Acknowledging America’s Racist Continuum: Harry Reid and Meaning in the Context of the Big Picture

Racism in The United States of America rears its ugly head all day long, every day. Those who suffer from its effects are very aware of that. Seems to me, for the most part, that unless you belong to a group challenged on a daily basis to find a way around the deeply entrenched racism of our nation to get done whatever it is you need to do, it’s purely academic. In college, I used to tell my white friends that the thing that pissed me off most about racism was that I had to think about white people all the time, and white people never had to think about me. As an African-American, I have to strategize, code switch, and pick my words carefully so as to not offend, to get whatever I need done. For my white friends, race discussions (and thoughts of racism), were an academic exercise they chose to engage in at their leisure. That being said, I’d like to share with all of you my point of view.

If we concede that this nation is racist, if we concede that our nation has been racist since its inception, since slavery, then, it seems to me, we need to consider the “givens” that the situation has created. If we recognize that racism is inextricably woven into the fabric of our nation, we must concede that no one would be unaffected. That “given” is beyond your control if you were born in the United States and grew up here.

Our society has always devalued African-Americans, and every aspect of American culture promotes that devaluation. Negative myths were created centuries ago to justify slavery and have been transferred from generation to generation. Black men have very large penises and are very scary – they want to hurt you. Black women are sexual beasts. Black people are very aggressive, and of lesser intelligence. While base in nature, on whatever level, completely or just slightly, white people seem to actually believe in the validity of these myths or portions of them. Mix that with family and their assorted attitudes, geographical location (some parts of nation being more racist, others less so), and socio-economics, and we have a perpetual simmering stew of bad feelings. The media, in all of its forms (representing the powers that be), contribute to and perpetuate racism through the images they choose to show and the rhetoric they engage in. Criminals are black. All welfare recipients are black. Tea Parties are patriotic and teabaggers are fighting for America. “Their” America apparently needs to be taken back. We could belabor this point ad infinitum. How could any white person in our nation not be racist? It is beaten into us all from day one that black people are fundamentally inferior and animal. How would it t be possible to avoid the taint in a nation where the problem is endemic? And, has always existed? I don’t think it is possible. I think no one can be unaffected.

For those with power in our nation – the color white giving defacto power – it would be impossible to not be racist. I believe it’s a question of degrees. No one is immune. It’s just irrational to believe so. Some white people, for a whole host of reasons, are less affected. Others are affected much more. This is our nation’s reality. Unless we fight it, it will continue to exist in all its glory. During the Tea Party protests, I read how the people I follow on Twitter felt about the Teabaggers and their racist slogans and signs. There was recognition that those Americans were racist, that they are upset because their President is of color. People seemed to feel perfectly comfortable pointing out their racist behavior. That behavior is at the extreme end of the racist spectrum. People are also infuriated by Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Lou Dobbs and Fox News at large. Again, liberal white people seem perfectly comfortable pointing out racist behavior at the extreme end of the racist spectrum.

Now, let’s talk about Senator Reid in the context of a racist nation. Many are of the belief that Harry Reid is not a racist. I’m not picking on Harry Reid. I don’t think he’s a bad guy, but neither do I see how in the world Mr. Reid would be unaffected by the machinations of racism in the United States. He was born here. He grew up here. Recognition of a racist nation is what I think is missing from the discussion or dialogue about Senator Reid’s remark. Instead of using his comment as a teachable moment about endemic racism, even unconscious racism, no one will let the discussion move beyond a faux argument about him not being racist. And, within the logic of the recognition of racism, there is actually reason for Harry Reid to resign. It would make no fundamental sense. To be replaced by whom? A non-racist white Senator in the United States?

Within this framework, it makes no sense to me to say the comment Senator Reid made wasn’t racist. Of course it was. The fact that the statement is true, within the confines of the racist nation, does not mitigate the racist nature of the statement. Of course white people are less threatened by what they consider to be a black person who doesn’t irritate the eye by being too black, and who can switch registers to one that sounds less black. I think we all know this is true. Black is bad. That is the point. And, that is what we should be talking about. The real point to focus on in what he said is that the nation is so racist that the only way a person of color can achieve within it, is to appear to be less like themselves. Damage. Intense damage for people of color. Don’t you think? What I find even more disturbing is not the rally to Senator Reid’s side, but the rhetoric spewed in his defense. He’s not a racist. It’s not a racist statement because it’s true. Really?

At the end of the day, party politics seem to have trumped truth. Don’t split the party. Pretend the statement does not betray what it betrays because Democrats need to stay together in the face of the GOP. I think this is folly for many reasons and I personally resent it. Racism is not GOP specific. It is an American problem. It must be recognized in all corners. Post the Civil Rights Movement, racism was swept under the rug. It did not go away…it code switched. Instead of being in your face,” No Ni**ers” allowed, it became a mind game full of “you are not qualified” or “I’m sorry, we’ve already hired someone”. If you keep sweeping racism it under the rug, for whatever reason, you are complicit. Period.

In a previous blog post, I discussed this concept. I also talked about how, if upon realizing certain thoughts and behaviors of yours are racist, and you don’t metaphorically slap yourself in the head and vow to not do it again, then you are part of the problem and not part of the solution. A work in progress has to be worked upon. These feelings, and, they are feelings, don’t disappear overnight because you know they are wrong. You have to work at it. A lot has been done to you too. And, to rid yourself of it is a life’s work.

Now, you might ask yourself what it is that I want. I’ll tell you. I want people to stop pretending that people here aren’t racist. Every word spoken otherwise, denies my life and my struggles, those of my family and friends. I want people to see racism in degrees, because nothing else makes sense. I want people to admit when they’ve said something racist, and I want people to apologize when they make mistakes and vow to work on it. That’s all I want. And, I don’t think it’s too much to ask. Or, is it?

Spain, Me, Sally and Suicide

I want to tell a story and share my feelings with all of you about one of my best friends, Sally Stein. She killed herself two years ago in February. That’s the month that most people commit suicide. She happened along, by chance, during  a part of  life that was filled with magic, wonder, self-exploration and freedom. I wish that period could have ended differently.

The first time I went to Spain was on a summer program after sophomore year of college. I went to the University of Salamanca in Spain to study language, literature and art. To be honest, I needed to get out of the country for a little while, I needed to pull myself together. My parents were always willing to fund any educational experience, particularly abroad, so I seized the opportunity, not only to learn, but to try and heal myself a little bit.

At Amherst College, one of my majors was a Spanish Literature. While I had fair mastery of the written word, like most people who study a foreign language a continent apart, my oral skills left something to be desired. I knew the best way to improve my ability to communicate with people, was to go to a Spanish speaking nation. I loved the language, but am also fascinated by people, other cultures, other ways of doing things, other ways of thinking. Language has the key to that door and, the way specific words chosen, the specific construction of a sentence can tell you a lot about the priorities of the people in a nation/culture.  All I really wanted to do was converse, ask questions and share.  I knew I  needed the type of immersion I’d experienced in Tunisia on a summer AFS program where I’d lived with a family. That type of constant interaction with people who spoke no English helped me immensely with my ability to speak French and understand the Tunisian people.

We arrived in Madrid, stayed a week, and then moved on to Salamanca. The University is one of the oldest in the world and I was excited to walk the halls as many had done before me over the centuries. I was hoping to find inspiration in the history and through that, the will to forge forward. I needed to find myself again. I was lost. I’d been involved in an abusive relationship with my boyfriend in college and I was confused, humiliated and had completely lost my bearings. I felt like I was living someone else’s life, or watching a movie where I was the main character. I felt detached from myself. I wanted to use this trip to figure out why this had happened to me and what it meant about me/for me. So, I left. It’s what I do when I need to figure something important out.

This was my first time in Spain and I loved it.  I loved the people – they were so open and friendly, and, I loved their way of life. There was an ease in the air I’d never experienced before. The collective stress level was much lower. I sensed a tacit acceptance of the flawed human soul. People didn’t seem to need to compete with each other in the way we do in the United States. Each person I met seemed to be doing their own thing, doing what they liked to do. No one asked you what school you went to, where you lived or what you did for a living as a measure of if they should even bother talking to you, of whether you were worth their time, whether you were one of them, or someone they could get something from. Life was a journey for Spaniards, not a destination. Spanish people seemed to appreciate the small things about life. Having a coffee and an interesting conversation might take precedence over any stupid chore you might have to accomplish on your self-imposed tight schedule. People seemed to take things in stride in a way Americans could not. They knew that everything did not have to be, nor would it be, perfect all the time. They knew happiness could be illusive and that the other feelings one had were to be savored as well, not rejected out of hand as inherently wrong or in need of drug therapy. I wanted to spend more time there and explore.

I was supposed to stay in Salamanca a month. I didn’t. I changed my ticket and decided to go to Cascais, Portugal for a month. I was still confused, still heartbroken and still very, very sad. But, that’s a story for another time.

I went back to school the following Fall semester and made plans to study in Spain again Spring semester. I chose to go to Sevilla because in 1985, no one spoke English there. I would be immersed, with no way out and I’d have to put all those words and constructions floating around my brain into some semblance of order to be able to communicate.

I left the U.S. on New Year’s Day. I wanted to start the year fresh. I was holding on by a thread. In the early ‘80s, domestic abuse wasn’t understood as well as it is now. It was a complete and total nightmare which involved the police as well as the administration. Everyone knew about my shame in this small New England College. I was humiliated and embarrassed; I needed to get away from this guy who was, at this point, literally stalking me. Who would think that would happen at Amherst College?  But, again, that’s a story for another day.

I arrived in Spain in the middle of the night, with no place to live. I’d lived with a family in Tunisia, I’d had that experience and wanted to do something totally different.  A woman on the plane recommended a hostel and we landed, I went straight there. It was disgusting, but I had no other options. It was the middle of the night, and everything in this “city” was closed.  I cried all night, got up early the next morning and moved into another hostel down the street I’d read about in a guide book. It was an extended stay hostel and had a communal kitchen for all guests. It was pretty nice and I made it my home for 6 months. I made crazy friends from all over the world and had a great time as I tried to communicate with my housemates. I went to school rarely. I didn’t want to hang out with Americans speaking English, so I forged my own path. I got a job teaching English to Spanish professionals and got an apartment. I dropped out of school. Needless to say, my parents were not pleased.

Sally in the '60s before moving to Spain

I began to meet the people of Seville. I lived in the old barrio, Santa Cruz, and made friends with my neighbors. I had a boyfriend (met him in a disco), the surest way to learn a language, and met a bunch of expatriate Americans who’d lived in Sevilla under Franco since the ‘60’s. I met these people sitting outside at a bar. We began talking and became friends. They had many fascinating stories to tell and all had led incredible lives.  I didn’t know what they did for a living, or where they had gone to college – it was all so refreshing. People were judged on what they said, not who they were. They liked me and found what I had to say interesting also. I felt like I’d found my safety spot. I felt I was being heard and being me for the first time. I started to feel better about myself.

I met John Fulton and Sally Stein on the same drunken night. We became fast friends and palled around every night in Sevilla. I had no phone in my apartment, so around 9pm each night, they would come and scream up to my third floor window in the tiny streets of the old barrio “Joy, Come out and play!” I did every night. They introduced to me many others, both Spaniards and foreigners and I became a part of their friend family. It was a magical time.

It's the '80 - leave my hair alone!

After many months, by accident, I found out my friend John Fulton was a famous bullfighter. He had been the first American bullfighter to fight in the ring in Mexico City as well as in the ring in Madrid. He had been Peter O’Toole’s understudy in Lawrence of Arabia and had the funniest stories about O’Toole in Franco’s Spain that I’d ever heard. He was an artist and a great man. He has since passed away and I miss him very much. He took me to my first bullfight and taught me the beauty of the dance between man and animal. I was fortunate. I met emotionally generous, amazing people who became my friends and developed solid loving friendships.

I want to talk specifically about one of them, the woman who became my best friend, Sally. I was tweeting about her the other morning. It was the first real time I had spoken about her, allowed myself to think about her. She committed suicide two years ago and I’ve not been back to my beloved Sevilla since.

Sally was singular. She was from Wichita, Kansas and had landed in Spain in the early ’60s. She’d gone there on vacation, a graduation gift from her parents and never left.  It happens a lot in Sevilla. There is something magical about it. None of us can put our fingers on it, maybe it’s the mix of cultures – Moors and Spaniards that gives it the special feeling that it has. Who knows? If you ever go there, all I have to say is beware. You might become one of us! Sally left the States after the assassinations of JFK, MLK, and RFK. She said she had become totally disillusioned with the United States. Maybe there was more to it than that, I don’t know. That’s what she told me.

We had a strange relationship. We were friends, we loved each other. We fought often, yelled, screamed and cried. While Sally was like a Spanish mother to me – she taught me much about life in Spain. She introduced me to new friends, she helped my find my apartment, figure out how to turn on the electricity and the phone, I was also like a mother to her. While I was much younger than she, I had more common sense. I helped her with work disputes, with friend disputes, with technology.  Our relationship was reciprocal, we helped each other.  We had fun, we giggled and laughed constantly like two little girls. We read very similar books and listened to the same types of music though we were generations and a culture apart. She also loved words as do I. That was an important bond. Many English speakers translated for Spaniards during those years. It’s how we all made extra money. She cared about doing a great job as much as I did. I appreciated that about her. For many years I visited Sevilla and Sally every 3 weeks. We traveled throughout Andalucia together eating all the fish and shell fish we could find. Over time, in order to not piss my husband off entirely, I started a business to help pay for my little oasis of sanity. I imported 16^th -19^th century Spanish antiques from Andalucia to New York. A Spanish friend that Sally introduced me to had/has an antique store in the old barrio and I bought antiques wholesale from Laura, and sold them retail in New York to architects and interior designers. It gave me something to do, some cash, and helped me immerse myself even deeper into Spanish culture. The latter had always been my true quest.

I talked to Sally every day on the phone from New York. It was as if she were a friend down the street. We were a large group of friends, many lived in other countries like I did, and we’d convene every so often in Sevilla  to tell the tales of our “other”  lives while drinking beer and eating tapas. Spain, for me was the antithesis of NYC. The things that I believed mattered, did matter there. No one talked about money; everyone was there for each other. There was no pedigree competition. You stood on the merits of your words.

Sally was a beautiful woman in her youth. We met when she was about my age now, 45. I turned 21 in Sevilla. Sally, like me was more comfortable in Sevilla. She appreciated the way of life for the same reasons I did. She worked as a secretary for some famous Spanish architects and had a nice life. She had a wonderful rooftop apt. in Sevilla, and a summer house on the coast in Vejer de la Frontera. We made many hysterical trips back and forth. I’ve always been amazed by how in a 2 hour trip to the coast, Spaniards have to stop every 20 minutes to get a roadside beer! It made me nervous for many years, then, I just got over it. There was nothing I could do about it.

As the years passed, we shared many secrets; she helped me with my marriage to David, with my kids, and held me together whenever I was falling apart. In 2001, after the demise of the World Trade Center where my husband spent 12 years of his life working as a banker, he decided to make some changes. He didn’t want to be a banker in a large firm anymore. He couldn’t stand the illegality of what his colleagues were doing, he couldn’t stand the assholes he worked with. Our lives changed dramatically. We sold our home and he started his own business. For all intents and purposes, we were broke. She was there for me. She let me cry every night, let me be afraid, told me it would be ok. Maybe it wouldn’t be ok tomorrow, but one day. I leaned on her, I needed her. I tried to be that for her too. She had serious kidney issues. I took her x-rays to Columbia Presbyterian and, through a friend got the head of urology to diagnose her. She was a very stubborn woman and waited 10 years to have her kidney removed. Later, she suffered from nodules in her throat. She believed it to be cancer. She was a very heavy smoker. She waited to go to the doctor until she almost couldn’t speak. The cancer was operable. She would have been fine. Instead, she chose to take her own life. It wasn’t just because of the throat problem; I think it had more to do with aging, being single, and not having any family around. She had been a Princess, beautiful, blond, tall, leggy and now, her reign was over. She was older, she wasn’t so beautiful anymore. All the men were married. She was too old for affairs. She made a bad property investment and lost her inheritance. She’d lost her job because of her kidney ailment; she was immobilized for some time. She was now living on social security and while she received money enough to live quite decently, she was going to have to downsize. She was going to have to watch her money closely. She didn’t want to do that. She wasn’t flexible. She couldn’t roll with the punches. She either wanted it all or nothing. To top it off,  I was basically her only family, and I had problems that precluded me from being around for support. I was depressed and could barely function. I didn’t have extra to give to anyone. I spent a lot of energy pretending I was ok in front of my children.

One day, I got a package in the mail with two plane tickets to Spain in it. They were gifts from Sally. The dates were firm and could not be changed. At the time, I was working full-time as a copy-editor and had to beg for time off in a rather precarious work situation. While on the surface, it seemed like a nice gesture, it wasn’t. It was strange, manipulative, intrusive and made me resent her. I told her I had problems at home, I was working  and couldn’t go to Spain right now. She didn’t care. She was forcing me to go there to spend time with her. The tickets were non-refundable.  If I didn’t come, she would lose the money and she didn’t have money to spare. I had to go.

I called a mutual friend (Ruth),  who lived in England. I told her what was going on and she decided to come with me. I told her Sally had been mentioning suicide, that she’d sent me the tickets. My British friend’s husband Mansour, (another mutual friend), had committed suicide one year earlier by diving off the cliffs of Penzance. When I heard that news out of Ruth’s screaming, crying mouth, I immediately thought of pirates and Broadway. I still feel a little bit guilty for that.

Thus, we both went to Sevilla to check on Sally. Sally had sworn me to silence about our conversations of suicide. She threatened me with cutting me off. On this trip, I decided her life was worth the cut off and I told our Spanish friends. They lived there, maybe they could help. What could I do from another continent? They all thought I was being a dramatic American. I am a couple of decades younger than all of my friends there, and sometimes, they think I’m not old enough to understand certain things. I’m sure they’re right, but this particular thing, I understood well. They shut me down and told me not to speak of such things.

Sally had Ruth and I over for dinner one night. We ordered Chinese food. Her living room seemed very different. At first, I couldn’t put my finger on it. Then, I realized it was slaughtered with framed photos of all of us. They were everywhere. It was like a shrine to someone’s life. We tried to talk to her, she wouldn’t hear of it. She told us if we continued this discussion, we would have to leave her home.  So, rather awkwardly, we ate disgusting Spanish Chinese food  and talked random bullshit all night. Two days later, after a drunken argument in a bar, I left Spain. I didn’t hug her, I was mad at her. I was mad at the entire situation and I was under a lot of stress at home. A family member was deeply involved in drugs and needed help. It was stressing out everyone in the family and along with my financial woes, I was having 10-20 anxiety attacks a day. I just felt overwhelmed.

I left Sevilla and went back to my home hell. I received two boxes in the mail and a large packet. I opened the packet and found a will, cremation papers, and a little note that began “I know you think this is wrong…”. I couldn’t open the boxes. I didn’t want to know what was in them. I didn’t want to talk to Sally, I was confused and angry. I didn’t know what to do. I called Ruth in England and she had received the same things in the mail. We tried to call Sally to no avail.

A couple of days later, I tried to call Sally on my cell phone from work. Nothing. She was always home, I was scared, but I also thought that maybe she’d gone to Italy. She sometimes did that without telling anyone to make you worry about her.  I called my friend/landlord Perdita in Sevilla. When she answered the phone, she was sobbing and screaming “Oh, Joy, Oh, Joy”. I started screaming “Oh Joy WHAT? WHAT?” She asked, “Didn’t anyone call you yet? Sally’s dead. She killed herself.” I started crying, hung up the phone and went to my desk, sobbing. My boss told me to go home. I drove from L.I. back to Manhattan afraid I would have an accident. I was having that out of body feeling and couldn’t really connect with what I was physically doing. I got home, sobbing while parking the car, through the lobby, elevator, and into the arms of my husband. I ran a bath, picked up a bottle of wine and proceeded to sob and get drunk in the bathtub.

Then, the phone rang. It was another friend from Sevilla, Robert Vavra. He was a close friend of Sally’s and had, in fact, financially supported her for the past few years. In her will, she left me 3K Euros. The first thing he said to me was that he thought I should give him the money after all he had done for her. I couldn’t believe my ears. My best friend was dead, and this guy was talking money. Robert is in his ‘70’s – a famous photographer of horses. He’s very dainty. He also has no soul. He was good friends with Leni Riefenstahl. I cussed his ass out. I was livid, drunk, sad, and disappointed that anyone would bring up money in this situation. I told him I would be there as soon as I could get a flight, and, that if he touched anything before I got there, I’d call the police.

I got on a plane, red-eyed and flew to Sevilla. First, I had to find my friends and get a drink. After the drinks, we went to her apartment. I had keys. She sent them in the packet. I walked in to see 2 chalkboards. One had my name and phone number. The other had a letter written to me on it while death had been approaching. She wrote about the pills kicking in, it being hard to breathe and then, the writing trailed off. There were pills and beer by the bed. There were also laminated notes taped to various things around the house. They were instructions for me about how to handle certain things.

The next morning, I went to the coroner’s office. I was charged with identifying Sally’s body. There were a lot of people just hanging around outside, waiting, smoking cigarettes. I walked in and was told to wait in line. I stood outside smoking too. Caskets rolled up, people came out crying and went off with them. There was this one casket with a gigantic Jesus cross on top of it. For some reason, I was mesmerized by it. Other caskets came and went, but this one remained. I couldn’t get the song “Along Came Sally” out of my mind. I felt like I was going crazy. Finally, that very ornate casket was wheeled inside and I was beckoned inside too. The coroner opened the top of the casket and there she was. She had frilly white ruffles surrounding her head. She looked like that rich girl vampire in “Bram Stoker’s Dracula”, the movie with Gary Oldman. I was shocked. She wasn’t even religious! What was all this?

The next step was to follow the casket to a hearse and then walk behind it down the street to the crematorium. Other friends were waiting there. They wheeled her casket into a great open fire and told us to go up the street for beer and come back in 3 hours. We did. It was very strange and awkward for me, these traditions very foreign. We went back after 3 hours and I picked up a purple thermal bag, the kind you put bottles in for babies. It was Sally and I took her home.

This captures my friend Sally perfectly

I just opened the first box she sent me last weekend. She’d put beautiful scarves from Italy in it and trinkets from Rome. I haven’t opened the second box yet.

Conversations About Race: Uncomfortable But Necessary

The other night, I posted a rather provocative video of a black man screaming at a young white woman. I added to the video tweet that my son had come into my office and made me watch it.

Here’s the video:

The black man’s speech, albeit it from a mic ripped out of the white girl’s hand, was incited by the woman’s questioning of the black man’s love of America. What an ironic accusation. And, as a result, the fed-up black man felt the need to explain to any and all listening how very hurtful that accusation was.

I cried when I watched the video. I cried because I felt that black man’s pain. Sometimes it’s just hard, you know? You can feel yourself walking on the emotional edge for reasons that range from stupid to life altering.  Could be because of some stupid ass racist comment that stuck in your craw that you wish you’d responded better to, or some store employee humiliated you by asking you if  you know the price of the item you asked them to show you, or you were being followed around the drugstore like a criminal,  you were ignored and skipped in line on purpose by the deli dude, or you stood in a store looking lost and directly into the eyes of some employee who had no intention of helping you. You might be getting fucked at work while some stupid ass white idiot receives more recognition, just because they’re white. You are 100% sure it’s not you because even your co-workers have mentioned it. It’s hard to swallow racist bullshit day in and day out. Sometimes you just need to blow.

Not often is one presented with the opportunity to just let it all out and, and, with a microphone  in the street, no less.  This man seized the moment to tell the smug little white girl just how Goddamn American he was/is.  Now, was it done in the nicest of ways? Nope. She challenged him, rather naively, I might add, and he challenged  her back with some real, hard ass truth. It made her cry. And, I couldn’t care less. She’s not the point.

Shortly after my video tweet, I saw an RT of it with the hashtag  #bigot #blackman. I was indignant. I asked the person to please remove the hashtags. I was angry, because while I knew that classification made no sense whatsoever, I also knew why the person had done it. Delivery.

Why was a black guy a bigot for telling a white girl the truth?  I, personally, was moved to tears by what he said in his well-constructed historical timeline of slight. Moved by how he said we’ve loved their children, and them, died for their/our country and hadn’t gotten one Goddamn ounce of respect for it. He was right. It was true. He said it with passion, yet control.  It was linear, and he covered a hell of a lot of bases. Quite frankly, I thought he did a damn fine job. And, I’m sure he did it so well because he’d been thinking about all of that  for a very long time. All of us African-Americans/People of Color have/are. Our whole lives, in fact.

In college, while participating in race conversations with my white friends late into the night, I tried to explain that these discussions were not just intellectual for me, they were also emotional. How could they not be? These issues they had the luxury of intellectualizing, actually affected every single part of my life, my existence.  The passion in my voice stemmed from anger, frustration, sadness, and hope. Yes, hope. Hope that I would be heard. Hope that we could be honest. Hope that the conversation could somehow make a difference. Did I get loud sometimes, certainly. I still do. I do because I hurt and I want the pain acknowledged, not dismissed as hysterical or a “chip on my shoulder” or “militant”, whatever that means. No amount of “it’s better than it was before” or “we’ve made progress”  make it any better because it’s still fucked up. I shouldn’t  have to feel “good” that the KKK isn’t stringing me up right now, or that I can stay in a hotel with white people, or that I can go to a school I deserve to go to. Seriously, how much better should I feel? How much better would you feel?  Hence, the frustration. The frustration that I know I have, and the frustration that the black man was exhibiting on video. I am a human being and I am asking other human beings to tell the truth, acknowledge the reality of racism and talk about it. I am asking for people not to deny it, ameliorate, soft peddle it, run away from it, or seek to circumvent it by talking about “delivery”.

The tweeter I attempted to discuss the substantive part of the tweet with could only focus on the girl and her momentary brush with the uncomfortable. While I conceded that it wasn’t perhaps “nice”, neither did I give it much of a second thought. My twitter friend, though, couldn’t let go of the black man’s delivery, saying it wouldn’t win allies for “the cause”. Seemed to me that the passionate self-defense by the black man of himself, his people, and other people of color, was just too much to acknowledge. It was as though through defending the girl, he was defending himself and all others who don’t want to be “accused” of something or have to “admit” to something.  I found that unfortunate, as well as somewhat typical ( I don’t mean that pejoratively), for race discussions are very uncomfortable. Focus on delivery, in lieu of content, provided the escape clause – and was very blame the victimish, I might add. I read “I can’t hear you because I don’t like the way your saying it”.

Racism is an emotional topic. That being said, it’s not a valid way out of the conversation for white people to tell black people that their feelings about racism will only be heard if delivered in a way they deem palatable, in a way that saves their  feelings and that is comfortable. That type of dialogue control comes at the expense of black feelings and is antithetical to the point – sharing and truth. To insinuate what we will only be listened to on your terms, that all other modes of expression are rejected, is a non-starter.  Black people are not the caretakers of white feelings. We are here, though, to share our feelings and experiences with you.  Through honest listening, questioning, reflecting, and coming back for more, we can move this ball forward, if only a little bit. Let’s all try to understand how other people feel, what their experiences have been, what they’ve been through and what we all want for our nation. Stop rejecting that which needs to happen for all of us to move forward. If we can overcome cop outs like “delivery”, then perhaps we might be able to hear each other’s actual words and begin to  foster a much more rich, fulfilling discussion. Shared truth and the ensuing growing pains will cleanse us all.

Joy

Tyler Perry and the Concept of “Coon” : Who Are We Really Worried About?

I witnessed a Twit argument between people of color about Tyler Perry. The conversation revolved around why a portion of the black community condemns his work as “coonish”. Well, it is coonish. And, I’m not really sure that’s a debatable point, but what is debatable is his condemnation. I guess the question is: is there a place for this type of representation of black people in America? I believe there is. But, I also understand how it might be problematic and uncomfortable for some.

Tyler Perry doesn’t bother me in the least. I’m not a fan or anything but, I have seen a couple of his films and to tell you the truth, while I don’t find the stories compelling, I do find some of the characters funny. They remind me of some of my old, black relatives. You know, the ones we ALL have! I picture my crazy aunts and uncles in D.C. saying all kinds of nonsense, the funny way that old black people do. His movies connect me with those memories. I think they make that connection for many black people. It’s why his work is so popular. It’s art for the masses. Art for the plebiscite. Same thing that Mozart created with his operas for the common man. Now, I am by no means insinuating that Perry and Mozart belong in the same sentence! In fact, in rereading that sentence, I shivered! But, my point is, humor exists on many levels. From idiotic to sophisticated and complex.

The real issue here is that there are not enough representative black images. How many black directors are there? We know the answer, very few. And, because there are so few, they become representative of the whole. They are “the” black people and, their films exist as the only representations we have.

It is very difficult to make a film, to find investors. And, because they are so expensive to make, target audiences are key. This is a money making enterprise, and high art is not necessarily involved. Tyler Perry gets to make movies because his movies make money. They resonate with a particular audience that’s willing to pay to go and see them. That’s the industry, that’s how it works.

Now, if there were room in America for more black directors,  if we were represented in many different ways, Tyler Perry wouldn’t have/be a problem. He’d be one part of a spectrum. Perhaps, the bottom, but part is the salient term. Because of the deficit of other images of black people in the film industry, Perry’s films are noticed. And, noticed a lot. Some black people are embarrassed by his coonery and think he does a disservice to the black community at large. I don’t feel that way. I don’t feel that way because I don’t care what white people think about Tyler Perry’s movies. I know the black community is not monolithic. And, I know many white people will never see it that way so, it doesn’t matter one damn bit how they feel.

Let’s get down to brass tacks. Tyler Perry makes movies for black people, not for white people. We understand who his characters are and what he’s making fun of. I’m not sure how white people see them, or if they see them, but I can guess how they’d feel about them – they’d think coon. So, the question really is, are the black people who Tyler Perry bends out of shape worried about what white people think? If we know our community, if we know that’s not representative of the entirety of black people, or that they are caricatures of very extreme personality types, why should it bother us that it exists?

As Frederick Douglas, W.E.B. Dubois, Carter G.Woodson, Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison and Alice Walker exist, so can Tyler Perry. You know why? Many white people see us that way already. They are racist. So, what the hell difference does it make. Who are you embarrassed in front of? How don’t you want to be seen by whom? Is the answer white people? Think about it. I think it is and, I also think you shouldn’t give one good god damn.

Open Letter to White People : Racism, What You Can Do

In order to work on the problem of race in America, we need to face some fundamental truths head on. It might not be comfortable, but, nothing important is accomplished without some modicum of pain. I hope you will listen to what I have to say and that you will think about it. What I really hope is that you will not only think about it, but work on it every day.

All of us who grew up in this nation were infected with the disease of racism. Racism was fundamental at the creation of the nation, slavery acted as a very important economic driver and racism has continued to exist to this very day.

Bartolemé de las Casas was the Spanish priest who decided black people should be enslaved in the Americas. After enslaving the indigenous people, and cutting of their hands when they returned from mines without the gold that was not there, he began to speak with them. He formed friendships. He then, realized that the indigenous people had souls. And thus, he couldn’t enslave them because slavery was rationalized through the belief that these “others” were, in fact, soulless heathens. This presented a formidable problem, the Spaniard’s couldn’t pay people to do the heavy lifting in the “New World” and thus, de las Casas suggested they use Africans as slaves. And, as history shows, he knew better than to befriend those Africans.

The people who began enslaving others knew that their claim of  ”soullessness” was a rationalization. They needed what they needed and that was that. And, in order to feel comfortable with the horrors they would visit upon those Africans, they created a particular mythology. Black people were animals and stupid. We represented a lower species, Simeon like. Picture planet of the apes!

When you look at slavery in the United States, what’s interesting is the methodology employed to keep the slaves off-kilter. Slave masters broke up families, slaves were not allowed to read. If they believed black people to be fundamentally inferior, why would you need to do these things? Because they knew we were not inferior and they knew that through the strength of family and the knowledge that comes through learning, the slaves would challenge them.

The mythology created to rationalize enslaving human beings along the way became fact. Successive generations truly believed and continue to believe many of the various myths: animal, exotic, sexually powerful, not as intelligent, lazy, shiftless. I could go on and on.

Our nation continues to perpetuate these myths as facts. People believe them. Black men have larger penises, black women are animals in bed, we are not as smart, and we don’t really want to work, we just want white people to give us stuff.

I asked my husband, who is white, how racism was learned in his home. (His parents were none to happy about our marriage). He said no one ever said anything directly racist. It was more about what they didn’t say. At the dinner table, a conversation would go on that my husband, as a child, knew was wrong. He would wait for someone to say something confirming it was wrong, and it would never happen. He said that instinctively he knew not to say anything himself, that he’d get in trouble. Eventually, he stopped noticing, it was normal. For many, this slow inculcation just becomes reality and truth.

We have been inundated with media imagery. Whether it’s the darkened picture on Time Magazine of OJ’s mug shot, or the local news where they only show black crime. We, black people are only 12% of the nation. Most crime would have to be committed by others. Funny that we rarely see their images on TV.

So, here’s the deal. No one can be unaffected. Logically, this has had to penetrated each and every white American. Thus, all white people would have to be racist to some degree. How is it possible that anyone could come out clean? I think it should to be measured in degrees: lowest to highest. The lowest consists of people who probably don’t consider themselves to be racist. They love all people. I’m not saying that’s not possible. You can love all humans and still be a little sick from the ever-persistent infecting racist forces – you know, like that involuntary moving of the purse when a black person gets a little too near, or the group of black teens that gets on your subway car and makes your heart skip a beat for a minute. These things mean something, and it’s not your fault.

You grew up here, it was done to you. But, if you know you do this and you don’t try to fight it, if you don’t smack yourself when you do/think it, and say “Ah ha…I know what this is!” then, it is your fault. You have to own this and continually fight against it. You can’t just say the right things, you have to try and modify that behavior. Take control of it because it has controlled you. You also have to call your friends out. If they say something racist in your company, you have to tell them you disapprove, you have to explain, and you have to stop them from doing it again. This is not our responsibility, it belongs to you. Only you can fix you. We have to fix us.

One Big Black Mass: Why Don’t People of Color Have Respect for Our Various Cultures?

I had a conversation last night that I’ve had many times before. Fundamentally,  it was about the existence of African-American culture. My phone friend insisted that the children of  people of color who immigrated here, were, in fact African-American. I took issue with that notion, as I have many times in the past and attempted to explain what a culture is, and the fact that you can’t just join one. There is no sign-up sheet.

This is the definition of CULTURE:

n.

1. The totality of socially transmitted behavior patterns, arts, beliefs, institutions, and all other products of human work and thought.
2. These patterns, traits, and products considered as the expression of a particular period, class, community, or population: Edwardian culture; Japanese culture; the culture of poverty.
3. These patterns, traits, and products considered with respect to a particular category, such as a field, subject, or mode of expression: religious culture in the Middle Ages; musical culture; oral culture.
4. The predominating attitudes and behavior that characterize the functioning of a group or organization.

African-Americans are the descendants of Africans from the western coast of Africa who exhibited an incredible will to survive while shackled in the bowels of slave ships that landed here, in North America. Their various cultures and languages combined as they lived out their lives as slaves in the United States of America. As a result, this combination, influenced to some degree by the culture of the slave masters, formed what we presently call African-America culture. This culture has all the tenets of culture described above.

Here’s my problem. White people do not differentiate between the different cultures that people of color in the United States represent. In their eyes, we are all just niggers. They just don’t pay attention because they fundamentally see no difference. They could care less. They don’t see that a person of color could be of Haitian, Jamaican, Dominican, Barbadian, Bermudan or African-American descent. Because of racism, there is no respect, there is no focus. All they see is black, which is a color, not a culture, coming at them.

That is just how it is. I know that there is nothing any person of color can do about that. What I find infinitely more disturbing is that many people of color see it the exact same way. They fundamentally believe that people of color from various cultures are African-American. They state that because these people of color are citizens of the United States and have adapted certain cultural tenets of African-American culture, they are, in fact, African-American.

Don’t misunderstand me, I’m not putting a hierarchy on any particular culture. What I am saying though, is that it seems to me, people of color have fallen victim to their oppressors mentality once again. They don’t see any difference so why should we? Let’s all just be niggers because that’s what THEY think we are. They can’t be bothered to differentiate, so, why should we?

Each individual culture represented in the United States brings with it the tenets of the culture the immigrant left to come to the United States. Each group brings with it all of the attributes of culture listed in the above definition. These various Americans of color contribute their art, food, music, literature and world view to the totality of America. People of color from other cultures have brought us reggae, salsa, rice and beans! We all represent the ancestors of Africans enslaved, but we were also enslaved in different nations and our cultures developed independently. We are different, we also have similarities. But, they are just that, similarities. Some things are similar because our ancestors were the same people, other things similar because we have and do suffer from racism and oppression. The rest is acculturation.

We all have so much to share with each other, so much to learn from each other. Why do we deny these wonderful cultural differences that we could all be learning from and reveling in? Why do we let white people make us define ourselves as one big black group?

We all need to think harder about who we are. We need to think about why we think the things we do. I know that I can’t change white people, they have to do that themselves. But, as an African-American, I know that  all people of color need to think long and hard about what’s gone on here, how it’s affected us, and what we need to do to be healthy.

Badges of Ability

As per sociologists Sennett and Cobb, here are my educational badges of ability and some personal information:

I am a graduate of Amherst College. I double majored in Political Science and Spanish Literature. I graduated in 1986, as part of the 5^th class of women admitted.  My husband and I met in college. We now have 14 year old twin boys. We are a visually “interesting” family, my husband is white and has one hand, I am a short African-American woman, younger twin (9 min), looks black and is taller than his brother, older son looks white with blue eyes and crazy curly locks. No one ever thinks we are related to each other in any way.

Carter G. Woodson

My great, great uncle was Carter G. Woodson. He was the first son of slaves to get a PhD. from Harvard (after W.E.B DuBois). He was the first black historian – invented Black History Month and wrote the “Miseducation of the Negro”. Oddly enough, we share many similar traits and have done many similar things. To my surprise, he spoke Spanish fluently, as do I, and spent every summer in my beloved Seville at a black think tank. I lived in the old barrio of the city, Santa Cruz and we surely walked the same streets every day. My twins were born on his birthday. Family joke is that I come to this historical/sociological perspective very naturally and that of course, I, like him, need to write about race and America.

The Cervantine Election of Barack Obama: How the United States Learned to Critically Analyze

I went to graduate school at NYU in the early ‘90’s. I thought I wanted an MA/PhD. in Spanish Literature.  I was fascinated with Spain and Spanish Peninsular Literature. I have no idea why. Like many students, I didn’t feel that I had done my best work (or enough work at all), in my undergraduate institution, Amherst College.  So, like many before me, I figured I’d go redeem myself in my own eyes in academia.

I took a course about the first novel ever written (Pt .I – 1605 and Pt. II – 1615), Don Quixote, by Cervantes.  Ultimately, I had to write a paper.  I chose to write about the Moorish narrator of the text, Cide Hamete Benengeli.

Keep in mind, this was the first novel ever written, the first piece of fiction ever written.  Previously, people who could read, only read church doctrine. It was all that existed.  It could never be doubted, it was “holy” truth.

I see Don Quixote as a didactic text.  It literally forces the reader, little by little, to doubt the stories told by people like them (whom they would normally never doubt), and believe the story told by someone they clearly believe to be very unlike them. It literally systematically teaches the reader how to critically analyze.

When I started writing this paper, I couldn’t find any scholars who had written on the topic.  I figured I was just an inept researcher. As I poured through the MLA database, I literally couldn’t find one article about what I’d considered to be a very obvious idea. I wrote it anyway – I’m from Amherst, a primary text institution.  When I got the paper back, my professor told me that it I’d had an original idea.  I was shocked. He said I should publish it, I did not.  I was happy I’d had an original idea; I didn’t feel the need to show everyone.  I got pregnant with twins shortly thereafter, and dropped out of school to be a mother.

As I thought about how it was possible for me to have had an original idea about such an old text, I realized that it had happened because I wasn’t the normal “reader” of this type of text.  I am African-American, a woman and was, at the time 29 years old.  I am the first generation post Civil Rights to have lived outside of segregation.  I am part of a small group of African-American children who in the late ‘60’s, moved into completely white towns and white schools. I was acculturated in white society and everyone said I was “different”.  I was always the only one like me.

Because of the times, because of racism in the United States, (do not read here that I think it has substantially changed – I have teenage children and it is not so different), I was forced to learn to read people and their subtext well from a very early age. It was never what someone said, it was how they said it, or, sometimes more importantly, what they didn’t say.  They could be my friends, my friend’s parents or my teachers. These were the people I spent most of my time with.  I learned how to read (through) many things at an early age as a form of self-preservation.  I also learned how to respond depending upon my audience, (that’s a whole other can of worms).

Don Quixote has many narrators, they are all Spanish and are all telling the same story.  The reader has to ferret out which of them is telling the “true” story.  The brilliance of Cervantes is not just that he makes the reader have to decide which person is telling the truth, but, that he actually has the nerve he has to make the least credible narrator, the Moorish narrator, the truth teller.

During the 15-1600’s, any Spaniard reading this text would have a hard time seeing through the hatred they had for the Moors.  Anything a Moor said would be dismissed out of hand as a lie.  Benengeli, the Moor, the narrator hardest for any Spaniard to “hear” at that time in history’s explanation of the events was/is the most logical and the most credible.  Cervantes forced his readers, against their prejudice, against their hatred and, fundamentally, against their will, to recognize that truth was truth no matter who was telling it. And, in this instance, the guy of color, the Moor, the “enemy” was telling the truth.  He forced them to put their hatred aside for the sake of logic. He asked people to think.

I bring this up now because it seems to me that something very similar occurred in the United States in 2008 with the election of Barack Obama. Barack Obama is not an African-American, but he is a man of color in a country that doesn’t differentiate.  The people of the United States, like the Spaniards reading Don Quixote before them, listened to all of the narrators telling the same story of our nation: John McCain, Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, and a host of others.  The people of this nation, the “readers”, picked the narrator who has always been assumed in this nation to be least credible—the narrator of color, Barack Obama as truth teller. The United States rose above all of its deeply inculcated problems with race that stem from the “peculiar institution” of slavery, listened to and most importantly, believed his was the “truest” of the stories being told.  The United Stated believed that Barack Obama was telling the truest story of what had just happened to us as a nation, and had the truest vision of who we can be as a nation. Under duress, the duress of the global economy, the fear for our future, the United States critically analyzed.  Again, I am shocked, and not just a little. And, while I’m not sure what it means yet, I’m starting to become a bit excited about the future in a way I never have been before.

*Since writing this piece, some things have change. We have teabaggers, birthers, schoolers, Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh. These groups, these people are creating obstacles. But, they are only that – obstacles. The fear that has ensued since the election of our President, Barack Obama, is part of the angry realization of the position – his election- that the nation was somewhat forced into. That does not detract from what we as a nation did by electing him. Somehow, if only for an election day, Americans put logic before race. They put their future in front of their past.

Autobiography as Fiction

Through autobiography, we seek to explain to others how we’ve become who we are, to tell the journey that brought us to our present destination. The stories we will link together from our childhoods and adulthoods will carry us down the river of life, a river sometimes full of rapids, to our present slip. We’ve arrived at the marina. We are docked. In order to (re)create the journey, we travel backwards in time. We must start from the beginning. We are proving our point – a conversion to a fixed point, our present destination. We link experiences that build on each other to bring us here. Were there other experiences perhaps just as meaningful, if not more? Certainly, but they don’t further the goal of explaining how we got to our present place. We are forced to be selective about the experiences we share, which, in turn, causes us to blow some of their true significance out of proportion and can, in fact, contribute to a rearrangement of  the order of events – whether consciously, or unconsciously to further our ultimate goal, the conversion.  Many times, the stories we choose and may even embellish are negative. They have to be, because we are telling the story of how we got better, how we arrived at this new life. We are in fact, apologizing. Apologizing to others, and/or to ourselves. We are letting it go, giving it back, setting ourselves free. After the apology, we are good. We are fine. We have converted. We are moving on. Moving on is happy after such a long confusing journey and that is always where our autobiography ends. No one wants to hear about your good life. Your happy life. Now it’s time to keep it to yourself.

In the following pages, I’m going to write my autobiography. I’m not going to write it in a linear fashion. I know the lessons I’ve learned were not necessarily learned linearly. I’m going to tell you stories. Experiences I’ve had and how they’ve made me  feel. My only trigger for the next story will be what any particular incident reminds me of, makes me think of. I will seize upon that next thought/remembrance and recount what happened and how it made me feel. My stories are not to be read in any particular order, I don’t really think that’s material. Feel free to read them in order if you choose.

Neither do I know what I’m apologizing for in particular. I’ve done a lot of things both good and bad, to others as well as myself. Mostly myself. I like myself more than I ever have, though I still have many serious issues that need to be addressed. I’ve always appeared to be very honest and I am. I’m honest about everything but how I really feel. Maybe the only purpose this serves to is free me of the chains that bind me. In my estimation, the chains come from how I’ve grown up, and what socio-economic and educational privilege has really given/taught me. The unforeseen results of the wonderfully interesting, full of  intellectualism, exploration of cultures throughout the world- a life that my parents struggled very hard for, ultimately turned me into an insecure person with a fundamental fear of being myself.

What does it all mean? Who knows, maybe nothing. I’m going to tell my story because I have a story to tell.