The White Imagination and Housing For Black Folx

Hello friends,

This quote from DL Hughley resonated with me.

He was talking mainly about the risk of Black people getting shot in America, both by law enforcement and other white people, but it also applies to other situations and other places.

The truth is that as a Black person you don’t have to do anything for white people to feel a way about you. I’ve mentioned many times my first experience of being called the N-word when a white guy assumed I was up to no good - in Trinidad, one of the world’s most multicultural places. That has stayed with me.

Housing Discrimination in France

But when I thought of Hughley’s quote, I remembered my time in France. My white roommate had made the arrangements for our flat (she later turned out to be problematic in her own way, but that’s another story), and it was time for us to go to our ancient French landlady and pay our rent. This we did and one of the first things that landlady said to me was “if I’d known you were Black I wouldn’t have rented to you”. 

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