One of the main messages I see in Kindred is how the passive forms of harassment and abuse are just as bad as, if not worse than,the obvious and aggressive forms. Throughout the book there are characters that are more aggressive, like Tom and Margaret Weylin, which were not well liked but were at least understood. We can anticipate the actions of obviously prejudiced people because they wholeheartedly believe in their views and have voiced them, and by knowing what reactions we can expect from these characters we worry less about what they're going to do. It is the people that are morally ambiguous and partake in more passive and less regular forms of harassment that we should  worry about. These are the people that normalize racist and sexist behaviors and make it less obvious that it's wrong to perpetuate such attitudes.

The passive aggressive prejudices I've found so far in Kindred is not a complete list: guilt tripping and emotional blackmail, and fetishization all three of which are based on sex/race. Rufus is the most obvious example of all three--convincing Dana it's her responsibility as a fellow woman and as a friend to make Alice come to bed quietly and taking absurd interest in Alice beyond the natural growth of a childhood friendship. However, Dana's family also plays on her emotions when she wants to marry Kevin, telling her how betrayed they are and how she owes it to the family to marry an African American. And, not to leave out the example of fetishization, there's Alice's and Kevin's coworker who is constantly talking to them about how they could make interracial porn. Beyond how this is a huge case of sexual harassment in the work place, he also isn't valuing them as a couple or two people who genuinely love each other;he cannot look past their race and how that makes them different.

These three examples are all instances that society has brushed past, even though they are obviously wrong when isolated. It is not right to toy with someone's morality in order to have an easier time raping someone. It is not right to hold inheritance and familial values over a person's head in order to get what you want out of them. It is not right to dismiss the validity of a relationship in favor of inquiring about their sexual activities. Yet, these kinds of situations are for the most part ignored because they are "isolated incidents" and "not everybody is that way"