UI Columnist: Racism Is Reality in Most of N Idaho

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I moved from southern California to North Idaho when I was in high school. Looking back on my time there some four years later, I can’t help but wonder if the Aryan Nations leaving the area even made a difference. I can remember hearing about the parade protests and the people angry that they were getting hate-literature in their mailboxes. I can remember being shocked when we got our first piece of hate mail. I also remember going to school and not seeing a single African American person for over a year. I remember my high school history teacher being shocked to hear that, where I grew up, whites were the racial minority. He was shocked so much, in fact, that he questioned the validity of a paper I wrote on that very subject. I remember coming out to some of my peers up there too, and losing what I thought was the closest knit group of friends I had ever had based on a sexual preference. I remember hearing the words “n——r” and “f——t” used in every other sentence by male and female students (and some staff in passing, too). I remember my younger siblings wondering why mom and dad said it was okay for their big brother to be gay when their peers and people out on the streets didn’t — Ryan West/UI Argonaut guest columnist.

Question: Is it fair to slap North Idaho with a racism tag simply because it has a white monoculture?