It's not just occurred to me that, while it's rather inconvenient to abstain from referring to another person as a member of a certain race when describing him or her to yet another person, as in, "you know, that Black girl with," or "the Asian dude that," or--well, it's too bothersome to explain, why wouldn't it be inconvenient--MEANWHILE, it's not just occurred to me that this is how people refer to race-groups down here in Chicken Scratch:
*Black
*White
*Asian (more frequently, Oriental)
*Indian (meaning the indigenous peoples of our country)
Everyone else triggers the "what are you" rudeness that's so pressing and exciting to share, but even "knowing" what someone "is" brings up rude questions: how can you stand there and say you're Cherokee when you have bright blue eyes; Is it really possible for everyone in Alabama to have a full-blood Cherokee grandmother; is it too much to ask that the same people who balk at using the term "African-American" frequently use "Black"; why are some people labeled with the continent of their proto-Ancestors, and some by ridiculous color-words? What I want to know forms a cascade:
*Why, when so-called Blacks and Whites form such a small portion of the global human population, do all other races become entirely obliterated in the Race Question, to the point that Gov. George Wallace once referred to people of predominantly-African descent as "the Opposite Race"
**How does one's incredible brownness translate into Blackness
***Why am I White [I'm not that insane: I just want to know why I'm not Beige or Taupe or even Pink-ass]
****Why does the child at the library with freckles, red hair, and green eyes still get referred to as "that Black kid needs you, Ms. ___"
*****Why do you see so many more Black men with White women than Black women with White men?
Ooh, I just got one of those tension headaches like when I attempt intarsia crochet. Sadly, I didn't even begin to tackle anything I'm really desperate to understand. but it's too late, I'm about to wince.
What I would like to know is what Ebonics has to do with the Ancestors risking and frequently receiving a punch in the mouth so that they could obtain the same education as their not-so-neighborly neighbors. I may not really care about color: I want to know why so many different types of people are so many different types of stupid. I took a seminary student to the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, one of the biggest tourism draws in the entire state, and he completely didn't get it. Admittedly, he's Polish--like, right off the boat--and I doubt they even have Chinese restaurants, much less real-live, uh, Orientals over there. But he just didn't get it. And I'm talking as if I do.
This rant was originally planned to dovetail neatly into a discussion about my understanding of the "post-gay" label and its similarity to what I think is the state of young people of African descent in this state, so you know that didn't work out. I have to wonder, what was the point of the Ancestors being hosed down and bitten by police dogs if the Walking Generation, our present and living young, seem to reject education? Okay, down here, you don't have to be particularly Black to accomplish that particular nothing, but it seems especially-pernicious, especially-damning, when the people who yet live aim low and shoot lower, with the idea that...there really was no point. I've had economically-disadvantaged Black children come into the bookstore where I worked and make a beeline for the shelves containing books embarrassingly-low for their grade level. It may just be the novelty of Having: the biggest and brightest: surely our schools aren't that bad.
To encapsulate a post that probably isn't going anywhere, I need to say now that I think that we as Americans really-rilly need to discuss race, or even if there's still such a thing, particularly now that there's the possibility of having a Black in the White House (why are African-Americans with European ancestors still Black, and what do you call a Black Frenchman--African-French?), and unless we do, unless we really confront affirmative action, racial profiling, miscegenation, and all of the other social innovations I believe are keeping us from going anywhere but straight down, well, at least we know where we're going. Unlike this post.
Turn these questions over in your head and e-mail me your answers, and even more questions:
*Which is more dangerous, racism or sexism?
*In a rapidly-shrinking world with easy-access to other cultures, is the Race Question kind-of silly?
*Why is the idea of Race becoming more and more awkward to define as we know more about human biology?
*Did you know that there could be as many as nine racial groups based on geography, if not more? Can you name them all?
*What are you? How did you first know that you were the race you are? Have you even figured it out yet?
*Is someone biracial "half/half" or "both/and"?
*What about that redhead: are we really at most only 32nd-cousins, or is that some attempt at feeling good about oneself and eveyone else?
*Can/will we ever feel good about ourselves and everyone else?
0 comments:
Post a Comment