Soft Bigotry: When “Helpful” Words Hurt the Most

What happens when words meant to be supportive actually cut the deepest? In this episode, I explore the subtle layers of racism, bigotry, and discrimination, and why so many people miss the nuanced forms that persist today.

I share a personal story of someone saying it was “good I didn’t go to an HBCU because it wasn’t the real world”—a statement packed with bias and false assumptions. This kind of comment leaves people of color constantly deciding whether to call it out or let it slide.

If you’ve ever faced that tension between intent and impact, this conversation is for you.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
And in the Good Evening everyone in the red Tony read.
When you read Tony read bio following the news that
shape or no shortage of things to talk about? What
did read? What will? This is a reality. We simply
have step read, we read, Let's go ahead, and kids started.

(00:30):
What do you say to someone who thinks they're saying
something to you that's trying to be helpful but it
actually cuts you deeply? Let's get into it. One of
the biggest problems we have is actually define the problem,
because when we think about bigotry, racism, and discrimination, they're
all interplays of basically the same types of things. Bigotry
is particularly an attitude or a belief towards particular groups,

(00:50):
which could include race and not necessarily be race. Racism
is the larger context one where we're talking about a particular, antagonistic,
discriminatory or prejudicial view against a particular group based on
race or ethnic group. Discrimination is the unjust or prejudicial
treatment against a particular group, whether it be sex, age, race,
or whatever type of category you're looking upon. A lot

(01:11):
of times, what happens when people are talking about these things,
these things often get interplay with each other, but from
a nuanced standpoint. Most people don't understand or appreciate the
nuance of each and for a great deal number of
Americans out there, racism or discrimination is often shaped by
their perception of what they've seen or heard from the past.
We often forget that Jim Crow was such a heightened

(01:33):
period of time because it was literally institutionalized systemic racism
against specific groups. Since those things are no longer in effect,
a lot of people refer to those as their reference
point for understanding what racism, bigotry, or discrimination is. But
since that time, we've kind of moved into this period
of time of what I call soft, nuanced, microaggressive type

(01:55):
of bigotry, and that can be a lot harder to detect.
When I was a student at the Universe City of Tampa,
I was the only black student on my co ed floor.
During my freshman year, each student was given the opportunity
to speak about which schools they had the opportunity to
go to and why they picked that institution. For me,
I was the only one who had actually mentioned going
to historically black college and universities was an option for me.

(02:17):
And during that time, I had a student who turned
to me and said, it's a good thing you didn't
go to a historically black college and university, because that
is not the real world. The sad part about that
statement is that it reveals a lot of things for me,
not only the unconscious bias from it, but also a
variety of false assumptions. The reality is is that when
you say the real world, you haven't clearly defined what

(02:38):
do you mean by the real world. You're also making
assumptions that going to an institution that is primarily focused
on people of color, being a person of color, that
I would not be adequately prepared to move in the
professional arena because I would only be around people who
looked like me. Again, all false assumptions, all unconscious bias.
But this person literally was approaching me thinking that they

(02:59):
were saying something that was helpful. Being faced with a
statement like this is not new to people of color,
and especially to black people, because we are faced with
many micro decisions that we have to make. Whenever we
have individuals who step to us and make these types
of statements, do we educate them, do we not respond,
do we provide information? Do we challenge them further? Do
we ask for more clarification? All of these mental gymnastics

(03:21):
that we should not have to do that we now
are forced to have to make the decision about whether
we should in order to ensure than one the individual
knows that they're coming from a place that they should
be coming from, and two asking ourselves do we bear
the responsibility of having to address that accordingly? Which is
why moving in this arena today can be very exhausting, because,
at least in the past, when you had express racism

(03:43):
that was prominent during the fifties and the sixties, you
knew how to engage accordingly, and you knew how to
avoid accordingly. However, when you are now in a space
where you're dealing with people who truly don't believe that
their discriminatory or biggoting a racist in any way, shape
or form, but they make statements that base show you
to the contrary, it can be exhausting trying to make
the decision of whether you should deal with that or

(04:06):
if you should let us lie. Which brings me back
to the comment about the HBCUs. I came from a
family of legacy of persons who went to HBCUs. My
mentors went to HBCUs. There's a lot of prominent citizens
and prominent men and women who have operated within the
space who actually did go to HBCUs. So when this
person comes to me and makes this statement, they're making
an assumption that a person who goes to these institutions

(04:29):
is not likely to succeed in a predominantly wide environment,
which is clearly not the case. And so for me
at the time, I didn't do anything, mainly because I
never had faced a question like that. I was eighteen
years old, so I was faced with having to decide
how do I respond to this Now as the person
who I am Now, it's even worse because at least
with the amount of it that traditional information I have

(04:49):
before me, I still have to go through this mental
challenge of asking myself is it worth my energy to
even address what was said to me? And that's where
the soft nuance bigotry can be a problem, because what
may feel harmless to one may actually cut deeper to another.
It has nothing to do with being politically correct, where
people quickly say you can't say what you want to say.

(05:09):
It's recognizing that when you say something, you should at
least be informed about what you're going to say and
be mindful how the person is going to receive it.
You're just merely espousing something that sounds good to you,
thinking in your mind that it may not hurt that individual.
Does not absolve you of the responsibility of taking upon
yourself to say, if I'm talking to someone, how are

(05:31):
they going to receive what I'm going to say? For
those of you out there, tell me how many times
have you heard a comment like this that cut deep
and the person, truly in their heart, believed that they
were saying something that was helpful.