“ Treat people as people, lose the male & female, black & white labels and the guilt that goes with them, and get yourself a life.”

Al, my rules for interacting with people on Medium is that if they appear interested in learning something from the conversation and are open to feedback, then I will work at engaging them. If they appear to just want to show me how much smarter they are than I am, then I don’t work as hard.

Your response makes me think you are probably in the later category, but I’m going to give it a shot anyway.

Looking at your profile, I am assuming that you are a white male like me. So let’s talk a little about how much responsibility we have for the sins of our fathers.

As white males, our ancestors have a history of being both racist and sexist. Is that our fault? Nope. But do we have some responsibility for making up for it, and for ensuring that the white men in our generation and in the generations to come are not racist and sexist?

I say yes.

I say that the fact that I can trace my family tree back almost exclusively to white settlers who came to the states and settled in the south, either owning slaves or supporting the slave owners gives me a responsibility to make sure that I fight racism.

I say the fact that I have a penis gives me a responsibility to fight sexism.

You can take comfort in the belief that you hold no guilt for the sins of your fathers, and use this as a justification to not fight the injustices of the world perpetuated by your ancestors and peers.

But I choose to take responsibility whether the guilt is mine or not.

And as for getting a life, I have a great one and am very happy with it, thankyouverymuch.