman crawled to her cell phone and called her own ambulance. I can’t help but think that a little bit of her dignity left with her.