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Xavier Woods Addresses His Experience Growing Up as Part of the Black Community, Dealing With Having to Present Himself as ‘Nonthreatening’

June 6, 2020 | Posted by Jeffrey Harris
Xavier Woods WWE Image Credit: WWE

– WWE Superstar Xavier Woods was a guest on Twitch Rivals this week to talk about the current situation of civil unrest going on in America following the death of George Floyd and issues of police brutality and racial inequality in the justice system. You can view a clip of Woods where he speaks honestly and emotionally about how his parents had to help him be ready for the world due to his skin color and growing up as part of the black community. You can view that clip and read a transcript of some of his comments that Xavier Woods shared on Twitter below:

“I didn’t really understand. I didn’t get it as a kid. But then throughout my life, he [his father] always made sure that I understood I had to work twice as hard as some people in order to get treated the same. In some situations, not even the same. When you do everything you possibly can, you educate yourself, you learn to be an athlete, you learn to play an instrument, you’re in AP classes. You’re doing everything that you can, and you’re doing it because you want to because you want to learn these things. You want to understand these things, but then at its core, I realized through conversation the other day hat because of the way things are, my entire life I’ve had to spend trying to figure out how to present myself as nonthreatening. And if you haven’t been in that situation or understood something like that, it’s a lot. It’s a lot because even though someone might hate me, the onus is on me to deal with it, not on them. There’s no pressure on them to deal with their hate and their pain. While in my house, as a child, I had to have this talk. I had to get this talk. My parents had to give me this information, not so I could be smarter, not so that I could do better; it’s so I could stay alive. That was the first goal in our house. Survive amongst people who might not want you to survive.”

article topics :

WWE, Xavier Woods, Jeffrey Harris