(Having grown up in suburban NC with all my family living 20 miles away in rural NC, and continuing to live in a deep-red county in NC, I can confidently say that people/family members I grew up around who told racist jokes and those who were legitimately racist are somewhere around a 1:1 ratio)

I grew up in southern Ohio in the 90s, I grew up calling brazil nuts the racist name. I didn’t know better I was a child, but i grew up and realized how awful that was and worked to change.

Amy, we cannot change the past and our past thoughts and actions, but we now try to do the right things for a better world. You are like many of us.