This is part of our continuing series of accounts by readers of how they shed the illusions of liberalism and became race realists.

Born into a secular Jewish family in California, my early childhood was fairly typical. Race was a trivial concept to my young mind, and the schools I attended were almost 100 percent white.

One day in the early 1970s, everything abruptly changed. Forced busing had been implemented, and I suddenly found myself attending a 90 percent black school on the other side of town — in Inglewood, to be exact.

I was only 11-years old, and all I knew about black people was that they were victims of historic oppression. This is what I had been told by my parents, my father in particular, who had been stationed in the South during Jim Crow, and had seen segregation first hand.

But from the first day on, chaos reigned. I soon realized that this school was a dangerous place. If I knew what was good for me, my main priority would have to be safety — not education. I spent a total of four years in black schools, and during that time, I had a knife to my throat, witnessed a white student get his teeth knocked out, and was threatened almost every day.

One day, while sitting on a bench between classes, a black kid sat next to me, and asked me, “What are you?” I didn’t feel like discussing my ethnic background with him, so I gave him evasive answers, and told him I’m just a regular American. He persisted, “Then why are you brown? As long as you ain’t no Jew. I don’t like Jews.”

It wasn’t just the students who were obsessed with race and ethnicity. The administration actually inventoried us by race. Once during gym, the coach conducted a racial survey of his students. Obviously, he had been told to do so by his superiors, and he had a sheet just for this purpose. As he proceeded through the class, he pointed to each student, “black, black, black, black, Mexican, black, white, black. . .” When he got to me, he felt it necessary to ask, and I felt uncomfortable. I answered, “Just regular.” There was vexation and awkwardness, but after a few seconds, he checked something off on his sheet and that was that.

Even though my family was secular, nevertheless, they instilled a sense of Jewish pride in me. So when I encountered a large black student harassing another student, who looked Jewish, I felt obliged to intervene. Unfortunately, I was scrawny, and stood no chance against the bully. Luckily, a larger black kid saw what was happening, and intervened on my behalf, diffusing the situation.

One experience stands out in my memory. It took place in Latin class. Our instructor was a Polish Catholic who survived the Nazi concentration camps. He probably had many tales to tell which would have made our class a fascinating one — except for the fact that he was terrified of his own “students.” Clearly, he had experienced abuse similar to what I had experienced. It bothered me to contemplate an old man, who had already gone through so much suffering in his life, being tormented by the brutes that passed for “students.”

This Latin instructor had set up a political system in his class whereby the students would elect a president, a secretary, and other officers. It was unclear which duties each “official” would have in class and it was unclear what was supposed to be accomplished through such a system. What was clear from the start, however, was that the black students would use this system to purge the class of any non-blacks. There were only about five non-blacks out of roughly 30 students. When the blacks overwhelmingly elected a white student as “president,” the boy was initially happy. But, as the harassment increased and the threats and attacks mounted, the white “president” soon realized that he had been targeted for elimination from the class. Electing him “president” was only a way of targeting him, making sure he couldn’t keep his head down and keep from being noticed.

After the first white “president” dropped the class to avoid this torrent of harassment, the blacks moved on to a second white student and did the same to him. He was duly elected, and then relentlessly bullied until he couldn’t take it anymore and stopped coming to class. After he left, the only white girl in the class switched classes before she could be elected to anything. They then elected a Hispanic student. He left immediately. When they started the next election, it was obvious that I, as the only non-black remaining, would be chosen. Indeed I was. For the rest of class that day, I was subject to objects being thrown at me, getting gum stuck in my hair, and incessant taunts. All this was right in front of our teacher — who feared too much for his own safety to do anything about it.

The moment class was over and I stepped outside, they were all waiting for me. Nearly 30 blacks stood around me: slapping me, throwing things, lobbing racial slurs, and making threats. More blacks from other classes soon joined in. But by then I’d learned that showing fear only makes matters worse, so I kept steadily walking, ignoring them all as much as possible. One of them said, “those Mexican sho’ is cool (back then “cool” meant “fearless”),” apparently taking me to be some kind of Hispanic. Just before reaching my next class, a stone whizzed past my head just missing me and hitting the wall in front of me with a loud thump, reminding me that although surviving in black environments requires grit and ingenuity — luck is just as important.

The knife incident was also illuminating. I was sitting outside waiting for my next class when two tough blacks approached me out of the blue. One of them put a knife to my throat and said, “I don’t like the way you look.” Luckily for me, this incident didn’t last long; an attractive black girl had been walking by and saw what was happening. She said, “Why are you messing with him? Y’all should come with ME!” Even though group differences are real, good people can be found in every demographic. That black girl may well have saved my life.

Eventually, my family left California, and I was out of danger. Those four years of forced busing had left me traumatized, and filled with a desire to reconnect to my Jewish roots.

In all, I attended three high schools, the black one in Inglewood, an almost all white school in central Oregon, and a mixed school in Seattle. In the black school, I was considered a genius, in the white school, I was exceptionally smart. In the mixed school, I had to compete with other Jews and Asians. Suddenly, I wasn’t so smart. The evidence of group differences — in both intelligence and behavior — has stared me in the face for all my life. With the help of American Renaissance and other dissident websites, I’m all too happy to stare right back.

If you have a story about how you became racially aware, we’d like to hear it. If it is well written and compelling, we will publish it. Use a pen name, stay under 1,200 words, and send it to us here.