Dear Herman Cain: Racism Does Hurts

NOTE:  This video was accidentally recorded while I was listening to another video that I recorded as a video response to Shirley Sherrod’s July 2010 discrimination firing experience.  I am crying in the video because of Sherrod’s personal painful racism history and the pain that racism (employment discrimination) caused me. Today, November 5, 2011, I am still suffering emotionally, financially, and physically, from my employment discrimination and retaliation experience with New York State Department of Correctional Services which violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended and Eliot Spitzer’s actions that denied me a jury trial.

Now that past allegations of sexual harassment have surfaced against Herman Cain he is realizing what many victims of racism have always known RACE does matter in America. During an October 9, 2011, appearance on CNN’s” State of the Union” Herman Cain responding to African Americans struggling economically in America stated in part:  "They weren't held back because of racism. People sometimes hold themselves back because they want to use racism as an excuse for them not being able to achieve what they want to achieve."

Vera Richardson
Author of Screwed by Former Governor and Attorney General Eliot Spitzer