I Have Benefitted from Racism in the Workplace
I almost entitled this piece “I Suspect that I Have Benefitted from Racism in the Workplace.” But upon further reflection, I gotta say I’m sure.
I have two stories that I’ve filed under the “suspicious” category for decades. They are from early on in my career and life, and although it’s difficult to say how or if they correlated to any success I may have had since, I can certainly say that being on converse side of the experience — if, for example, I had been a black woman to whom these things did not happen, rather than a white woman to whom they did — would have been an astoundingly unjust and disgusting experience.
So here is my part in those stories.
When I was a senior in high school, I got a job at a fast food restaurant. I saw the help wanted sign out front, went inside, and asked the manager about it.
He seemed oddly grateful to see me, and he hired me immediately.
I worked there for several months, and made a lot of friends — not the least of which was the young, white, recently college-graduated manager who hired me. He, his wife, and I became friends, weekend troublemakers who would travel from college town to college town crashing fraternity and sorority parties.