you make a very good point. What is sad is that living up North in Michigan (as I can't speak for all Northern states) I found that mainly that is the mentality. Skin color is a way to describe someone nothing more, and when it is more the person admits they don't like X group blah blah blah and most people will roll their eyes and mark them down as a nit wit and go on with the day or drown them out. Down here in Louisiana, however it is a much different reaction to that sort of thing. They would never say they don't like x group when anyone of that group is around or they think they aren't around friends, but the second they think they can they berate that group horribly and when they do the rest of the people around join in with it rather than drown the person out or think he is a nit wit. It is actually one of the shocking things coming down here as everyone treats that sort of behavior as normal and okay to do. I personally don't feel that it is and am pretty offended when they do it, but when everyone in the room is doing it it is hard to reprimand anyone, so I stay pretty quiet or when asked my opinion I tell that that they are being pretty bad, they just chuck it up to the fact that I am a Yankee (I have been called this I don't know how many times even though I hail from Michigan, not the North East). It is bad down here and I am sure in many other areas of the country.

I don't know if that is the state of the world and I do beleive in time it can be changed if we all work together to make black and white merely an insignificant detail like they wore an orange shirt, but it just isn't the case yet. I do think we are all way too touchy nowadays though and we all regardless of race need to work on being less defensive.