By Monique Judge, The Root
I have never had white privilege before.
I don’t know what it smells or tastes like. I have never had the opportunity to use it to my advantage, The one thing I can do is imagine how it feels, and I imagine it feels like being on molly. You are so high and feeling so good, you don’t give a fuck about anything. All decorum is out the window, and you are floating on a thick cloud of “nobody can fuck with me, so there” as you go about your day.
It is probably very empowering and unapologetic, and it leads to entitled and unapologetic actions on the part of white people.
For example, meet Nancy Goodman.
Nancy was at a Bonefish Grill restaurant in Raleigh, N,C., on Tuesday evening when she saw two black women enjoying themselves—you know, laughing, talking, minding their business and definitely not worrying about Nancy or anyone else.
But you know what happens when white people see Black people with smiles on their faces. They get super upset and want to find the best way to kill that joy. And that is just what Nancy did.
In a video posted on Facebook Tuesday, as the camera focuses on Nancy, Chanda Stewart, who shot the video, begins describing how Goodman walked over to a table where Stewart and a friend, Lakesha Shaw, were sharing a meal and some laughs and told them they were “the rudest people” that she had ever met.
https://twitter.com/shaunking/status/1154453948411105281?s=20
As the woman is relaying the experience, Goodman looks up and notices she is being filmed. She smiles big for the camera and waves, before taking out her own camera phone and approaching the table again.
As the two women watch incredulously, Goodman comes up to their table and proudly proclaims “I have got really good friends that are Black, and I love them.”
Clearly, she already knew the entire reason she was bothering the young women was that they were Black, because, as one of the women can be heard reminding her in the video, no one even said anything about color. They were just shocked by her rude behavior.
Goodman then tells them that she is bothered by their behavior because they are “too loud” in what already seems to be a very loud restaurant, judging from the amount of background noise in the video.
Shaw turns to Goodman and tells her, “Let me show you my money; it’s just as green as yours.”
Goodman responds by saying “Oh, you’re such stupid niggers,” and begins to walk away. One of the women tells her to call her Black friends a “nigger,” to which Goodman retorts “They’re not like you.”
Whew, chile, the ghetto.
Our story doesn’t end there, though.
Local station WRAL caught up with Goodman and asked her about the incident.
WRAL reporter Sarah Krueger spoke with Goodman outside her home, and Goodman told her that not only would she not apologize for using the slur, but that she would use it again.
“I’m a 71-year-old woman who lives in Raleigh,” Goodman said on camera. “I suffer from tremendous anxiety.” She went on to tell Krueger that her anxiety and the women’s behavior pushed her into using the slur.
“I’m not going to say I’m sorry to them because they kept pushing at it,” Goodman said.
“What about your use of the n-word?” Krueger asked her.
“I used that word because they forced me into it,” Goodman said.
“Do you see how that’s incredibly offensive,” Krueger asked.
“Yes, I do,” Goodman said. “That’s why I said it. I would say it again to them.”
And there it is. White privilege, that ever so popular intoxicant, in full display from a 71-year-old white woman in Raleigh, N.C., who could have just sat there and ate her food. Literally.
After the video went viral and Goodman’s face was plastered across television screens in North Carolina, WRAL reports that she posted an apology of sorts on her Facebook page.
“Tonight on WRAL TV news there will be a news article about me using the N word in a conflict with three rude, loud obnoxious Black women,” she wrote. “I would like to apologize to my family, friends and other patrons in the bar at North Hills Bonefish. The TV reporters came to my house today as they found out my name which that could only happen if the restaurant gave them my information. The women taped me and apparently shared the video all over social media. I suffer from extreme anxiety which is not an excuse. I am ashamed of my actions.”
One has to wonder, is she ashamed of her actions or ashamed a video of showing her actions has gone viral and exposed her for being the racist she is?
Either way, we don’t feel sorry for you, Nancy.
Do better. Do a lot better.
This article originally appeared in The Root.
