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Tonya
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Username: Tonya
Post Number: 4905
Registered: 07-2006
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, March 18, 2007 - 12:39 pm: | 
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No, My Son Doesn't 'Act Black.' There's No Such Thing.
By Aleta Payne
Sunday, March 18, 2007; B03
Sam came home from the overnighter visibly crushed. He curled around his hurt as though he'd been punched in the gut, and he refused to say what had happened. My husband and I fought panic as all the horrible things that might happen to a 14-year-old away from home pounded through our brains. We cajoled and interrogated as he tried to disappear into the living room sofa, until finally, enough of the story emerged to reassure us that our oldest son hadn't been physically injured. But his suffering was still real.
His friends had asked him why he didn't act black.
My husband and I were dumbfounded. We had been challenged ourselves with variations on this same question 30 years ago. But back then, we were being teased by our African American peers, many of whom were growing up in communities where they saw little opportunity for success or achievement and where frustration took root early. Sam's questioners were white suburban teenagers, living college-bound lives of comfort.
Poised to start high school, Sam is at the age where he wants nothing more than the acceptance of his peers. So this question staggered him. And while we learned the basics of the story then, the details have emerged -- syllable by reluctant syllable -- in the months since. That it had not happened that one time but had built over months. That it was always the same small group of boys who generally treated him as one of their buds. That he'd stopped being able to laugh it off as the question wore at him.
"People think I should be able to rap or something," he said. "Like they see in movies and crap." Strong words from our almost silent son. "They want me to act like something I'm not."
Sam is studious and quiet, much as his father and I were at his age. He inherited my light complexion and poor eyesight, his father's analytical mind and love of tennis. Apparently his wire-rimmed glasses and athletic leanings undermined any "street cred."
Though our North Carolina town isn't especially diverse, and our three sons attend mostly white private schools in Raleigh, I don't know that it has ever occurred to Sam that he is sometimes the only child of color in a room. But he certainly felt isolated by the expectation that he should behave like some modern-day minstrel in bling instead of blackface.
I know Sam's friends. He has visited their homes, and we've had them in ours. I doubt that they had any idea how painful their misguided teasing could be. I suspect that if they thought others were treating Sam unfairly, they'd stand up for him. But they have listened to rap and watched music videos that paint a picture of African Americans as loud, rude, undereducated, oversexed. Where guys in grills and girls in short shorts grinding against one another appear to be the norm. The boys whose words hurt Sam are skateboarders and soccer players, not hip-hop wannabes. But they have still been inundated with what it is to be gangsta and they may be dangerously close to believing that that is what it means to be black. Or its inverse, what Sen. Barack Obama has called "the slander that a black youth with a book is acting white."
I thought, or at least hoped, that my children's generation had transcended that, even if their parents aren't there yet. Standing in a boutique hotel outside New York a few years ago, my husband was one of several men in dark suits waiting for a shuttle van when someone asked if he was the driver of the limousine they'd requested. The only thing setting him apart from every other man in that lobby was the color of his skin. Our sons, I hoped, would never deal with such pre-judgments.
I'd had a sense that there was still work to be done when I overheard some young people from our church freely using "ghetto" as their adjective of choice in a conversation. The word was unexpected and discordant, coming from this particular group at that particular time -- we'd just driven down a patch of rural highway in my minivan to a corn maze. "Ghetto" could not have been farther from their reality. Their use of it was as out of place as my mother volunteering her opinion of Snoop Dogg's latest CD.
Combating stereotypes, my husband and I have made certain choices for our three boys. Guns have been particularly unkind to the black community, so the closest they've ever come to one, even as a toy, is a Super Soaker. We strive for proper English, limit what music they download and which movies they watch. The boys know about the accomplishments of their ancestors -- not just historical figures in a textbook, but a grandfather who emerged from poverty in strictly segregated Alabama to become a college president. The work of our ancestors is not finished, but I'd thought there was less to do.
Some parents, white and black, may not recognize the accumulated damage from what is being sold to all our children. Perhaps they want to be the cool mom and dad or perhaps they just don't want another fight with their teenager. They may screen the movies their children leave the house to see, but they allow them to stay home with 50 Cent and his legendary bullet scars or the profanity-laced catfighting on "Flavor of Love."
The mature brain can understand what's intended as exaggerated entertainment. But young minds aren't yet hardwired to decipher what's for real from what's for show. And perception can eventually harden into attitude. Pop culture creeps into our lives through every unguarded crevice. My own sons have surprised me with bits of lyrics or lines from movies that they've never heard or seen themselves but that they've heard repeated by others or seen as a teaser on television. Some of that is fine, or at least benign. But some of it leaves African Americans in danger of being enslaved by imagery as we were once enslaved by law.
And that's something I refuse to allow to happen to my sons.
aletapayne@hotmail.com
Aleta Payne is a writer and editor in Cary, N.C.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company |
Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 8924
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, March 18, 2007 - 12:58 pm: |
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How cool for Payne that she can be paid by the Washington Post for describing how she is so excellently raising her sons.
Hell. I could use a gig like THIS! |
Tonya
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Username: Tonya
Post Number: 4906
Registered: 07-2006
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, March 18, 2007 - 02:19 pm: |
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....LOLOLOL!!! I didn't even check it from that angle, Abm. You're right. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 7883
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, March 18, 2007 - 02:50 pm: |
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The dilemma described by Payne is the trade-off for being financially able enough to provide her son with the affluent and - ultimately sterile upbringing that bleached the "soul" out of him. And just think; he would be even more traumatized in the company of black kids who might express derision about his not acting "black". |
Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 8925
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, March 18, 2007 - 03:19 pm: |
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Tonya,
Hey. I ain't hating on a sista for being able to swing a job like this. Hahahahaha!!!
Seriously, though, it's just that it's one thing if she'd posted this on her blog or something. But I find it odd that the Washington Post would publish such self-congratulation. I mean, what the purpose here? For her to applaud her for doing what all Black parents SHOULD do and what MANY other Black parents ARE already doing?
It would have seemed less self-serving it had included the opinions of OTHER experts and parents, results of some studies, etc. |
Tonya
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Username: Tonya
Post Number: 4908
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, March 18, 2007 - 06:10 pm: |
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Yeah. Snoop Dogg is hardly the person to hammer if your wish is to put a dent in a billion dollar industry. It would have been nice had she acknowledged this and spent more time citing how these images impact the (entire) community as a whole. Because, really, it's hard to feel sorry for her son's dilemma when this almighty-pen-wielding sista chooses to breeze by some of the more pressing communal ills that these images help to construct. |
Serenasailor
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Username: Serenasailor
Post Number: 1434
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: 
Votes: 5 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 12:34 am: |
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Typical RHETORIC of the Black Burgeiousy!!! Notice how they all seem to have the same agenda!!!
1. Marry White/Light-skinned
2. Produce Light-skinned/mixed children
3. Move to all-White neighborhoods
4. Put children in all-White schools
5. Look down on all other Blacks you deem to Black looking or acting
6. Encourage children to date/marry White/Light-skin
Notice how eager they are to please to White ppl? Notice how they only care about what White ppl think? |
Yukio
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Username: Yukio
Post Number: 2009
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: 
Votes: 1 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 12:53 am: |
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i don't know. to be so 'intelligent' i wonder why our black middle class condemns hip hop artists for the stereotypes that pervade white folks minds...it is silly to me. i wonder if white people are condemning whites artists for not representing the race....of course not!
the fact is, regardless of what we do, as long as our minority status is based our lowerlessnes, then we will always be viewed as black rather than many different individuals who are also black. |
Yvettep
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Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 1775
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Rating:
Votes: 2 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 11:28 am: |
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i wonder why our black middle class condemns hip hop artists
Typical RHETORIC of the Black Burgeiousy
I wonder why many see no problem at condemming "our Black middle class" and painting this extremely diverse group of Black folks with such wide (and, oftentimes, totally inaccurate) brush strokes.
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Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 8926
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 11:29 am: |
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Yvettep,
Good Point! |
Tonya
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Username: Tonya
Post Number: 4914
Registered: 07-2006
Rating:
Votes: 1 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 12:47 pm: |
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I wonder if Serenasailor equates "the Black Burgeiousy" w/the Blk mid class.
And I wonder if Yukio was actually condemning "our Black middle class".
I also wonder if all this disingenuous shuffling, fancy editing and mismatching are even necessary just to make a point. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 7890
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 12:49 pm: |
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The favorite pass time of the black community has become pointing fingers at whose to blame for the dire situation that has evolved from negligence and misunderstanding on the part of all parties involved. Me, I still think it all boils down to personal responsibility. |
Tonya
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Username: Tonya
Post Number: 4917
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 01:10 pm: |
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Your absolute correctness must have everything to do with your extraordinary wisdom, Cynnique...
It's easy to respect your position when it‘s accompanied by such a wise statement.
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Tonya
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Tonya
Post Number: 4918
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 01:15 pm: |
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Where's my *DAPS* for the upgraded improvement!? LOL!!
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Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 7893
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 01:16 pm: |
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What can I say?  |
Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 4083
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 01:37 pm: |
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Yukio
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Username: Yukio
Post Number: 2010
Registered: 01-2004
Rating:
Votes: 1 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 02:17 pm: |
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cynique: what you have said has always been true. and oftentimes, the severest critiques of the middle-classes had come from its own. E.F.Frazier's corpus of writings implicates himself, as well as his class. i am 'middle-class' with underclass beginnings, and i am critical of the black middle-class. but being critical is not condemning, at least in an intellectual sense.
yvettep: I did not condemn the black middle class, but said their behavior is silly; in fact, i think it is tacitly accepted, presently and historically, that the black middle class has been more so than the poorer class concerned with how white folk view black people.
That the black middle class is diverse is true, but it is also true that as a group, as a class, it is consumed with respectable representations of black folk.
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Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 8930
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 02:22 pm: |
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Yukio,
I agree.
Hmmmmmmm?
Though I might ask, given our place here in this country, "Why should the Black Bourgeois NOT be concerned about 'respectable representations of black folk'?." |
Yvettep
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Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 1776
Registered: 01-2005
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Votes: 1 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 02:30 pm: |
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"Respectable" means worthy of respect and high esteem. How is concern with respect a fault or "silly"? Where would any of us be today if our ancestors--most who were likely not "middle class"--had not been concerned with demanding respect? |
Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 8932
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 02:33 pm: |
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Yvettep,
Perhaps the issue is whether or not being concerned about appearing respectable actually leads to and/or is a product of really being respected. |
Yvettep
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Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 1777
Registered: 01-2005
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 02:38 pm: |
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Yukio, I am glad to hear you cop to being middle class yourself! LOL Anyway, my apologies for putting the "condemming" label to your statement. It was, indeed, a critique and not a condemnation.
So many times I hear Black folks critiquing "the Black middle class" who are just as "middle class" themselves. But they often are not talking about themselves; it's always some other Black middle class folks who are responsible for the self-hate, the worrying about what White folk think, etc. etc. But most of the middle class folks I know do not fit this description. They work as professionals in Black communities. They give money to scholarship funds and churches and other Black organizations. They are the ones their families turn to when someone needs a helping hand--whether it is an elderly relative or bail money or rent. They are the ones formally or informally adopting neices and nephews and cousins. They are often the radical ones calling for institutional change in their writing, research, or other professional work.
And--surprise--many of them listen to and like rap music!
So where/who are all these other Black middle class folks? Either I just do not know them, or perhaps this is just as much a prevailing (but inaccurate) myth as the "trifling Black underclass." |
Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 8934
Registered: 04-2004
Rating:
Votes: 1 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 02:45 pm: |
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Those of us who have (a little) are (rightly and wrongly) charged with being and do more for those who don't have. Sadly, our fidelity and largesse to other Blacks often pales in comparison to the the enormity of the problems MANY Black foks confront. Because, in truth, MOST middle class Blacks are themselves a misstep or 2 away from being in a situation very similar to less fortunate Blacks. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 7894
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 02:58 pm: |
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The middle class "has room to talk" because they can argue that their accomplishments make them worthy of being listened to. The underclasses always assume a defensive posture, because they feel as if they are being picked on for their failures. Critics choose to zero in on the bourgeoise because their class is more materialistic than altruistic, something that's not really about silliness; it's more about selfishness - a very common human trait that is found among the poor as well. |
Yukio
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Username: Yukio
Post Number: 2011
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Rating:
Votes: 1 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 03:33 pm: |
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Cynique, you error. Indeed, elder, what I said was silly was not the middling classes' proclivity to promulgate "respectability," but that they, or should I say we, "condemn hip hop artists for the stereotypes that pervade white folks minds."
These stereotypes are part of this country's history and present, so re-representation of hip hop a la Will and Todd Smith, respectively, would neither make white folk believe we are their equals nor enrich the coffers of the black community.
ABM: the black community should be concerned but not consumed.
Yvettep: I'm using 'respectable' in the cultural sense. And as you know, or not, respectability in the black community meant those who were overly concerned to a fault with proper language, deportment, and dress; and I may add, this was across economic status, though generally those in the professionals were those most engaged in this behavior.
I am indeed aware of the black middle class of which you speak; and in fact, they often have similar qualities that I have described above.
There is no one way to describe them, or should I say us. Indeed, friday, I was having lunch with a friend who was kidding around w/some white waitresses. And in order to show that they were down w/black people, these young girls began to speak in broken english [not the same as ebonics].
And he, undisturbed, continued to play around with them, while I stood with silent disdain. Now, while I do not really care what they think, I was more bothered that he enabled them, and that they all seemed to enjoy this exchange. |
Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 8937
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 03:42 pm: |
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Yukio,
I don't know how you distinguish "concerned" and "consumed" here.
But I believe their are basically 2 concerns middle class Blacks have about the behavior of lower class Blacks: A) Does their behavior negatively reflect upon or affect ME in some way? and B) Does their behavior and/or appearance of such negatively impact THEIR ability to get the help and resources they need to improve and succeed?
So I think the issue of middle-class Blacks being concerned about the 'appearance' of lower class Blacks is not as selfish or self-serving as is often inferred/implied. I believe many middle-class Blacks are sincerely concerned that their less fortunate brothas and sistas are creating insurmountable problems for themselves.
Now. Having said that. I ALSO think that middle-class Blacks THEMSELVES are often NOT as accomplished/strong as the might want to believe. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 7899
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 03:55 pm: |
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Well, Yukio, what I initally said was that the middle class earned the right to be heard and is it so silly for them to condemn the "hip-hop stereotypes that pervade white people's minds." Hip-hop is, indeed, one source from whence white folks get these negative stereotypes. Also, "critic" E. Franklin Frazier often referred to the black bourgeoise as being "fatuous" because of their materialism. |
Tonya
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Username: Tonya
Post Number: 4920
Registered: 07-2006
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 04:00 pm: |
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Talk is cheap when it ends up adding to the misinformation, fabrication and distortion that the history books are infamous for. What our ancestors DID is how I define "accomplishments" in this context; so to me nobody has room to talk.
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Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 7901
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 04:06 pm: |
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What you say may be true to some extent, Tonya. But many members of the middleclass would disagree with it, claiming that they paid their dues by not only talking the talk, but walking the walk. |
Yukio
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Username: Yukio
Post Number: 2012
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 04:12 pm: |
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abm:
yes. what you describe does sound like "concerns." But I would add that in the case of (A) in the concern column can lead to (C, for consumed):
C)If I condemn the disreputable behavior of the poorer classes, all of all races and ethncities [but especially blacks], will I be accepted or deemed respectable by white folk?
I think a more "respectable," in its denotative sense, way of of dealing with these concerns is to acknowledge that no one group has ownership of poor habits; indeed, the affluent are worse than the poor. Also, point out that poverty is the result of both personal responsibility AND structural factors.
What I find silly, indeed, is that in condeminig hip hop artist, this segment of the black middle class of which i speak is itself engaging in playing the race card for its own aggrandizement.
This is uncanny this same segment is so committed to the shibboleth of personal responsibility and an assiduous work ethic, qualities that have nothing to do with group or racial representation and more with highlighting the power of the individual. When I think of the most successful hip hop artists mogul, they are indeed assiduous and individualist as are some of these "respectable" black folk.
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Tonya
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Username: Tonya
Post Number: 4921
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 04:16 pm: |
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If that were true, Cynnique, we'd be in pretty good shape since the majority of us make up the Black middle class. That's the thing about logic: can't get around it.
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Yukio
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Username: Yukio
Post Number: 2013
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 04:25 pm: |
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Cynique: your humanity not your class and achievements earn you the right to be heard.
You are right. Hip hop is one source, but the poverty of black people is the greatest, and most persist image of black people here and across the world that white folks have to confirm what they already believe. And we, as a group, have always been poor.
I think 33 percent of black folk in the U.S. is middle-class, but we are poor. And THE reason aint because of hip hop, single parents, increasing high dropout rate among boys...these are symptoms.
And since emancipation of northern blacks after the American Revolution, white folk have been asking why we are poor? And their answer has been because we are inferior, lazy, etc...
In fact, southern whites often claimed that slavery was necessary because if we were freed, all of black people would be like the impoverished poor blacks in the North.
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Cynique
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Username: Cynique
Post Number: 7902
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 04:34 pm: |
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Everything that everybody opines on this subject is true, but the fact remains that middleclass people have a certain mentality, whether out of ignorance or self-importance. They are not all sociologists or historians. They are people who take pride in themselves whether it is justified or not. |
Mzuri
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Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 4087
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 04:41 pm: |
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There are different levels of the middle class, and the Black middle class is separate from the regular (white) middle class. 
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Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 7903
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 04:46 pm: |
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Yep, black people are more about middle income than the traditional "values" of the white middle class. |
Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 8938
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 04:47 pm: |
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Yukio,
I agree your C) may be a parallel to my A). But I added B) because I genuinely believe that it's as much a part of what concerns many Black foks as A) and C). Because, understand, MOST middle-class Blacks have foks they LOVE whom are amongst our lower class.
I would agree Blacks have NOT cornered the market on misbehavior. The problems is we're much more negatively impacted by such due at least in part to those "instructural" issues you allude to.
Funny you mention how the Black middle-class deride hip-hop. I have several Black middle-class friends who have SONS and DAUGHTERS who write, produce, record and perform hip-hop music. They're not international stars or anything. But all seem quite good at what they do.
So I'd agree that some of the hardest foks younger foks around are in hip-hop. |
Yukio
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Username: Yukio
Post Number: 2014
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 04:49 pm: |
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hmmm....to take pride and disdain is incompatible. Is the pride on account of the quality of being assiduous or in not being labeled 'ghetto"?
If it is the latter, then it is not pride at all, elder. |
Yukio
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Username: Yukio
Post Number: 2015
Registered: 01-2004
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 04:52 pm: |
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no, no, ABM...your (A) could become my (C), from concerned to consumed. |
Tonya
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Username: Tonya
Post Number: 4922
Registered: 07-2006
Rating:
Votes: 4 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 05:12 pm: |
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Abm,
Let's use this article for example. Instead of blaming other Blacks for her son’s dilemma, why isn’t Payne pissed at the ignorant white students who harassed her son? Why isn't her anger towards their lumping of all Blacks, for their total ignorance and downright racism? Why didn't she contact their teachers, their parents, the school board? I can certainly understand the frustration of some Blacks. Constantly having to carry these ever-growing stereotypes on they're shoulders which mirrors the behavior of other Blacks ain't easy. But I don't get why poor Blacks are always the victim of this frustration. To me it's because poorer Blacks are a much easier target than the actual ignorant white culprits. |
Serenasailor
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Username: Serenasailor
Post Number: 1436
Registered: 01-2006
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 05:13 pm: |
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Those of us who have (a little) are (rightly and wrongly) charged with being and do more for those who don't have. Sadly, our fidelity and largesse to other Blacks often pales in comparison to the the enormity of the problems MANY Black foks confront. Because, in truth, MOST middle class Blacks are themselves a misstep or 2 away from being in a situation very similar to less fortunate Blacks.
Thank You ABM Very good point!! |
Serenasailor
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Username: Serenasailor
Post Number: 1437
Registered: 01-2006
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 05:17 pm: |
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Yvette I'm am just stereotyping the Black middle class the same way the Black middle class stereotypes lower-class Black ppl.
Notice the article about the eagerness of condemning the lower-class Black ppl and Hip-Hop generation.
Now don't get me wrong!! "Give condemnation to where condemnation is due". I think the Hip-Hop generation has alot of faults.
But so does the Bill Cosbyish, Black Burgeiousy!! |
Yvettep
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Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 1781
Registered: 01-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 05:38 pm: |
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why isn’t Payne pissed at the ignorant white students who harassed her son? Why isn't her anger towards their lumping of all Blacks, for their total ignorance and downright racism?
Tonya: Now this part is something that struck me, too. Also, she needs to be giving her sons the tools to confront this kind of nonsense with his peers, teachers, etc. If she thinks it is hard to get a 14 year old to talk to his parents, wait just 2 short years. Now, obviously I do not know her, so maybe she is doing that but didn't talk about it in this article. (Or she talked about it but it was the victim of "editorial decisionmaking"...) |
Abm
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Username: Abm
Post Number: 8939
Registered: 04-2004
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 05:39 pm: |
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Tonya,
I agree with everything you said in your last post. I recall expressing very similar views when the Cosby flap first revved a couple years ago. |
Yukio
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 06:00 pm: |
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Tonya, your point, is exactly what I tried to express without pointing fingers, or "condemning" the privileged Payne.
Remember, Aleta is accustomed, along with her beloved husband, of having her blackness questioned...first by her black peers, "many of whom were growing up in communities where they saw little opportunity for success or achievement and where frustration took root early," and know, benightedly, by her children's peers.
It seems, dare I say, that she maybe really ignorant of the inertia of white supremacy. As if her children's peers aren't their parents' children. How could she hope "that [her] children's generation had transcended that, even if their parents aren't there yet" ?
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Yvettep
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Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 1782
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 06:21 pm: |
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she maybe really ignorant of the inertia of white supremacy
Ignorant? Naive? Optimistic? Or maybe, even, she knows this full well and is actually sending a between-the-lines message to the WP's largely White audience--the very parents of the pre-teens who her sons deal with?
Again, I don't know her so I cannot say. Her email is right there in the article, so perhaps we should just ask her Or maybe she'll Google herself and come upon this thread on her own... |
Cynique
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Username: Cynique
Post Number: 7906
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, March 19, 2007 - 06:58 pm: |
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In a way this "acting black" issue is kind of paradoxical. Just for the sake of argument, why should it be considered an insult to say that a black person doesn't "act black"? Does anybody here really like phony black people who try to be carbon copies of white people? A black person can be intelligent and well-spoken and affluent without sacrificing their black mystique. It's black people who try to masquerade as white people who can be irritating and if white people are amused that these kind of people don't "act black", then the message they are communicating is for blacks to be themselves. And to be themselves black people need only be cool and hip instead of corny and square. And they can do this without acting like ghetto stereoptypes. And who is to say that white people won't pick up on this subtle vibe and appreciate your being black as opposed to your acting black. |
Tonya
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 12:00 pm: |
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Abm,
It’s like the guy who goes home & beats his wife & children because he’s too weak to stand up to his boss. This is basically what it is and it's exactly why I’m always stumping for the underdog. I was bullied as a kid, you guys would NEVER guess why, but this experience has made me sensitive to the plight of every underdog--regardless of race or color or gender or whatever--because underneath it all, it's all about a bully who’s too weak to stand up to his boss. |
Yukio
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Post Number: 2018
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 12:22 pm: |
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tonya...i'm still waitin for dem pics...LOL! |
Abm
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Username: Abm
Post Number: 8946
Registered: 04-2004
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 12:34 pm: |
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Tonya,
To a great extent I agree. I mean, I AIN'T for excusing foks just messing up their lives. But I agree a lot of the Black middle class criticism of poorer, lower class Blacks smacks of a distasteful sort of bullying that, ironically, most of those one's who do the bullying would condemn Whites for doing to them. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 7911
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 12:41 pm: |
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This is what amuses me about the self-righteous attitude you and others have adopted, Tonya. You all chastise the middleclass for being condescending toward the underclasses, yet the thought of white people lumping you with the ghetto stereotypes you so passionately defend horrifies you and fills you with indignation! Why do you really care if white people don't think you act "black"?? Such inconsistency. |
Tonya
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Post Number: 4925
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 12:46 pm: |
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Yukio,
You KNOW what I'm still waiting for YOU to do...ain't NOTHIN changed!
LOL!!!
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Tonya
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Post Number: 4930
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 03:32 pm: |
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Here's another perspective...
...It's similar to Payne's but it has a little more of what ABM was looking for.
THE BRIDGE: Ghettos of Our Minds
By Darryl James
March 20, 2007
Across all socio-economic levels, we can find African Americans who refer to some portion of the Black community, or some Black behavior as “Ghetto,” a word that was originally used to refer to any area filled with people from similar racial or ethnic background live, typically separated into inferior conditions. Historically, Ghetto was most used in reference to the areas where Jews were forced to live, particularly in Nazi Germany.
It is not only a shame that we have adopted a word that has always been negative, but is now no longer used in reference to anything original. Yet, the word “Ghetto” is now clearly and interminably, a Black thing, baby. And, that’s not a good thing at all.
All things Black or remotely Black are referred to as “Ghetto,” but only in the most negative light, including any lower social behavior or related lifestyle. For example, when we see Black people acting without the social graces we are taught to pursue, we call them Ghetto, ignoring the fact that whites in the trailer park are prone to the same behaviors, but rarely, are those behaviors ever referred to as Ghetto.
For some of us Ghetto is the new cool, and we use the term to label every aspect of our behavior, even when it is no different from anyone else’s behavior. In a video for his single, “Been There, Done That,” Dr. Dre performs a tango that he obviously took professional lessons to learn. Yet, he referred to it as the “Ghetto Tango,” simply because Black people were doing it.
Another, perhaps more crucial difficulty with our relationship with the word Ghetto, is that we have embraced the term in our minds, creating a slave mentality that follows us up the economic ladder, where we find middle class Negroes referring to themselves and specific aspects of their behavior as Ghetto, when they should be celebrating in their joy of being out of the Ghetto.
And, even worse, we have been relegated to the Ghetto of the American consciousness, where we are thought of in Ghetto terms, no matter whether we are demonstrating our most base behavior as Flava Flav and Bobby Brown or exuding our finest dignity as Barack Obama and Denzel Washington.
For many non-Black Americans, we are rarely considered outside of so-called Ghetto situations. James Baldwin outlined this clearly, in Notes of a Native Son.
“One may say that the Negro in America does not really exist except in the darkness of our minds,” penned Baldwin, as the voice of white America. “This is why his history and his progress, his relationship to all other Americans, have been kept in the social arena. He is a social and not a personal or a human problem; to think of him is to think of statistics, slums, rapes, injustices, remote violence...as though his continuing status among us were somehow analogous to disease.”
Baldwin was outlining the Ghetto-ization of the African in America, illustrating how important it is to keep us in our place mentally (our own minds as well as theirs), if not possible physically.
Baldwin went on: “If he breaks our sociological and sentimental image of him we are panic-stricken and we feel ourselves betrayed. When he violates this image, therefore, he stands in the greatest danger…we uneasily suspect that he is very often playing a part for our benefit.”
In other words, House Niggers who realize that walking through life with dignity as Black men or women has a certain jeopardy attached to it choose to coon and buck dance their way around being identified as a “threat” to America. And even the noble mental slaves, including our most refined entertainers and politicians who speak against us recognize the threat, and so choose to target others, by identifying the “Ghetto” Blacks and their “Ghetto” behavior as America’s intrinsic problem with Black people.
By serving up specific targets in the Black community (who are typically unaware and generally defenseless), noble mental slaves are hoping to avoid being targeted themselves.
We see this with brain dead comedians who extol the divergences between “Niggers” and “Blacks,” and we see it when any of us refer to some of us as “you people.”
Some of us with dignity refuse to use the word Ghetto in universal reference to Black people or Black behavior, any more than we accept the word “••••••” as a universal label for some or all of us.
Still, others of us dance a precarious dance with the word “hood” that threatens at any point to take on the same meaning as Ghetto, even though with more subtlety.
If we are going to break the chains of our negative experience in America, we must first pay special attention to the powerful labels foist upon us, or embraced by us, including •••••• and Ghetto.
Case in point, “Barrio,” a term once widely used to label areas where a high concentration of Hispanics was found, has been relegated to small pockets of society, but certainly no longer wholly embraced by that community.
And, no Jewish community in this nation refers to themselves or their living areas as Ghetto.
At some point, we have to force the reality upon the world that being Black in America is no more organically inferior an experience than being Asian or Italian or Irish, and so no more deserving of being placed in a literal or figurative Ghetto than being Jewish.
But first, we have to force that reality into our own minds.
Darryl James is an award-winning author who is now a filmmaker. His first mini-movie, "Crack," was released in March of 2006. He is currently filming a full length documentary. James’ latest book, "Bridging The Black Gender Gap," is the basis of his lectures and seminars. Previous installments of this column can now be viewed at www.bridgecolumn.com. James can be reached at djames@theblackgendergap.com.
http://www.eurweb.com/story/eur32182.cfm |
Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 8954
Registered: 04-2004
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 03:45 pm: |
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Tonya,
I'm always amazed by how we become bogged down in diction (e.g., ghetto, nigg.er) when ultimately words only mean and can do what we allow them to mean and do.
For example, I think the fact that so many Black foks still live in ghetto-type conditions is much more important than is whether or how we should use the word ghetto. |
Tonya
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Post Number: 4931
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 03:46 pm: |
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...me too. |
Cynique
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Username: Cynique
Post Number: 7923
Registered: 01-2004
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 06:40 pm: |
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The way the word "ghetto" is now synonymous with "black" is an example of how language becomes utilitarian. It's like the word "urban". It used to refer to "city" as a opposed to "rural" which referred to the country. Now "urban" refers to the "inner city" which is a code word for a black area that is removed from "suburbia". These are the semantics of racism. And I think the article posted correlates somewhat the question I raised in regard to blacks considering it an insult if a white person tells them they don't "act black". Of course, Black people have mixed emotions about blackness; there's "good" black and there's "bad" black. But no black wants to be associated with "bad" black because white people might think they are bad, too, and would therefore not respect them. Nevermind that sometimes bad blacks can be good and sometime good blacks can be bad. And so it goes. tsk-tsk.
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Renata
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Post Number: 1866
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 06:41 pm: |
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I don't see why we all have to "act" any particular way because we're black.
She should have told him to go ask them if they're going to a Nascar race or to the Garth Brooks concert (hell, even bring them some Slim Jims for lunch), and if they say no, tell them they aren't "white" enough.
What's most offensive about this is that white people feel that they can just "be" whatever personality they are and it doesn't have anything to do with their color....whereas, the smallest kink in your hair mean you have a predisposed preference for baggy pants, fish, and watermelon. 'Cause you ain't black if you don't "fit the mold".
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Yukio
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Username: Yukio
Post Number: 2019
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Votes: 2 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 06:48 pm: |
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right. white identity, at least to white people, is limitless, whereas black identity is not.
part of the problem is, black people care too much about what white people think, as if they have ownership of identity...at the same time, at the political level, "ghetto" being "black" have salience as voters think about who Obama represents....
anyways, tonya, what you waitin for MA? |
Tonya
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Post Number: 4936
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 07:22 pm: |
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...too sexy. |
Yukio
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Username: Yukio
Post Number: 2020
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 - 11:22 pm: |
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so you say... |
Tonya
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Username: Tonya
Post Number: 4939
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, March 21, 2007 - 12:53 am: |
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......so you say MA
Call me MA again... |
Yukio
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Username: Yukio
Post Number: 2021
Registered: 01-2004
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, March 21, 2007 - 11:04 am: |
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Sweetcheeks?! LOL! |
Tonya
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Username: Tonya
Post Number: 4944
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, March 21, 2007 - 08:15 pm: |
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I like MA better ...lol!! |
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