Race hate

So I guess just about anyone who is breathing and over the age of, say 10 years old, has probably seen the video on Youtube of the crazy British woman on a tram from London to Croydon this week?  The one entitled 'My tram experience'?  I would have posted the video url here, but, well, as I said, everyone has probably seen it by now, and besides I don't  really want to blight this page with smut like that.  And I'm sorry, but that is truly how I see this video.  My colleagues were talking about it in the office the other day and we all hopped onto Youtube to see what the fuss was about, and my mouth literally hung open in shock when I watched it.  Other than the fact that she was clearly drunk and/or stoned and also, aside from the fact that she had a little boy on her lap, she was fearless and clearly insane.  Well, I chose the word insane because one would have to be in order to sit there and pick on a tram full of people - full of multiracial people - and swear and spew racial abuse at them.  Yes, I understand she has been arrested 'for her own safety' I am told, and this is probably for the best.  I am sure when she came down from whatever she was on and I'm sure, on viewing the video of herself on Youtube, she was mortified.  Well, one can only hope.  But, my heart goes out to that little boy.  What kind of environment will he be growing up in?  Where he will be taught that hating someone just because they don't speak the same language or because they have a different colour skin is the acceptable thing to do.  This is the 21st century.  Our planet is getting smaller and smaller with every new advancement of technology and we all live in it, right on top of each other.  Where will you be if you cannot accept that the town/country/planet where you live is made up of many different types of people.  If you cannot be accepting of that, then i'm sorry, but its your life that is going to be hard to live. You, the racist.

I was born in a country where race hate was very much a part of my background.  Everyone knows the history South Africa has with 'apartheid'.  Its not pretty and I am not proud.  But just because you grow up with it doesnt mean you have to be like that.  We are nothing, if not the makers of our own fate/destiny.  We are nothing, if not responsible for our own lives and happiness and thats why I chose not to be racist. Its a conscience decision that ultimately means that I don't carry issues of hate around with me.  Yes, people piss me off sometimes.  Yes, I get mad and swear at people sometimes, but I don't have issues with who they are, just some things that they do.  And I don't give a damn what colour they are or what language they speak or in which country they were born. And I will tell you this, being accepting of people makes you a happier person.  I don't want to walk around with hate in my heart and I don't know why anyone would choose to.  Ultimately, it is you who will be miserable in yourself and I can only hope that little boy makes his own decisions and does not grow up into an adult believing the hate his mother spews or worse, that he becomes just like her.