Of course, as easy as it is to paint these actions as shameful now, and as easy as it was to be annoyed by them back then, it is just another move in a line of moves that seemed invested in safety. In retrospect, I have sympathy for this concern, when it came from elders who I knew had these beliefs because of violence they’d witnessed, or been a victim of. Things they’d been denied access to. The idea that if only they’d sounded a certain way, or dressed a certain way, things might be different.
