It's to the best of our knowledge. I'm Anne Strain Champs. Today, what are you afraid of?

I was at home and I was living alone at the time and I heard what to me sounded like someone

trying to break into my house. And I hid and called my boyfriend. And when he got there, you know, he did a perimeter

of my house and was like, it was like the trash can blowing over. You are in possessing of a wildly

overactive imagination. But what was it you were so afraid of? And I really don't remember what I

told him, but I do remember the image that popped into my head.

It was the image of this tall, lanky, young black man.

Fear of black men. That's the issue today, isn't it? The ugly truth, hiding behind the

deaths of Michael Brown, Eric Garner, and so many more.

We don't like to admit it, but a lot of Americans are afraid of black men.

So what happens when you recognize that fear in yourself?

When Rachel Chedone realized she was biased against young black men, actually afraid of them,

she was appalled, and she decided to do

something about it. She tells her story in a recent article titled, I am racist, and so are you.

I mean, you do feel bad. It's made me a lot more conscious of the way I carry myself around

black male strangers. Like, it's very important to me that I don't let

any of my conscious or unconscious racial bias ruin their day. So as you begin to notice and

name your own internalized bias and your own fear reactions.

Where do you think they came from in you?

I mean, did you grow up around many people of color?

You know, I didn't grow up around very many people of color.

It wasn't until I was in high school that I had very much exposure to people of color at all.

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