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When I said I wasn’t reading books any white authors for the foreseeable future, this white woman got all offended. She said that was fairly racist and if I had said the same about Black authors, it wouldn’t be acceptable. Then I told her I had spent my ENTIRE LIFE reading books
by white authors. From the books I was assigned in school to the books I read for pleasure, 98% of them were written by white authors. And I read voraciously as a child, because I didn’t have to spend time trying to pay bills. I would finish a book or two a day. So, even if I
read a book a week from this point forward—which is virtually impossible for me—I wouldn’t be able to read enough books by BIPOC to come close to evening that out. There are 52 weeks in a year. Sometimes that many books are released in a single day. Most of them by, you guessed
white authors. Even most of the books ABOUT BIPOC are written by white authors, so if I go by (mostly inauthentic) representation on the page along, even then I’m reading a bunch of white authors. So when I explained that I’d never be able to put a dent in what ACTUAL racism had
done to my reading history, she sort of sputtered and said something about how being so picky with my present-day choices wouldn’t solve anything. And I said she was free to consume all the seasonless literature she liked, my decision was made.
