Play the game.

Yelena and I were riding the muni today when someone almost attacked me.  We sat down and I glanced around (I like to be aware of my surroundings).  I noticed a guy looking at me.  This happens sometimes.  I find if I look back at them (nothing threatening, just a flat stare) they usually look away.  After my second flat stare, this guy jumped up, stepped forward, and made the "let's fight" movement with his arms.  He was a large black guy with a poofy jacket (even thought it was a warm day).  He was bigger than me so I didn't want to start something.  Yelena and I got up, I made a "I don't want trouble" motion with my arms, and we moved to the back of the train car.

Let me stop right now and make one thing very clear: this isn't about racism.  I do not look down on ANYONE because of the color of their skin, their religion, or their country of origin.  But this rant will deal with racial issues.

I started wondering about why this black guy wearing ghetto-style clothing would want to pick a fight with a white guy wearing prep-style clothing.  (No, I'm not a preppy.  But that's not the point here.)  The most likely explanation is that he's on something.  He never even said anything, just challenged me.  But it's also quite possible that he just has a chip on his shoulder because he's black and underprivileged, and I'm white and privileged.  There are a lot of black people in San Francisco, and I've almost never had a negative experience with any of them.  But occaisionally I've noticed black people expressing resentment toward white people, or society in general.  Sometimes it's small things, like crossing the street right as the light changes to red, so that the oncoming traffic has to wait.  Sometimes you'll see someone turn and glare at the cars, as if saying: "You may be successful enough to own a car, but you still have to wait for me, motherfucker.  I may not be able to buy a house or move out of the ghetto, but I can still slow you down a few seconds."

Here's what I have to say to these people: play the game.

I already refered to myself as a privileged white person, but that's not really true.  A lot of Jews don't consider themselves "white;" "white" means White Anglo-Saxon Protestant.  My grandparents are holocaust survivors.  I went to college in La Jolla, but forty years ago Jews weren't allowed to live in that neighborhood.  My family has never had a lot of money.  I've entirely paid my own way through law school.  When my wife and I graduate, our household debt will be close to a quarter of a million dollars.

What's my point?  I've played the game.  I wasn't handed a law degree, I wasn't handed a beautiful apartment in SF, my parents don't pay for my cell phone or internet access or even my health care.  I've done this all myself, through hard work and a LOT of perserverence.  And I certainly never resented anyone else for being more privileged or having more money or an easier life.  I consider myself lucky for what I have.

The mistake a lot of people make is deciding that resentment is easier than making an effort.  They just convince themselves that it's not their fault that they're poor; it's someone else's fault.

You know who else makes that mistake?  Angry Arabs.  "Our economies are in the dumper, and our governments are weak and ineffectual.  Whose fault is it?  The Jews!  Rather than deal with our problems, let's just collect a bunch of explosives and make life difficult for them."  What's going through the minds of the leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah?  Do they honestly believe they can win?  Look at the last 50 years!  Israel is here to stay.  To believe otherwise is to go against all logic and common sense.  Not to mention that waging war against Israel has completely destroyed their own countries; the Prime Minister of Lebanon recently complained that the recent violence has taken his country back 50 years.  And I can't imagine there's much of an economy at all in Gaza any more.

The answer is the same: play the game.

You're not in charge.  Someone else is.  The white people have more money and more guns than you do.  Whining about it won't change it.  Resenting the white people won't change it.  And fighting them won't change it.  There is only one way to change it: play the game.  Allow Direct Foreign Investment, create a free trade zone, reduce government corruption, get an education, create an economy and get out of the ghetto (real or metaphorical).

There are blacks and Arabs who get it.  We now have our first generation of black millionaires.  You see black politicians all over the country.  Some Arab countries have made peace with Israel and are working on democratization (like Jordan and Turkey).  These are the people who have decided to play the game.  I applaud them for their successes.

Now, I'm not naive.  I understand that there are powerful social forces at work.  Whenever a Palestinian politician stands up and says "We need to make peace with Israel," masked gunmen take him down.  A lot of people in the ghetto get flack from their friends & family if they try to get an education.  If you're getting opposition at home, it's even more difficult to walk the hard road.

So really, this rant isn't directed toward individuals.  It's directed toward societies. 

There's really no other choice.  You have to play the game.