38 Who Saw Murder

As a child growing up in Canada, I was very sheltered when it came to racism. I was raised around different races and my best friend was white. From Pre-School, I sat in classrooms with several other races. Statesboro’s school system was filled with many different types of people. There were no cliques or groups, everyone stayed in mixed company. I cannot recall a time when someone called me out my name living here. As far as I knew, everyone was treated with the same amount of respect no matter the color. Years later, I moved to Georgia my last year of middle school. Miles away from my hometown, it was a completely different environment. The people spoke to each other differently and it was more divided. Even the way they sat in a classroom. One class in particular. The gym class was segregated, but only with the girls. The black girls played together and the white girls played together. This was all new to me. One afternoon during this class, I found out just why it was the way it was. We started out with a not so normal game of badminton that turned into something appalling. As we played, segregated of course, I noticed that both teams were not into the game. Everyone was just trying to make the best of it and have fun since the coach ignored us that day so it surprised me to see how angry one of the girls had gotten. She threw her racket on the floor and walked up the bleachers. Nothing could have prepared me for what happened next. She screamed to the top of her lungs, “I’m so sick of these cheating niggers!” as she stomped up the bleachers. I stood there at the bottom of the bleachers with my mouth open and my feet glued to the floor as I watched every black girl in that gym run after her. I had never been in a situation like this one so I had no idea how to handle it. After everything had simmered down, all the girls involved were called into a room to talk about what happened. One side only wanted an apology and the other side was hell bent on not