What is the significance of it being one of the darkest and coldest months of the year?

@LovinLarge Probably because the white establishment, grabbed the better months for their own issues.

@Fernapple My point goes to his story. As I understand it, his boss was celebrating that his cultural heritage was acknowledged with black history month so to rain on his parade this guy made up ways to undermine the significance of it when in fact February was chosen by the black community for culturally relevant reasons.

The post is appropriately comical but the action described in the comment is racist. We should all be trying to avoid committing acts of racism so it is important to acknowledge them as they arise so we can all learn from them, myself included.

[britannica.com]

@LovinLarge I see. It is a bit of history I did not know. Though I did understand that the joke was feeble.

@Fernapple I didn't know it either, and I didn't look it up until you said something. But I immediately recognized the story as racist and gave the author an opportunity to acknowledge it.

In the US, systemic racism is insidious such that we must be vigilant in weeding it out. My own paternal grandfather was furious when they began to allow blacks to play major league baseball. The level of racism was one of the biggest cultural shocks I had moving back to the US from Canada. Five black cops recently beat a black motorist to death as a function of a combination of police brutality and internalized racism. It does not appear that the US has ever healed from the rift established by the Civil War such that we may be heading for another so that's how important an issue it is.

@LovinLarge Yes your systemic racism is why I though it plausable that the black month had been squeezed out into Feb deliberately.

@Fernapple Yes, very reasonable presumption to ponder. To suggest it to a black person "crowing" about BHM to deflate their pride is something quite different. As a quote from one of the articles I read about this stated "there is no American history without African American history".

@LovinLarge Thank you for the comment. Problem is we were working in Europe. He, Sammy, had a father who was an officer in the AF and they lived in Arizona. Because he was black he had few white friends but lots of Latino friends and learned to speak Spanish fluently. The first time he came to Europe (Spain) he fell in love with it and there was very little racism. He married a Spanish woman and found a job with the University we worked for. He and I were best buds and he was always making self-deprecating jokes about being black. For example, there was a river in Gemany, the Negar. An advisor once visited the town above the river, known as the Obernegar (above the river - Ober can also mean boss). The guy took a picture of the town sign and Sammy hung that picture over his desk. We were always playing jokes on each other, sometimes against blacks and some against whites. Don't get me started about the position of the day, using gummi bears, I would put on his desk.

@Fernapple Sometimes, in my case, it can be contextual. I explained the situation with LL

@jackjr Thank you, I completely accept your contextualization just as I hope you can understand how I interpreted your first comment the way I did. I will take this opportunity to say that my grandfather had many black friends but was still a racist that didn't want blacks playing major league ball. I accept that your situation was not like that. I very much doubt that you and Sammy could have been so close if you were a racist.

Even though your situation was not as it first appeared (which is why I asked you about it before drawing any conclusions) I am still glad to have had this opportunity to have this discussion at this time when racial turmoil is especially problematic in the USA. I think it is a discussion that needs to be had as often as possible and I appreciate you receiving my comments in the spirit intended. Nice to meet you.

@LovinLarge I was expecting some accusations of racism. I still remember how much fun we had working together. The teasing was two sided. He also mad a lot of anti-white comments. Funny thing, his wife told him she was crazy (and so did her mother). She was and it got worse and worse. He wanted a divorce but didn't have the guts to file for one. Then he met a new worker. A petite, blonde woman from Alabama. She was married to a captain but an incident get him sent to Leavenworth and she divorced him. She and Sammy had an affair and eventually got married. The last time I saw them they were working for University of Maryland in College Park. Funny coincidence, In Germany he lived in a city named Waldorf. When they moved to Maryland they moved to a housing development in Waldorf.