This has been a pet peeve of mine for many years. In 1969, while I was in Vietnam, the Marine Corps started recording "interracial incidents." A light green Marine and another light green Marine, or a dark green Marine and another dark green Marine could get pissed off and fight and it was a fight. But if a light green and dark green Marine had the same beef, and got in a fight, it was an interracial incident. While not explicitly stated that it was about racism, it was implicit. It led to where we are ib your story.

The thing is, assumptions are easy. Yesterday, I was in a sporting goods store. A large group of black people came in and spread out beyond the capacity of the employees to monitor them. In a few minutes they reassembled and went out the door without buying anything. A remark from someone made it clear that they were concerned about shoplifting. Was it a racist assumption or the "tactic"? Maybe a bit of both. By the same token, if the people in question just split up to speed a search and they left when they didn't find what they were looking for, might they have considered the profiling a microaggression? I could understand that.

There's a store my wife won't shop in anymore because she was followed around. In her mind, they thought the little brown lady (her) might try to steal something. Was she right? Who knows? Assumptions are easy. Maybe they wanted to be ready to assist her. Improbable but possible in that store.