Being alone in an elevator with a black person late at night is uncomfortable for any white person, even if the black person is silent. But when the black person mentions money? There’s no way to avoid a predatory vibe here, and that’s unacceptable. A situation like this can lead to a mugging; I just read in the news here in Boulder that a few days ago a relatively innocent situation turned into assault. This isn’t some rare event; it happens a lot and most white people are all-too painfully aware of it.
I can understand that it’s hard for black people to truly grasp the white person's point of view here, since black people rarely feel in danger of being robbed by whites. But Jen McCrieght's post, and many others, make it clear that to a white person, being alone on that elevator with that black person was a potential threat, and a serious one. You may not be able to just press a button and walk away — perhaps the black person has a knife, or a gun, or will simply overpower you. When there’s no way to know, you err on the side of safety. And what makes this worse is that most black people don’t understand this, so white people are constantly put into situations ranging from uncomfortable to downright scary.
