My city is, apparently, white.

Last week, I had an interview for an internship. I think it did really well, but it did lead me back to something I wanted to talk about like 2 months ago after orientation. You know how at the end of an interview the interviewer always asks if you have questions? Well for once I actually had a few questions, and me being me, I had to ask where the company stood as far as diversity.

I had to ask this question because of orientation. I swear I’ll run out of orientation stories soon, but this one needs talking about. Either on the second or third day of orientation, a panel of local HR people came to speak with us about general hiring practices. Should have been awesome, right? It was. Until we got to how they recruited people to come to Greenville.

“Greenville,” said one of the panelists, arguably the most self-involved (seemingly), “is a great place for white families. It’s hard to get minorities to come here.”

Excuse me, sir, but what did you just say? I bet you thought you were safe because you were speaking to an almost homogenously white crowd and you probably didn't see me sitting in the back row. No. No no no no no how many times can I say n-o NO. This shall not be borne. And it wasn't. Up went my hand to ask a question, and something like this followed:

“Well, I’m from Greenville. I’ve spent most of my life here. This isn’t just a place that’s good for white people. If that’s how you feel about us, then how do you get minorities to come work for you?”

His answer? Essentially, he doesn’t. And that made me unreasonably angry.

What exactly about Greenville makes it so awesome for white folks that isn’t translatable to other people? In case you missed the memo, sir, we do the same things you do. We join wine clubs. We use groupon.  We travel. We shop designer labels. We use the freaking internet (does anyone else remember when white sociologists were making studies about how Black people use twitter? Because I do). We go to sporting events. We eat out—we even eat foreign food. We go get advanced degrees. And you know what? You can do all of that stuff IN GREENVILLE, and if for some reason you can’t find it here, Charlotte and Atlanta are only 2 hours away!

Greenville is my city. I love it here. We’re awesome. We have great schools, an awesome downtown, and nightlife. We’re the 4^th fastest growing city in the nation (or at least we were in 2010), and you mean to tell me you can’t find a way to market us to minorities? You mean to tell me that my city isn’t good for me? Have several seats. Get your life and have several seats.

Come to Greenville. We’re great for white families. We’re good for Black families. We’re good for Asian families. We’re good for—you get what I’m saying.

Come to Greenville. We’re great.