Martin Luther King's Birthday is upon us again, and it appears that the "sort of" holiday (I have never gotten a paid day off because of MLK Day) serves as a checkpoint to see how the United States is dealing with the race issue. The answer is that we get better and worse as we go along.

First off, the public perception for different races is much better than MLK's time. Every color can eat in the same restaurants, drink at the same fountains and poop in the same toilets. You can't shout nigger or wetback or gook or towel head or cracker without causing a lot of scorn from those who hear you. Racists have to be selective with their irrational insults. They have to look both ways before they start in on their bigoted rhetoric.

There are, however, still a bunch of racists out there. A guy retold me a tale of how a heavy metal musician blamed hip hop for ruining the music scene. White college students accuse minorities of taking all the scholarship money. Indians still complain about the white man for taking all the land. When life is not going the way you planned, it's always easy to point the finger at an entire race of people. It's that overarching conspiracy that's keeping you down.

Of course, in an attempt not to offend anyone, some PC freak came up with long winded euphemisms for how to describe all the colors of the rainbow. African American, Native American, Asian American, Canadian American, Antarctic American. Why these names would make anyone feel more comfortable is beyond me. It should not take five or six syllables to explain that a person is a minority. That's why we used the primary colors in the first place. No one calls white people Vanilla, red people Burnt Sienna, or yellow people Sunrise.

Then, there's affirmative action. What do we do with affirmative action? Is right? Is it just? Is everyone getting a fair shake? The answer is no, but when it comes to employment, affirmative action is only one of their considerations. Employers have all kinds of biases and preferences when they pick employees. Some of them won't hire you because you're black. Some will want you just because you're black. Some won't like your crazy clothes or hair style. Some embrace your individual expression. The point is that if a company wants a good image, they will have a diversified work force. If they want to use some affirmative action policy, that's really up to them. It's a personal choice for the business. All this government debate hoopla is just so politicians can say they took a stance on the subject. They usually start out "I'm for people of all race and creeds, but..."

The funny thing is that the heart of the race issue isn't about equality, it's about initial acceptance. MLK said it exactly right thirty-five years ago that people should be judged not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. I have met people from most races, both male and female, and let's face it, they are the best and worst people in the world. You will find every stereotype from drunk Indians to punk ass niggers. There are many horrible Asian women drivers, and there are too many ignorant skin head Aryans. The goal is to give everyone that initial benefit of the doubt that they are good people. If they turn out to be assholes, the reason probably has very little to do with the color of their skin and more to do with what they value in life.

I live in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and the population is close to a fifty-fifty split between anglos and minorities. Lots of Hispanics, a good chunk of Indians, a smattering of black people, a decent amount of folks of Asian descent, as well as Europeans and South Americans. It is truly a melting pot in the middle of the high desert, and the result is a greater amount of tolerance than I see in most towns in this country. We don't have much of the white-black thing or the brown-yellow thing or the red-blue thing. Everyone has to tolerate everyone else because there are too many types to deal with to be selectively racist. I go to other towns, and they still have one group pitting against another. All I can say is that it's old and stupid. Go read or reread Huckleberry Finn, and you just might realize how ignorant racism is.

So how is America doing with the race issue? I think we are trying too hard to be "equal," and not trying hard enough to be "fair." You shouldn't feel obligated to like someone just because they're a "minority." You don't have to add "American" to the end of some faraway continent to politely describe someone. All you have to do is assume everyone is all right until they prove to you otherwise. Once you do that, you are running a race worth winning.

Chris Jungle is a honky-cracker-jack-white-trash-wanker.