I think that another white drill sergeant may have been enraged. This one happened not to be. And perhaps if we were doing this as a play or a short story or novel or a parable, we would be able to shape it a little differently to make it more true to our own sense of it. But having fixed on these individuals in each case, we have a certain duty to be loyal to their story. He said he thought discussion of race had largely subsided in America, that it was in a quiet period.
People talk about race all the time.
One of things that's so gratifying about the New York Times series is that the Times is focusing on race at a time when the nation is not focused on the one big crisis. I think it's helpful for us to take account of the fact that even if politicians are ignoring race, people are either trying to live together or resenting being forced to be living together. People have conflict in the workplace. People are watching intermarriage with either glee or despair at what's happening in their own culture. Race is very much a topic that's being talked about and sorted all the time in most of the neighborhoods I know, across class lines.