Sweep, Sweep, Sweeping

America is a nation of closet cleaners.

One of the abiding cliches found in movies and network television shows is the conniving child who, when ordered to clean up his room, instead comes up with a bright idea. Rather than put things where they belong, the child crams them all into the closet, only to have those same toys and clothes come tumbling out at the most inopportune time. The child is then stuck with an even bigger mess than before, and the added stress of angry parents.

See where I'm going with this?

When it comes to issues of race, Americans have become so adept at sweeping things under the rug that they've convinced themselves that the floor is actually made with those unsightly lumps.

Take Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour, who is angling for a presidential nomination in 2012. Barbour recently unveiled a recollection of how the South became majority Republican that was so completely and utterly divorced from reality that I wouldn't have been surprised if he was high on 'shrooms when he said it.

He basically said that the people of his generation--mind you Barbour is 63-- rejected the Democratic party because they just couldn't abide by the enduring racism of southern Democrats, and the Republican party provided a refuge. He downplayed the well-known "Southern Strategy" which entailed Republicans openly playing to the racial bigotry rampant in the South to gain votes. Nope, the move to Republicans was all about embracing equality, not protecting a supremacy built on lies.

Those are some kick ass shrooms, right?

I don't know why Barbour trotted out this alternate version of reality. Maybe, possibly, he did switch from the Democratic party because of concerns about the racism among Southern Dixiecrats, but there is no way he examined history and truly believes that most folks made the switch for the same reason.

All he had to do was consider the rhetoric used by Republicans to draw in supporters to see the truth. But, it's a good bet that Barbour has purposely avoided examining history's ledger and instead decided to draw on his own anecdotes and faulty memory to create his new reality. Life is easier that way, you know?

Many folks don't want to deal with the problems of the past before they march boldly into the future. They'd prefer to just sweep all those ugly details aside and get on to the fun stuff. After all if the room looks clean, why do you need to go looking in every crook and crevice to make sure it actually is clean? That's seems like a lot of work for very little pay off, right?

Wrong. Clean is clean. Shunting problems to the side doesn't solve them, it only delays dealing with them. Refusing to acknowledge the true history of this country, and deal with the effects of that history in modern times, is the reason why only limited progress can be made with regards to racial issues. It's like putting Old Spice on a funky body. You just create a new, more creative brand of funk.

Barbour and his audacious lies or faulty memories is a big part of the problem. It's particularly galling because he's one of those people who loves to propose sweeping policy changes based on his bad information, and that's a danger to me and everybody else. Before he wants to solve the world's problems as president, he needs to figure out how to solve his own problem with discussing the reality of this country's racial history.

Sweep around his own front door, before he sweeps around mine.



 




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Ignorance is Bliss

Have you ever learned something that you immediately wished you could forget?

Some tidbit of information that changes your entire view of a situation? My best friend and I often joke that when women meet men they should keep information about their past to themselves no matter how much a man may beg and plead for the dirt. Both of us can remember times when we've developed feelings for a woman only to have her let some nugget about her past drop in casual conversation that causes a terrible sinking feeling in our guts. When this happens it's hard not to wonder if the woman's whole persona, or rather the persona we created for her, is based on a series of lies and fabrications.

You can never unlearn the truth.

I thought about that recently while reading a book by Douglas Blackmon called "Slavery by Another Name" on how de-facto slavery continued in America long after the Emancipation Proclamation and the end of the Civil War. I'm just beginning the book, but already I've learned stuff that's made it hard for me to see the world in the same light. How many northern conglomerates, like U.S. Steel, were built on the backs of black men sold into indentured servitude because they happened to be walking down the wrong street on the wrong day? Not only did black folks have to contend with widespread domestic terrorism in the form of the KKK and other groups, but now I learn that they had to deal with the disappearance of loved ones who spent some of their most productive working years slaving in dark coal mines to re-build the Southern economy that was decimated by the war that granted them their freedom.

Can you imagine that existence?

The book's author notes that many black people have contacted him and thanked him for providing them with a reason for the slow march of progress in the black community in the decades following Reconstruction. For them, there was always the hidden fear that all the lies told about black people's inherent inferiority were somehow true, and the proof was in our failure to advance once the slaveowner's manacles were loosed. In his book, Blackmon reveals that those manacles were actually in place up until World War II in a variety of forms.

The thing is, while it's good to learn these types of stories because it fleshes out my understanding of the lives my ancestors lived, it is still jarring. It's tough to know that authorities used crimes like vagrancy, or loud talking, or curfew violations to imprison black people, and then tacked on unfair fines to force them back into slavery. I wasn't ignorant about the venal nature of humans, but I was still shocked that I could live so long in this country and never really understand just how widespread and longstanding this practice once was.

More importantly, it has some uncomfortable similarities to our current prison system. I can't help but notice which crimes black prisoners are overwhelmingly incarcerated for, and how their bodies are used once they are imprisoned. I can't help but see the connection between vagrancy and loud talking and crack possession and three strikes laws.

Sadly, it's obvious that while some of the surface details have changed, the mindset and underlying aims of the power structure has not. I always suspected, but with this new information it's just been confirmed as truth.

And sometimes the truth doesn't set you free, it just weighs you down.





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A Few Short of a Thousand

Like many black folks, I haven't been overwhelmed by the Age of Obama.

I don't regret my vote, and I respect the challenges dude has faced. I see the ridiculous outrage, the blatant racism, the double standards and the general effed up reality of the world and I'm glad I'm not president.

But, still, I can admit that I'm a little disappointed.

I didn't expect this cat to completely change the world in four years. But, I was kind of hoping, despite all the evidence to the contrary, that his tune on certain issues might change once he'd fully grasped the reins of power. Like many of the white bigots who opposed him, I believed that President Obama was something of Trojan Horse. Only, I thought he would bring a positive change in the racial war being fought in this country, while conservatives feared he would bring the destruction of their world. Neither of us had it right.

There have been changes, but they've been of the incremental and behind-the scenes variety. Truly, I blame myself for my disappointment because if I'd honestly assessed the situation I would have realized that Obama the candidate only addressed race directly when backed into a corner. I should have known that President Obama would rarely be backed into a similar corner.

But, my disappointment has not turned into disillusionment simply because of what's in the picture above.

Air Force One is traveling to do God knows what in the name of the United States of America, and four black folks are involved in the discussions, with one of them being the actual decision maker. They are not serving drinks, or cleaning the cabin. They are making decisions, and appear comfortable in their skins. I don't know about y'all, but as a black man with a decent grasp of the history of my people in this country, that's a mighty beautiful sight.

Just beautiful.



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Some Light Reading

I stole this link from Prometheus Six's site, but I thought some of y'all might be interested.

It's a 75 page scholarly paper discussing the fact that Western societies are actually the "weird" ones in the world, not everybody else. I think the topic hits on a lot the stuff I've dicussed about perspective, reality and generalizations.

Enjoy.



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