An excerpt from “Chapter 6 – White Men Can Jump (Just Not as High): Seeing Past Stereotypes” from Not Like Me: Learning to Love, Serve, and Influence in our Divided World.
God is worthy! Hallelujah! He is worthy! Hallelujah!”
Those of us in his vicinity tried not to stare, although he appeared to want the attention. “He sure picked an interesting place to perform,” I thought. We were in the terminal at Los Angeles International Airport, waiting for our direct flight from LAX to JFK in New York City.
At first his song had seemed unintelligible. After much straining, I could begin to understand the lyrics he was singing through his thick accent. His black shoes, slacks, and button-down shirt matched his black hair and mustache. The black hair on his arms covered his dark brown skin. He continued bellowing his tune for all to hear. He was alone, it seemed, yet why was he singing? He continued to pace back and forth as his song continued.
The date was September 19, 2001.
Eight days prior, the world had changed. As the next several days came and went, the story began to unfold. Hijackers. Terrorists. Osama bin Laden. Taliban. Heroes. Todd Beamer. New York City firefighters.
Everything was a blur during the course of those first few hours on September 11 and the following days, yet somewhere in the middle of it all, it hit me: Deborah, Caleb (two years old at the time), and I were flying into New York City to see friends and to speak at a youth conference the next week. Surely it would be canceled. I called the youth pastor to confirm my suspicions, but he told me that the students and the people in their church needed this retreat more than ever. Some people from his church had friends who had offices in the World Trade Center towers and who were still missing. He felt it would be good to have an outsider’s perspective of hope and trust in God in the midst of such devastation.
In addition to the natural numbness I had been feeling, I now felt fear. I was expected to fly just days after the airports were allowed to reopen. I was flying at about the same time of day, on one of the same airlines, and between the same airports. Surely the youth group would understand if we could not come. “If it were just me, of course I would come” (I said to myself, hoping that it was true), but since Deborah and my two-year-old son were planning to travel with me - it was the perfect situation: Deborah and Caleb would be the reason for my withdrawal, not my own fear.
Just as I had hoped, Deborah did not want to go. She hated flying (an attitude that predated 9/11), but she did feel we should pray and seek advice before deciding. After a couple of days of vacillating, we decided that we wanted to be a part of helping people who were hurting. We began to feel that this was an opportunity God was placing before us and that he wanted us to respond in a spirit of trust and obedience.
Of course, we created an escape clause. I agreed with Deborah that if she did not feel comfortable flying to New York at any time before the trip, we would not hesitate to cancel our trip.
So then, up to this point in the days preceding the trip, all was proceeding smoothly. Once the Pavarotti wannabe chose to sing his own version of “This Is the Day,” things began to unravel for us.
Just as the terminal singer concluded his song so he could get in line with his friend, we noticed that the two men in front of us also had dark brown skin and jet-black hair. Upon closer inspection, I could hear them speaking a foreign language, which I assumed was Arabic. Worse yet, they seemed to be big fans of cellophane. Both of their suitcases were wrapped tightly with sticky plastic wrap. How could the airport security check for bombs? Wasn’t all of the luggage going to be opened and screened? We had arrived almost four hours ahead of our flight time because of the supposedly intense security. We watched as the woman at the gate checked in their bags and placed them on the conveyer belt. They were headed straight to the plane.
Deborah turned to me. “Didn’t those guys with the plastic-wrapped luggage look like they may be terrorists? Did you hear the song that guy was singing? These guys are plotting something!”
One of the advantages of marrying a woman who is prone to worry is that I get to be the courageous one. As she articulates what I am thinking, I have the chance to articulate the opposite. I become the more positive voice, even when I feel the same way she does, and most of the time I do.
Worrying seems to be in my genes. I have an aunt who once dialed 911 and hung up so that if she needed help while her husband was out of town she could just hit redial for a faster means of dialing. This was not a good idea as she discovered when an ambulance, fire engine, and police cars arrived to check on her. When I was a child, I wet my pants playing goalie in my first year of soccer, because the entire field of five-year-olds started running toward me all at once. When I was ten, my doctor had me on a bland diet to alleviate the ulcers I was developing while playing baseball - as a pitcher, I was afraid of hitting the batter with the ball.
Somehow my verbal assurances that she was just being hypersensitive and that they were probably on a different flight backfired. Not only were these guys waiting to board our flight; another olive-skinned man was already in the waiting area when we arrived. The men did not sit together as they waited at the terminal — -a strange thing, since we had seen two of them talking with each other in the baggage line earlier. Deborah was sure that the men were exchanging glances with each other over the tops of their newspapers and magazines. As one man seemed to wink at another, Deborah found her breaking point. She was still willing to fly to New York, but she did not want to go on this particular flight. She approached the woman at the counter to ask if there was an opportunity to transfer to the next flight.
“I’m sorry, ma’am, but your luggage is already on board this flight. We do not have time to remove your luggage. You will need to fly on this flight. We cannot allow you to switch.”
I tried to persuade Deborah that all would be OK, in spite of the woman’s response. I tried to point out once again that these four men were probably not the people she thought they were. For a time she seemed to have discovered enough peace to get on this flight. She acknowledged to me that she was already afraid and that this experience was just accentuating her inner feelings.
As we boarded the plane, we noticed a disturbing scenario. The guy who had been singing was sweating profusely while wringing his hands and asking one of the flight attendants questions such as, “Can I move to the front of the plane? How many gallons of gas does this plane hold? Do we have enough gas in case we can’t land immediately in New York?”
When we finally reached our row, which happened to be filled with what we perceived as Al-Qaeda operatives, Deborah continued moving toward the back. She was carrying Caleb in her arms, and she had her own set of questions for another flight attendant. Unfortunately, this flight attendant seemed to be more upset by the current state of events than Deborah. As Deborah asked to be allowed to get off the plane and book a later flight, tears began to slide down her cheeks. The flight attendant empathized with Deborah; she was scared too. Deborah was now more afraid than ever. She came back to me to invoke our escape clause. She was not going to fly on this plane. The flight attendant from the front of the plane approached us as we began gathering up our things. “I’m sorry, but you cannot leave this flight. Your luggage must travel with you. Please be seated so we can begin our flight.”
Now we were being held hostage by American Airlines employees wearing name tags and polyester dress suits. Terrified that the men seated in our row knew enough English to have understood our conversation, I bounced back and forth between looking straight ahead and looking at Deborah. I did not want to make eye contact with these guys, fearing that my family and I would be their first victims.
Within a few minutes, the flight attendant returned and asked us to gather our things. We were now going to be allowed to exit the plane - apparently we were scaring the other passengers.
Stereotypes
If we are honest with ourselves, we all have to admit that at times we find ourselves stereotyping others. We allow the words of others, bad experiences from our past, news reports, and even our fears to be projected onto others so that we form prejudicial judgments against others. None of us like to be seen in light of a stereotype, but we do not seem to hesitate to do the same to others. Think of the last time you made a decision or chose a course of action based on a stereotype of another person. It’s quite likely that you won’t have to remember back too far into your past.
After getting off that particular flight at LAX, we got on the next flight. This flight also had men and women from Arab heritage, yet without the singing and the cellophane, we were able to ride with relative peace (as much peace as possible on a plane in that time in history). Of course, the other plane had been filled not with terrorists but with scared men, just like us. We had allowed the images of Al Qaeda operatives to move our minds to lump into their category all one billion Muslims and anyone with a hint of Middle Eastern heritage. Too often we assume the worst in others, limiting the possibilities of others based on their appearance. I’m thankful that Caleb is too young to remember this lapse in our lives, because so often our children and those we influence absorb and live out the same stereotypes we hold.
Stereotypes exist because we do not form friendships with others who differ from us.
We assume everyone from an entire ethnicity has the same character or idiosyncrasies. As a result, taxi drivers in New York or police officers in certain parts of the country racially profile others, targeting them on the basis of their race. Some taxi drivers don’t stop for those with dark skin, while some police officers look for those with dark skin to stop.
