Joseph, I really didn't understand the differences between 'racism' and 'prejudice'.

I think I got a good glimpse into that difference when the City of New York, in its infinite wisdom, moved a couple from a homeless shelter into the middle-class black neighborhood where I lived.

When this tenant moved into the empty two-family house [complete with basement], it has just been sold, so he was the sole occupant at that time [along with his pregnant partner who gave birth last December]. He proceeded to break into both the empty apartment and the basement.

One day [in April of this year], there was an altercation between him and another man over a member of his 'stable', and he pulled a gun on the other man.

The police were called and discovered that he had the prostitutes working in the basement [where they took their Johns] and living in the other apartment [the one he had broken into].

Our outrage over this incident was great. We did not want the city putting anymore of these homeless people in our neighborhood where our children, our elderly citizens [like myself] and our young were constantly in jeopardy. THAT IS PREJUDICE.

The block has 50 families, some residing in one-family homes, some residing in two-family homes. There are various ethnicities in residence [Haitian-American, African-American, Guyanese, Hispanic, and West Indian. At no time did I hear anyone speak of his race [hispanic] or judge him based on his ethnicity. THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN RACISM, I think. What do you think?

P.S. Following this incident, the city moved yet another family into the same house from a homeless shelter. I have subsequently moved out of the family home and rented an apartment and I am urging my sister to move out as well. The future of that neighborhood [where property values still range from $300,000 [one-family] to 500,000 [two family] is in jeopardy.