When I was 20 years old, I boarded a flight from St. Louis, Missouri to Houston, Texas. It was Fall and the temperature had begun dropping. That being the case, I was dressed like a typical college student at that time of year: sweatpants and a hoodie. After taking my seat, a middle-aged white woman sat next to me. Little did I know what I was in for.
Over the course of our two-hour flight, this woman, whom I had never met, berated me. “Why do you dress like that?” she asked. “Do you think you’re cool?” After giving her my rationale that it was cold outside, and I wanted to be comfortable on the flight, she continued to criticize me; “Why do you talk like that? You don’t even know how to speak well.” Her belittling was beyond reason. What stuck with me the most was when she said, “Nobody will ever take you seriously. You’ll never be successful.” I remember asking myself: Is this what society thinks when they see people who look like me?
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