‘Sidewalk Susie’ Asks Woman And Biracial Child If They Live In Affordable Housing In Viral Video

It seems a lot of white people in this country have problems with black people doing the most normal things. Going to the pool? Not okay. Selling water (water!) without a permit? Uh-uh. BBQing in the park? Absolutely not. Delivering newspapers? Think again. Just recently a black woman had the cops called on her for trying to use a coupon.

And it’s not just recently that this has been happening — it’s just recently that there have been phones with cameras available for people to be recorded pulling their racist crap.

Like this story, where Theresa Lund, the executive director of the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative (who is white), tried to intimidate a woman named Alyson Laliberte, whose toddler was playing outside Lund’s home, and earned herself the nickname “Sidewalk Susie” in the process. Actually, the homes were apartment units, so they were also outside Laliberte’s home, only Lund didn’t seem to believe they lived there, asking Laliberte at least two times if she lived in the “affordable units.”

Laliberte recorded the interaction and posted it to her Facebook page.

In the video, Lund tells Laliberte, “I’m sitting here because you’re preventing my children from sleeping. Would you like me to do that to your kids?” Laliberte quickly responded, “Who is even watching your kids right now. Are you? Cause you’re not, you’re here with me and my kid.” Good point. Also, important to point out — this was at 3:30 on a Saturday afternoon. Not late at night, not early in the morning. The middle of a Saturday.

That’s when Lund tried to condescend to Laliberte, asking, “Are you one of the affordable units? Or are you one of the Harvard units?” DAMN.

While Laliberte remained calm during the incident, she expressed her true feelings on Facebook on July 14, writing, “It was totally discriminating and racist of her.. or maybe it was because my daughter is biracial who knows. I have no idea who this woman is and the fact that she thinks she has some kind of authority over me is crazy!”

Lund has since apologized for her behavior in an email to the Boston Globe: 

“I want to be accountable for my actions in a situation where I fell far short of my values and what I expect of myself. This clearly wasn’t my best moment, and I have work to do to more consistently be my best self.”

It seems Lund has a ways to go on working on her problems with racism and condescension.

h/t New York Post