Dear Brian,

Moving to a new school is tough enough. Having to also deal with racial prejudice is even more overwhelming. If your parents are able to move, that would certainly be one solution, but what if they can’t or won’t? If that’s the case, there are things you can do to make your situation more tolerable.

Unfortunately, people are all prejudiced to some degree, whether they realize it or not. Prejudice is born out of ignorance. More specifically, when people have very limited or no experience with folks that are different in some way, they make a lot of false assumptions based upon stereotypes. They do this because they have nothing else to base their opinions on. When confronted with this, try to remember that they are coming from a place of ignorance and consider how pathetic that is for them as they don’t even realize how ignorant they are! Try to replace feelings of anger with pity. I know that’s tough to do, but it will leave you less personally upset as a result. Hopefully, there are some classmates who, once they get to know you, will be able to replace their dumb stereotypes with more accurate knowledge about you as a person and not a color.

This may also be a blessing in disguise for you. As you get older and go on to college and eventually get a career, chances are you’re going to have to continue to deal with a lot of folks who are different than you and this will give you good experience to learn how to be successful, even in an environment where you’re the minority. There’s no two ways about it: prejudice is ugly and nasty. Remember that it’s got nothing to do with you and everything to do with their limited experience and ignorance. It’s a challenge that will likely continue in your life. If you have no choice but to be there, try to make it work for you and get everything you can out of it.