Just a minute ago, I was walking in Uptown Charlotte with two of my friends when we ran into an all-too familiar situation. As in many cities, it is not unusual to be stopped in Charlotte by homeless or poor people on the street who are looking for money. While most of the time the people we run into are kind and genuine, still as 20 year old girls we always put up our guard. Today, in particular, we started to ignore the man who was reaching out to us, until he swore that he wasn’t going to ask for money. Upon that reassurance we stopped a moment for him to tell us his predicament: he was diabetic and in need of a “plate of vegetables” which he already had the money for. Then, of course, he asked us to give him money, since he had money for food, just not enough. We honestly told him that we had no cash or coins to give him and that we were sorry. He began to walk away before he said one last thing: “If I were white, you would've helped me.”

First let me start by saying this, I work in a transitional housing facility for women who are homeless, so I am the last person to lack empathy for those who find themselves in the most unfortunate situation of not having shelter or stability. Furthermore, I understand how hard it is for one to pull himself out of homelessness, but I know there are places that are willing to help and can help more than a couple of pennies from random people on the street. However, what upset me about this man was that, without even knowing me, he called me out and assumed that I would favor someone because they are white. So here is my question for that man, and it turns out for our country as a whole: WHY IS EVERYTHING ABOUT RACE?

Let me tell you all a secret: I did not choose the color of my skin, nobody does- same as how I did not chose my hair color, eye color, height, or weight. In addition, I am neither ashamed or proud of the color of my skin, I just don’t pay it much mind. Because, when it comes down to it, it just doesn’t really matter. Now I know a lot of people will react to my saying that by saying I don’t care about my coloring because I am white, as if by being white I “have not suffered” and have lived a life of pure “privilege.” That makes no sense. I have suffered in my life and I have had troubles, just because I'm not black does not mean that I am not human. I don't care about skin color because God does not care about skin color. In the same way, I don't really notice other people skin colors, that's not how I chose to identify people.

'I look to a day when people will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

Somehow in our nation there has become this place where your skin color should define yourself as a whole. This leads us into a trap of only seeing a two-dimensional, one-sided world, which I will get into in a second. Now, this practice of defining people by race is not completely new; I will not pretend that our nation doesn't have a history of slavery and racism in the early-mid 1900s. However, the issue at hand today is vastly changed. Slavery in The United Sates ended in 1865, over a hundred years ago. After that, we did enter a long period of segregation and racism, but even that began changing in 1964 with the Civil Rights Act. Martin Luther King, Jr. died in 1968 and then things started to change. Today, I would argue that "old-school" racism is dead. People of color and minorities do not have to deal with the same horrors their grandparents did. Our nation has created a racism that is founded and perpetuated by the very minorities who are claiming victim-hood, and without any actual racism to fund their claims, they make every insignificant thing somehow racist. What else can this country do to give Black people equality (never mind the fact the president of our country is black.)? The answer is nothing! Black people, in fact all minorities, have equality in this country. Now I can hear Francessca Ramsey's voice in my head arguing that this country has institutional racism built into its foundation, but that again is not true.

Now, back to the importance of individual. Each individual person in this country has the same opportunity. I do not mean that each person has the same ability or ease of taking advantage of those opportunities, but the law is neutral to skin color. Those who argue this, again, are just looking for anything to fuel their own belief that the world owes them. My being white or my friend being black does not automatically, naturally give either us a hand over the other. God puts as all in the place, he has a plan for each of us, and he gives each person his own struggles and temptations. It is possible for a black man to be a CEO of a company, or a lawyer, or a doctor, or even the POTUS, but that will never happen to a man who sits back and just claims racism. The problem is not racism, it is the fact that they feel entitled. Black culture thinks that White men are handed everything on a silver-spoon, and so in turn they should be as well. WAKE UP PEOPLE! Nothing in life is given for free, you have to work for everything you want, we all do.

"Nothing ever comes to one, that is worth having, except as a result of hard work." - Booker T. Washington

I don't know if any of this has made sense. But I do think it goes for saying that the racism in our country, even the very real racism against whites, needs to just stop. Not everything is about race, in fact very little is. America is a country where anything is possible if you are willing to work for it. But you have to work for it. And in order to work for it, you have to let go of the predisposed belief that you can't have the life you aim for because of your skin color. For those who are guilty of blaming another race for the condition of their lives, stop. Stop seeing people for their skin and start realizing that we are all human. Stop saying you can't do something and then rationalizing that with your appearance.

I'll end this by giving a second story. Yesterday I was leaving the gym when I found myself stopped in the locker room eavesdropping on a mom talking to her 10 year old daughter. The mom kept telling her daughter to stop saying "can't." "You are not what you can't do, the only reason you think that is because you did not try it. Once you tried, you realized you can. We need to remove that word from our mouths, because you can do anything, you just need to try. Don't let anyone tell you that you can't and definitely don't tell yourself you can't." P.S., not that it matters, but this mom was black.

LIFE ISN'T BLACK AND WHITE- IT'S GREY.