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NYT: Running While Black: Our Readers Respond
New York Times ^ | 5/18/20 | Kurt Streeter

Posted on 05/19/2020 5:14:31 AM PDT by conservative98

Black runners make exhaustive mental checklists, are confronted by suspicious neighbors and fear for their lives when they go out to log miles.

We asked readers to share their experiences of “running while black.” Here is a selection of those submissions, led by an essay from Kurt Streeter, one of our writers. Responses have been edited for clarity and length.

SEATTLE — Our jog was just beginning when my young son asked the question. “Dad, today can we go through my favorite neighborhood?”

During the pandemic, we’ve made a habit of running together in the early evening. We course down the middle of calm streets, exhausting ourselves as best we can. It’s become our way to bond.

But now my jaw clenched. The neighborhood that has become his favorite route? I had to think fast. What should I say to him about how that place makes me feel?

How would I ever tell him about the killing of a black jogger in a corner of the country far from ours?

When will be the right time to explain to a 9-year-old the wariness that comes every time I lace my clunky green sneakers and pad through the streets in our almost entirely white Seattle community?

I’m not a great runner; I’m a 6-foot-2, 220-pound plodder who tends to wilt at Mile 4. But I get out there as much as I can, to ease the stress and to feel free.

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Chit/Chat; Sports
KEYWORDS: ahmaudarbery; black; fakenews; jogger; jogging; kurtstreeter; race; running
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And there lies the complication. Like many black runners, the very act of doing one of the things we love most in life comes with a searing existential stress and constraint. I’ve been putting in hard, slogging miles since 2005, as I processed the fact my father was dying. Out there on city streets, visible and vulnerable, I have never jogged without the specter of race. The way I look shadows my every stride.

Sometimes it’s in the forefront of my mind — gutting, angry, mournful — as in the days after Ahmaud Arbery was chased and fatally shot. Sometimes it’s in the far corners, background noise, but still inescapable.

1 posted on 05/19/2020 5:14:31 AM PDT by conservative98
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To: conservative98

"When will be the right time to explain to a 9-year-old the wariness that comes every time I lace my clunky green sneakers and pad through the streets in our almost entirely white Seattle community?" @kurtstreeter writes. https://t.co/rnW8jAtEWs pic.twitter.com/6sk9eOk289— NYT Sports (@NYTSports) May 18, 2020


2 posted on 05/19/2020 5:15:45 AM PDT by conservative98
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To: conservative98

I would like to see an article on black joggers in Bill and Hillary Clinton’s hometown of Chappaqua.

The cops would get a call from half the houses the jogger ran by....

Some pigs are more equal than others.


3 posted on 05/19/2020 5:20:05 AM PDT by cgbg (New poll: post elderly voters like Biden's experience as Wilson's VP fighting the Spanish Flu.)
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To: conservative98

Seattle may seem like the most racist place in the country. But, in reality, the whole USA is homicidally racist.


4 posted on 05/19/2020 5:22:01 AM PDT by campaignPete R-CT (Committee to Re-Elect the President ( CREEP ))
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To: cgbg
Safety in numbers while jogging.


5 posted on 05/19/2020 5:22:34 AM PDT by Bonemaker (invictus maneo)
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To: conservative98

Where’s the three weeks running national coverage of this crime?

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8323375/Delaware-couple-shot-killed-veterans-cemetery-visiting-sons-grave.html?fbclid=IwAR09ciJQgQ81W4rrFNh23ESuP8QgxYRFoqyk1ty7DHOgW9klJcooWRXBw30


6 posted on 05/19/2020 5:22:39 AM PDT by Ancient Man
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To: conservative98
What should I say to him about how that place makes me feel?

Tell him his father is cowardly racist man child seeking attention.

7 posted on 05/19/2020 5:23:31 AM PDT by Vision (Obama corrupted, sought to weaken and fundamentally change America; he didn't plan on being stopped.)
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To: conservative98

What a great article— Sean Lawlor Nelson (@HornedPoet) May 19, 2020

---------------------except for the part they left out about the black jogger rushing the man with the gun and trying to take his gun away.

8 posted on 05/19/2020 5:23:57 AM PDT by conservative98
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To: conservative98

From my own perspective, I find this really hard to believe. Unless those interviewed ran through severely racially prejudiced areas, which would be democrat controlled bot begin with.

If we lived in a city and a black guy ran past our home dressed in the garb runners typically wear, I’d think nothing of it, probably would not give it a good look.

Now there probably is some merit to the story. Statistically speaking, in some neighborhoods, there are thugs that shoot, steal, rape and sell dope that fit such a description. Our prisons are flooded with them. So if that type of a threat were nearby, I’d check out the person running too.


9 posted on 05/19/2020 5:31:48 AM PDT by redfreedom
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To: conservative98
If you are jogging while wearing gloves, a hoodie and a knapsack, you will get looks no matter your color.
10 posted on 05/19/2020 5:34:26 AM PDT by deadrock
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To: conservative98
Black runners make exhaustive mental checklists, are confronted by suspicious neighbors and fear for their lives when they go out to log miles.

All that stress, and they still don't think not to break into homes while jogging?

11 posted on 05/19/2020 5:36:59 AM PDT by Pollster1 ("Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed")
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To: conservative98

This excerpt made me literally LOL.

Reads like a romance novel. Anyway, lol.


12 posted on 05/19/2020 5:41:53 AM PDT by americas.best.days... ( Donald John Trump has pulled the sword from the stone.)
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To: Ancient Man

Really sad how quickly and conveniently that story has been dropped into a “memory hole.” As if it never even happened.


13 posted on 05/19/2020 5:46:56 AM PDT by Vigilanteman (The politicized state destroys aspects of civil society, human kindness and private charity.)
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To: conservative98

And this is in Seattle?!


14 posted on 05/19/2020 5:49:49 AM PDT by Rummyfan (In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel.)
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To: conservative98

Kurt Streeter covers sports at The Times. He primarily writes features and essays, and has a particular interest in stories related to race, gender and social justice. Prior to coming to The Times in 2017, he was a senior writer for ESPN. He also covered the inner city for the Baltimore Sun and spent 15 years at the Los Angeles Times, where he wrote about everything from crime to transportation to religion, and also was a columnist. A former athlete, in younger days Streeter played college tennis at California Berkeley and was world ranked by the ATP Tour for three years. He lives on the west coast

https://www.nytimes.com/by/kurt-streeter


15 posted on 05/19/2020 5:53:39 AM PDT by McGruff
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To: conservative98
Oh, please. Leave it to the Slimes to turn a single, isolated incident into an epidemic of jogger shootings.

What about the Central Park jogger? She wasn't black. Turned out to be a pretty dangerous pastime for her too.

What about the elderly couple who were shot dead while visiting their son's grave in Maryland? "Mourning While White." I must have missed that headline.

Spare us your racial scab-picking, Slimes.

Stop putting all that nasty ink all over the paper and just sell it as a toilet paper substitute. Just until the shortage passes ...

16 posted on 05/19/2020 5:57:31 AM PDT by IronJack
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To: IronJack

My sympathies; it’s too bad that identity politics has forced us to see things in racial colors.

But... how safe would a white guy be jogging through a black neighborhood? Would he take his kid there? Would he always be aware of his color?


17 posted on 05/19/2020 6:00:18 AM PDT by CondorFlight
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To: conservative98

New York Times, now do this:

Visiting your sons grave while white; our readers respond.


18 posted on 05/19/2020 6:02:22 AM PDT by Trinity5
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To: conservative98

If he’s so afraid to run in white neighborhoods, why doesn’t he go and run in a black neighborhood? Is it because he knows that black neighborhoods are far more dangerous than white neighborhoods?


19 posted on 05/19/2020 6:11:31 AM PDT by euram
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To: campaignPete R-CT

jogging while black, funny Just like wearing a hooding will get you shot


20 posted on 05/19/2020 6:23:33 AM PDT by ronnie raygun
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