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Undercover Black Woman

Undercover Black Woman* is one of several potential names for my autobiography. It refers to the fact that I look white but identify as black. I say identify because race is not a fact of biology but a construct that varies across cultures, societies and nations.

If race isn't a thing that can be measured and assigned, despite the efforts to do so throughout this country's history, why then does racial identity matter? When I was growing up some white kids would ask me why, since they thought I looked and spoke and acted like I was white why didn't I just call myself white? They didn't understand why I needed to proclaim and explain that I am other.

My great-great-great grandmother, Ellen Craft, was the child of a white slave owner an a slave, as was her mother. Therefore, she was 3/4 "white" and 1/4 "black." However, by the laws of the United States at the time she was legally defined as "black." Those laws no longer exist and so I can now choose my race, my identity. Although I clearly have European ancestors, I identify solely and completely as black.

I choose blackness rather than whiteness for a number of reasons. In part it's because of my family history. In part it's because, though most of my family are fairly light skinned, my father and sisters, along with other family, have brown skin. To proclaim myself white would mean to me "passing" and rejecting my family.

Because I perceive myself as black while people who don't know me treat me as white, I am acutely aware of the privilege whiteness brings. As I wrote in a post a few years ago:

I know this because I benefit from white privilege even though I'm black.  I'm made aware of my privilege every time I go to dinner with friends and I am the only person at the table the waitress will speak to.  I'm made aware of my privilege when I go into shops with family and they are followed and I am not.  I'm made aware of my privilege when white people assume I share their racist thoughts and they spill their secrets to me unaware that I'm working undercover.  I'm made aware of my privilege and thus the corresponding depth of racism every day.

Bearing witness to such behavior only strengthens my identification as black.

I sometimes want to wear T-shirts stating my racial identity. Or perhaps hand out some of Mollena's fabulous race cards (Though Mollena is thoroughly awesome, her link is possibly NSFW) or maybe a calling card like artist Adrian Piper:

Dear Friend,

I am black.

I am sure you did not realize this when you made/laughed at/agreed with that racist remark. In the past, I have attempted to alert white people to my racial identity in advance. Unfortunately, this invariably causes them to react to me as pushy, manipulative, or socially inappropriate. Therefore, my policy is to assume that white people do not make these remarks, even when they believe there are no black people present, and to distribute this card when they do.

I regret any discomfort my presence is causing you, just as I am sure you regret the discomfort your racism is causing me.

There have been some among my ancestors who chose to live as white, who do not have a black identity. However, everyone I grew up with in my immediate and extended family identifies as black to the best of my knowledge. Some of my young relatives might not but just because I think race is less of an issue for younger generations. However, when people over the years have asked me why I don't consider myself white the unspoken subtext is that it would be easier, better. But, while it might be in some ways easier to be white, for me to deny my blackness would mean rejecting my family which would be as painful as cutting off a part of my body.

Living as a racial spy is fascinating and sometimes horrifying. You can imagine some of the things I've heard when people believed that they were talking to a white person. And some of the things that have been said when they learned of my African American heritage. It's hard when I'm the only black person in the room, at a job, on a panel. As many black people can tell you it can be wearying to have to represent all black people and constantly educate even well-meaning non-black folk. I don't always want to be in teacher mode - sometimes I want you to do your own research. And, for me, even when I am happy to be the face of diversity, unless I get a tattoo on my forehead or wear a tee-shirt at all times that says "Yes I am a black woman. Ask me how!" and print the story of Ellen Craft on the back, the impact of the color (pun totally intended) and perspective I bring to settings is lost on anyone who doesn't know my back story. I make for a terrible token.

There are times that I've wished to have browner skin but I have never longed to be a real white girl. Perhaps that's because of the fact that I've escaped most of the overt racism living in brown skin can bring to you in this country. But I hope it's because (say it loud), I'm black and I'm proud.

*I actually coined this name for myself before the late David Mills launched his blog Undercover Black Man. However, if I were going to steal from pay homage to someone, Mills would be at the top of my list. I was a fan of his writing and his blog and in my limited interaction with him he was kind and generous. He died far too young - may he rest in peace.

African American Lives: American History and My Family Tree

Like many, I grew up hearing stories about my family's history. I have a few ancestors whose stories live in history books and who are studied by scholars to this day. There are institutions and organizations named for them. These family stories provide a perfect example of how African American history is American history and another reason why Black History Month still matters.

My great-great-great grandparents, William and Ellen Craft made one of the most daring and inventive escapes from slavery in American history. Ellen, the daughter of a slave and slave owner, was fair skinned. So light, in fact, she could pass for white. She and her husband, William, devised a plan where Ellen would dress as a white man and purchase train tickets for herself and her "slave" (William) to travel north to freedom. Ellen further enhanced her disguise with a sling and face wrap as though she had a toothache so that she would not have to reveal that she could not sign her name (neither Ellen nor William could read or write) or reveal her woman's voice.

When the Fugitive Slave Act passed, their former owners sent slave catchers to Boston to recapture and return them to slavery. Aided by abolitionists, William and Ellen eluded capture, causing the hunters to give up and return home. William and Ellen then went north to Nova Scotia and sailed to England where they lived until slavery was abolished and they returned to the United States. After failing to recapture William and Ellen, their owners petitioned President Millard Fillmore to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act and asked for his assistance in returning them to slavery. Fillmore promised (despite the fact that his faith led him to personally abhor slavery) that he would do everything in his power to enforce the law and even use the military if necessary.

Another President factors into my family history. Thomas Jefferson was a slave owner and Sally Hemmings is the slave most Americans have heard of because of their relationship. One of the descendants of Sally Hemmings' sister, Mary, was activist William Monroe Trotter. Along with W.E.B. Du Bois, Trotter helped establish the Niagara Movement which was a precursor to the NAACP. William Monroe Trotter's sister, Bessie, married Henry Kempton Craft, grandson of William and Ellen Craft. They are my great-grandparents. William Monroe Trotter, the founder of the Boston Guardian newspaper, the first black Phi Beta Kappa at Harvard, was simply my grandmother's "Uncle Monroe."

My grandmother has been interviewed by researchers from Monticello as they acknowledge and incorporate the stories and history of the slaves who lived there and my aunt, uncle and cousins have attended "family reunions" at Jefferson's home. William Monroe Trotter had his own history with presidents in his day. He challenged Theodore Roosevelt and later Woodrow Wilson about the treatment of African Americans. His protests were so forceful that President Wilson banned him from the White House.

As Kim Pearson pointed out in her post on Black History Month and the American Civil War, personal stories connect the past and present and illuminate history in the process. Kim shares the story of Adrien Wing, the great-great granddaughter of Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard. When she visited Beauregard's home in New Orleans, Ms. Wing spoke up when the tour guide failed to mention the whole story:

I will also never forget the guide's face when I told the group that those women on the wall were not the general's only family. He had Black descendants as well, and I was one of them. She blanched and said that she knew that the general was like the other southern gentlemen of his time, but she was not allowed to talk about that. Then she hurried us on to look at the cookbooks.

I'm glad that the caretakers of Monticello and Jefferson's legacy have researched, and now acknowledge and discuss the lives of the slaves who lived alongside Jefferson. History is not created in a vacuum, by individuals acting alone. It happens through our interactions and at the crossroads. Unfortunately, though, in this country, history and accomplishments are too often only made visible or seen when it's through the eyes of white people or embodied in white skin. Black history month gives us the chance to give voice to the too often invisible.

The role of being the first African American to accomplish something notable did not stop with Uncle Monroe. My father was the first African American to earn both a JD and a CPA in California. My grandfather was the first black city councilman in Oakland. My aunt was the first black woman to edit the editorial page of a major American newspaper.

That's three U.S. presidents that my family's lives directly impacted. Three doors my family opened. My family quite literally helped to shape the course of American history. While understandably their stories loom large in my family's hearts and minds, they are just strands in the tapestry that is American history. As long as Black History Month and other events like it help us better understand and add to that tapestry, the stronger and richer it will be.

Cross posted at BlogHer

William Monroe Trotter's sister, Bessie, married Henry Kempton Craft, grandson of William and Ellen Craft. They are my great-grandparents. "Gramps" passed the stories of his grandparents to his daughters, my grandmother and great-aunt. My great-aunt and her daughter were active in the civil right movement. My cousin Peggy carried on William's and Ellen's legacy of civil disobedience and while working as a member of the Student Non Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) on helping blacks in the south securing voting rights she was arrested and spent several weeks in jail. A few years ago I met a minister who was moving to South Africa to continue his human rights work. He had been the pastor of my grandmother's church and had ministered at dome of the funerals of Black Panther members. The minister told me how much he admired my grandmother, who as the relatively comfortable middle class school teacher and wife of a civic and community leader would not be expected to, for attending those funerals.

Tip of the Day: Jane Velez-Mitchell

I'm going to try out a new feature here. A daily pointer to something I think is worth knowing about. I come across lots of great stuff every day and I want to share the good stuff. It might be a thought provoking article, a useful website, a product I've found to be indespensible, an incredible image, groovy places to visit or someone you should know. You can always check out my del.icio.us account (mrniles) down on the left sidebar or follow me on twitter or friendfeed (marianiles) or read my BlogHer blog to get a sense of stuff I'm finding but this series will serve as a spotlight.

I very much enjoyed this profile of HLN (from CNN and formerly known as Headline News) host Jane Velez-Mitchell. She seems like an interesting person whose life has lead them to some insights that have supported her success. And it gives hope to those of us past our teens and twenties that new frontiers and the best of our life and career can still be ahead of us. Here are some choice bits but I encourage you to read the whole thing.

Jane Velez-Mitchell is a true-crime author, a television talking head, a lesbian, an animal activist, a recovering alcoholic and a vegan. She was until recently a glorified freelancer for Headline News, the sister channel of CNN.

Now she is one of Headline News’s nightly hosts — and her 7 o’clock show is setting ratings records for the network....

After almost two decades in Los Angeles, chasing local news for its CBS affiliate and covering criminal trials for the syndicated show “Celebrity Justice,” Ms. Velez-Mitchell, 53, was content to fill in for Ms. Grace, promote her book about crimes and write a memoir.

In appearances on Ms. Grace’s show starting in 2005, she had been enticed to share opinions, a marked change from her years in local news where, she recalled, producers would tell her to “stick to the copy.”

Having made the leap from news to views, “I kind of sensed that I couldn’t go back” to local journalism, she said. “Which is O.K.: life’s an adventure, and you keep moving forward.”

Ms. Velez-Mitchell said she drew her one-day-at-a-time philosophy from the 12-step program of Alcoholics Anonymous. She will celebrate her 14th year of sobriety on April 1. “That’s really the main thing that informs how I look at the world,” she said. “I’m not in control of anything, so why bother trying to control it?”...

“It’s astounding how little you need to survive, it really is,” she said.

Holding Up a Mirror: Reflections of Invisible Americans in Obama's White House

One of the many exciting aspects of electing the first black president is that some segments of American life will be more visible to all of the country and world in a way they seldom have in media and popular culture.

There is much attention being paid to the fact that the Obamas are a black, upper middle class, traditional nuclear family. As several observers have noted (however clumsily) the first, last and only time previously that reality has occupied (especially white) America's collective mindspace was in the heyday of the Huxtables.

No, the Huxtables were not real. Yes, real Huxtables exist - they are not mythical creatures.

(photo credit: JibJab via flickr stream of mind on fire)
On President Obama's first day in office it was evident that our new first family were welcoming a new face of America to the White House.

Although caution should be taken not to idealize the Obama family and marginalize other (black) family structures, there is a certain gratification in seeing the rest of America learn what black folks have known all along, i.e., there are black families headed by two, married parents, not just single mothers and absent fathers as seems to be all too common in the media and popular culture's image of how we live.

Though the new first family may seem like a novelty to some, for others they are familiar.

Barbara McKinzie, international president of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, says she grew up in a small town in Oklahoma surrounded by black couples and an extended family of teachers and neighbors, who were knit together like the new first family.

She didn't need to look at the Inauguration Day festivities to see a vibrant black family.

"It's not new, but it appears new," she says. "The president and his wife and children are not a novelty in the African-American community.

"It's the only family I've known in my life." Black first family 'changes everything' John Blake, CNN.com

And though it wasn't the experience of Michelle and Barack specifically, I guarantee that they are representing for those of us bougie black folks who grew up in the world of Jack and Jill, The Links cotillions, AKA's (of which Michelle has been made an honorary member) and Deltas, Alphas and Kappas and the rest of the "Divine Nine" black Greek service organizations.

(Oakland Links Cotillion 2005 photo from The Globe Newspapers)

Even within the black community there is rejoicing at the stereotypes Barack and Michelle are smashing because Michelle is not fair and is darker-skinned than her husband. The reality that "black is beautiful" is being writ large via our first lady, no paper bag tests need apply.

Beyond changing up the image of the black family for many Americans, the extended Obama family represent the reality of much of America.  We are a nation of immigrants and indigenous people, slaves and masters all intermingled.  My own family is a brilliant rainbow example of this America.  On my mother's side we are descended from black African slaves and white slave owners.  My father is an immigrant from St. Vincent in the West Indies and his multi-hued ancestors hailed from Africa, Portugal, Venezuela, Scotland and Ireland.  My extended family encompasses Native Americans, Canadians, Arubans, Dutch and Swiss. We are Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Religious Scientists, Catholic, Jewish, Buddhist and non-believers.  And with the Obamas in the White House, we've come a long way from the days of George H.W. Bush describing his Mexican-American grandchildren as "the little brown ones."

For well over two centuries, the United States has been vastly more diverse than its ruling families. Now the Obama family has flipped that around, with a Technicolor cast that looks almost nothing like their overwhelmingly white, overwhelmingly Protestant predecessors in the role. The family that produced Barack and Michelle Obama is black and white and Asian, Christian, Muslim and Jewish. They speak English; Indonesian; French; Cantonese; German; Hebrew; African languages including Swahili, Luo and Igbo; and even a few phrases of Gullah, the Creole dialect of the South Carolina Lowcountry. Very few are wealthy, and some — like Sarah Obama, the stepgrandmother who only recently got electricity and running water in her metal-roofed shack — are quite poor.

“Our family is new in terms of the White House, but I don’t think it’s new in terms of the country,” Maya Soetoro-Ng, the president’s younger half-sister, said last week. “I don’t think the White House has always reflected the textures and flavors of this country.” Nation's Many Faces in Extended First Family by Jodi Kantor, The New York Times

At Jack & Jill Politics, rikyrah shares some thoughts on an image of a young man with braided hair meeting the president and first lady at the post-inaugural open house:

Look at that picture. How many of us have passed this young man on the street and had all these ideas about him? Was one of those ideas - ‘ this young man wants to meet The President of the United States’. No, I believe it wouldn’t have made the list.

This was a goosebumps moment that I didn’t even realize I wanted to see. "The People's House"

I for one cannot wait to see all the ways in which President Obama shines a bright light on all sorts of invisible Americas.

How do you see yourself or your family in the new first family? What have you seen or are you learning about American families that you might not have known? What aspects of American life are you hoping will be better understood by the diversity the Obamas have brought to our national consciousness?

Oakland: My City of Ruins

Here are just a few links to blogs worth reading in the wake of the New Year's Day killing of Oscar Grant by BART police in Oakland. 

M. Dot at Model Minority: BART Police Kill an Unarmed Man, Oscar Grant, on New Year's Day and Black on Black Murder and Oscar Grant

Oakland haunts me.

Edwin Okong’o at Okong'o's Policy: 'Pigs, go home': Oakland Riots Awakened My Demons

That single night did not make me change my attitude toward pigs. Over the years those pigs have harassed me, used unnecessary force, racial slurs and profanity against me, and even killed people I know. Those pigs judged their victims collectively. They assumed that every black man was a hardcore criminal that deserved to be manhandled and locked up. But the night taught me that stacking officers like Raul and my brother in that filthy pile makes me no different from a pig.

Oaklander Online: Oakland Authority, Now and Then

I wait in anticipation, then, of the BART police’s findings. Their investigation, said chief Gary Gee yesterday, should end this week. It’s my hope that they’ll conclude what all of us should already know, that a man was unjustly shot while on his back and on the ground. The subtext, as the videos show, is that Oscar Grant died because he was a black man. We also know—after looking beyond the color of his skin—that his middle name was Juliuss. He had a warm smile with a little gap in between his teeth. And those who knew him say he was a loyal friend.

Diane Leota Davis: Violence in Oakland

With all this said, in a spirit of protectiveness, I must add that this is my home and I love Oakland.

City Homestead: Thoughts on a Fractured City

To the world: we are not trapped here in this city; we have chosen to be here. We are here not because it is the only place we can afford living, but because it is the only place we can imagine living. I believe in this city, in its vast potential and its vibrant communities—and I love it, with all its imperfections. As a community, we will work through the anger and the violence, unearthing the very roots of it. Then, together, we will rebuild trust across the city and create from the fragments a single unified community. There’s a long road ahead, but I have faith that it is one that the people of this city will travel together.

Richard at Fem. Men. Ist Report From The Oscar Grant Protests/Riots.

I head down 14th street towards Webster... and that's as far as i get. A couple blocks further down, the crowd looms, and its a riot crowd. i can smell something burning, and Broadway is obscured with smoke that could be the source of the smell, or tear gas. A metal hulk slowly rolls out of a backlit cloud of smoke. it is a paramilitary tank with a mounted water cannon. Is this my neighborhood?

RaceWire has several posts worth reading.

Hope. With these hands. C'mon, rise up.

A prayer for Asbury Park, New York, New Orleans and Oakland...

The Future of Race and Politics After Electing Obama

The election of Barack Obama to serve as the 44th President of the United States does not bring and end to racism nor racial politics. However, the election of the first non-white president will likely have an effect on political engagement and involvement (empowerment) of not only African Americans but other racial and ethnic groups as well.

Academic literature in political science has long considered the effect of the election of members of minority groups and their presence in governance on increasing political empowerment. The examination of the election of black mayors has been most prevalent. Without a doubt, Obama's election as President will lead to many years of research and study of what empowerment it brings.

Election dynamics on the national level are very different, of course, than on a local level. Given the relatively small percentage of the population blacks are nationally and even at a state level (affecting electoral college votes), blacks alone cannot elect a president as can happen with a mayor or congressional representative. Obama was elected by a coalition of every racial and ethnic group including the majority group of whites. Obama's election likely would not have been possible had he not received a larger percentage of whites than voted for John Kerry and Al Gore though he did not receive a majority. This election dynamic may lead to increased engagement from minority groups other than African Americans as they see that multi-ethnic coalitions can succeed.

One possibility is that Obama's election may signal, for the African American electorate at least, less of a need to see one of our own elected in local or state election in order to feel politically empowered. Similarly, increasing numbers of black politicians represent majority white districts. As I previously noted, in a majority black congressional district in Tennessee, voters chose a white candidate who better represented their views rather than a black candidate in a Democratic primary.

However, Obama's election may encourage more African Americans to run for office at all levels. Other groups may also see his election as a sign of the success of political empowerment and seek to increase their own through electing group members to office.

In the not-too-distant future, Americans of color will collectively outnumber white Americans. Younger Americans show less interest in identity and more in political competence. These two forces combined with increasing political engagement of Latino and Asian American voters along with increased political coalition building will likely lead to a very different future of race and politics than the form it has taken in recent history.

I for one will be watching with great interest the exciting promise this future holds.

Morning in America Again

It is morning in America again.

As I predicted, white voters joined the broad coalition that elected Barack Obama the first black President of the United States (and allowed us to perhaps finally put the Bradley Effect to rest). It is morning in America again.

Despite the fact that a surprising number of people (even some who voted for Obama) believe at least a few of the untrue rumors about what electing him would mean are making a run on guns, though (unsurprisingly) white supremacist groups are using Obama's election as a recruiting tool, and even in the face of recent revelations that Sarah Palin's rally rhetoric lead to not just shouts of "kill him" but curiously coincided with notice from the FBI that the Obama family experienced a sharp increase in threats, it is once again, gloriously, morning in America.

Morning in America was a feel-good campaign slogan of optimism that came to be synonymous with Ronald Reagan. The morning in America that dawned on November 5, 2008 was one that found many feeling fully American and prouder than ever of their country.

Like many, I was moved to tears on Tuesday night. Wednesday morning I awoke with a feeling of American-ness I've never before felt. My skin is a constant reminder of America's legacy of excluding black people from full humanity and citizenship. I am farther removed from slavery than many other African Americans of my generation because my great-great-great grandmother used the same quirk of genetics as I have that left her - a child of slave and slave owner - fair enough to be seen as white to escape slavery. After she and her husband made their daring escape the fugitive slave law was passed and men were sent to recapture them. They fled to England and raised a family. After slaves were emancipated, my great-great-great grandparents returned to America. After risking their lives twice to escape a nation where they were treated as property and not human beings, they believed in the promise of this country enough to return.

On Tuesday night the faith of my ancestors was rewarded. And on Wednesday it was morning in America again.

Related Reading:

A Bold Prediction: White Americans Will Elect a Black President

Most white Americans will not vote for Barack Obama. No Democratic candidate for president has received a majority of white votes since Lyndon Johnson won in a landslide 44 years ago.

But more white voters than voted for John Kerry, Al Gore and even Bill Clinton will vote for Obama on Tuesday if polls are correct. And they will join a majority of black, Asian American, Latino and Native American voters in a coalition that will make history on Tuesday.

This moment has been coming as seen in the growing number of black politicians elected in places where there are few non-white voters. Small town white voters have helped to create the path Barack Obama now walks.

Prejudices can be so deeply ingrained that we are not aware of them. We can hold biases yet vote differently. There is an anecdote of uncertain origin circulating which demonstrates that even openly racist voters can move past their hatred to vote for a African American in the face of economic crisis:

So a canvasser goes to a woman's door in Washington, Pennsylvania. Knocks. Woman answers. Knocker asks who she's planning to vote for. She isn't sure, has to ask her husband who she's voting for. Husband is off in another room watching some game. Canvasser hears him yell back, "We're votin' for the n***er!"

Woman turns back to canvasser, and says brightly and matter of factly: "We're voting for the n***er."

In this economy, racism is officially a luxury.

The ugly racism that still exists to this day in our country cresendoed when a group of neo-Nazi, white supremicist, sons of klansmen, skinheads plotted to kill black school children and then Barack Obama. But even as most Americans recoiled in horror and were grateful that the ATF quickly foiled the plotting as they've done twice before this election season, we will awake Wednesday morning to find that racism, fear and hatred still exist. Black men will still be seen as "boogeymen" and made out to be convenient scapegoats. Many will remain unsure and wary of those who are different from them and others still will openly express their hate. However, their ranks continue to shrink. Obama's candidacy has opened a space for dialog.

This 2008 election is a milestone and may put a black man in the White House. That creates an opportunity for an adult conversation about the murky complexities of race, in part because there’s evidence that when people become aware of their unconscious biases, they can overcome them.

Wounds may have been reopened and rubbed raw anew but in that freshness is an opportunity for them to better heal this time. And we have come far as a nation and that progress as we continue to grow into America's promise of greatness should be celebrated.

What should also be celebrated with this election is that many white voters will ignore the calls to their basest instincts. As Frank Rich noted in his New York Times Op-Ed "In Defense of White Americans":

But the other, less noticed lesson of the year has to do with the white people the McCain campaign has been pandering to. As we saw first in the Democratic primary results and see now in the widespread revulsion at the McCain-Palin tactics, white Americans are not remotely the bigots the G.O.P. would have us believe. Just because a campaign trades in racism doesn’t mean that the country is racist. It’s past time to come to the unfairly maligned white America’s defense.

Carmen VanKerckhove at Racialicious wrote "An open letter to white voters, or what McCain really thinks of you":

Dear white voter, it’s time for a decision.

This November, will you support the candidate who assumes the worst about your character and motivations?

Or will you vote for the candidate who has never stopped believing in and championing your capacity for greatness?

And perhaps that will be Obama's greatest gift towards healing the racial divisions still present in this country. However, it will be up to all of us Americans to use that gift:

We must. When we elect Barack on Tuesday we will not be at the end of struggle; we will be at the beginning. The White House is not the prize. Our calling is to something greater than any one man in the halls of power. When Obama wins we must begin to govern. We must begin to craft a nation that will move forward in truth and reconciliation rather than in fear and division.

Then, and only then, can we begin to create history:

Obama doesn’t transcend race. He isn’t post-race. He is the latest chapter in the ever-unfurling American racial saga. It is an astonishing chapter. For most Americans, it seems as if Obama first came to dinner only yesterday. Should he win the White House on Tuesday, many will cheer and more than a few will cry as history moves inexorably forward.

But we are a people as practical as we are dreamy. We’ll soon remember that the country is in a deep ditch, and that we turned to the black guy not only because we hoped he would lift us up but because he looked like the strongest leader to dig us out.

Additional Reading:

Princeton Professor, Melissa Harris-Lacewell writes at her blog The Kitchen Table:

I know that when Obama wins next month America will still be marked by racial inequality. I know that being black will still mean living poorer and dying younger. Nevertheless, I am holding onto the hope that his win will be one more step to making Melissa the professor as much a citizen as Joe the plumber.

Wendi C. Thomas asks at The Root (rhetorically) "Will White People Riot?" [when John McCain loses]

If the polls are accurate—and Obama wins—will these few angry white people make good on their oral declarations? And will those who stood by them silent, join them? With dreams deferred, can angry whites do what Langston Hughes taught us—to let it fester like a sore, even to let sag like a heavy load? Or will the dream of a perfect streak of white men in the White House, if deferred, cause white people to explode?

Cassandra Spratling in the Detroit Free Press describes how Obama's rise reflects a dream realized for many:

Serving proudly in the Army in the 1940s, Samuel Green sought to exercise a basic right of citizenship. He wanted to vote.

While stationed overseas, he requested an absentee ballot. But officials in his hometown of Montgomery, Ala., said no.

He had not paid the poll tax, the roughly $2 fee that kept many black people from voting.

"Here I was overseas, fighting in World War II, and they denied me the right to vote," said Green, who moved to Detroit in 1945. "We could hardly afford to live, let alone pay a poll tax."

For African Americans like Green -- who lived through segregation and the country's hottest stretch of racial violence since slavery -- the rise of Illinois Sen. Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president is more than amazing. It represents the realization of a future they never thought they would live to see.

They are elated, not just because a black man is the presidential front-runner, but because voters appear to be judging Obama for his qualifications, not his skin color.

While the elders help us put history in context, children show us the hope and promise of the future.

BlogHer Contributing Editor Sarah of Sarah and the Goon Squad writes "My Children Give Me Hope for the Future":

She pointed at the man on the left “This is Narack Ofama” (meh, close enough for a four year old) “and this is John McCain. You know how I can tell?”

I asked her how.

“They have different color hair.”

While I sit here and worry that there are Americans out there that won’t vote for a good man just because of the color of his skin I can be assured that at least one of the next generation of voters didn’t even notice the difference.

That gives me hope.

And Stefania Pomponi Butler at City Mama writes a letter to her children before election day:

Bunny and Wallie, in Barack Obama, you can also see yourselves: a multicultural citizen of the world with a mind that is open to all ideas and with a heart that is capable of loving all people. That is my hope for you and that is why your parents voted for Barack Obama.

BlogHer is non-partisan but our bloggers (including me) aren't! Follow our coverage of Politics & News.

Cross posted at BlogHer where the comments usually happen so check it out there, too.

The Political Rhetoric of Race and Racism Invokes Historical Perspective and Potential Backlash

Race continues to be a factor in the presidential campaign this year and in recent weeks has been raised as an issue in ways that have led observers to analyze the issue through historical lenses.

Nicholas Kristof, in an Op-Ed in the New York Times noted that there was a "push to 'otherize' Obama." Kristof describes some of the forms this otherization is taking:

What is happening, I think, is this: religious prejudice is becoming a proxy for racial prejudice. In public at least, it’s not acceptable to express reservations about a candidate’s skin color, so discomfort about race is sublimated into concerns about whether Mr. Obama is sufficiently Christian.

This type of othering has moved from email rumor campaigns to much more explicit and public expressions. The Mayor of Fort Mill, South Carolina sought scriptural backup for the rumor that Obama is the antichrist. In North Carolina a real estate agency put up a sign reading "Obsama-Obama. Not American. Not Welcome." Karen Tumulty, in Time magazine, reports that The Virginia state GOP chairman urged volunteers to compare Barack Obama to Osama bin Laden as they go campaigning door to door. Recently at a John McCain town hall appearance a woman told McCain that she could not trust Obama because she read that "he's an Arab." McCain did take the microphone from the woman and say that it was not true but unfortunately did so in a way that implied that Arab people are not decent family people as BlogHer member, ManagementProf noted. And Rochelle Nelson at Sagacious Rambling reports that the woman who made the statement about Obama remains unconvinced despite McCain's rebuttal.

As the economy crumbles, McCain-Palin campaign rallies have become hotbeds of racism from subtle to overt from audience members, campaign surrogates and Sarah Palin herself. At recent campaign stops surrogates introducing the candidates have referred to "Barack Hussein Obama" and audience members at the mention of Obama's name have yelled out "terrorist" and "kill him." They've yelled at an African American sound man for a television network covering the event to, "Sit down, boy." A man displayed a stuffed monkey with an Obama sticker on it and then passed it off when he realized that he was on camera. They've accused Obama of "treason." (Stephania Pomponi Butler has a round up of racist smears and denouncements at MOMocrats)

And it is not just at campaign events where such sentiment is being heard.

Debbie Gorman at MOMocrats reports that at her workplace she has heard from two people that they would not vote for "a black" or a "goddamn ni**er" (Oh, and Palin's "a babe").

At an Oregon university "a life-size cardboard reproduction of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama was hung from a tree on the campus, an act with racial undertones that outraged students and school leaders alike."

Republican Party spokesperson, Didi Lima was removed from her role in McCain's campaign after making "racial remarks"

Maud Newton shares the story of a Florida teacher who taught his seventh-grade social studies class that Obama's call for change stood for "Can You Help A (expletive) Get Elected."

TPM reader libgirl reports that two young men yelled "N***** lover" at her (and her six year old) while standing in her yard which displays and Obama sign.

Conservative observers have compared a video of young men performing step dancing while expressing how Obama has inspired them as like "Nazi Youth" or as an example of Obama's training of "militant radicals."

Some watchers of the most recent debate wondered if McCain's response to a question asked by a young black man was subtly racist when McCain assumed that the questioner probably hadn't heard of Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac prior to the current economic crisis. The young man responded on his Facebook page and he too wonders:

In defense of the Senator from Arizona I would say he is an older guy, and may have made an underestimation of my age. Honest mistake. However, it could be because I am a young African-American male.

And, perhaps most frighteningly, there are reports of incitements to and threats of violence, property damage and, in one case, actual violence (a man was shot for wearing an Obama T-shirt).

The news is not all sad and scary, though. A Daily Kos reader reports a positive racial encounter from the campaign trail:

Early on, my canvassing partner and I ran into two young black men - bling, tattooes, etc. I try not to be racist - but it was all I could do not to be scared to death. They came up to us - and we introduced ourselves. The one gentleman's name is Kai. I asked Kai if he was registered to vote - he said No and we discussed how he could register. He looked up at me - and I swear he was tearing up in his eyes - he said - "You are the first white man who has ever spoken to me with respect in my life.

In another attempt to inject racism into the campaign, there has been a concerted effort to blame the economic crisis on lending to "minorities." Unsurprisingly, conservative pundits like Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin are fanning the flames of this talking point. But Republican Congresswoman Michele Bachman made similar charges on the floor of Congress.

Although the ugliness I've noted above has all happened in the past month, there is much historical precedent for the roots of this behavior. Journalists have begun to call on their colleagues to not ignore our nation's history of race.

Journalists need to do more than call the play-by-play this election cycle. We also need to blow the whistle on such egregious fouls calculated to undermine the political process and magnify the ugliest prejudices that our nation has done so much to overcome.

Donna Brazile recalls living in the segregated South and speaks of the conversation on race we are now having because of Obama's campaign:

I’m gonna say it and get it off my chest, because for the next thirty days, I’m gonna be the best Catholic woman ever….As a child who grew up in the segregated Deep South, we’ve come so far in this country….But I remember when I used to get on the bus: my mother would tell me, “Donna, when you get on the bus, you and your brothers go all the way to the back, and don’t look at anybody.” We have changed. This is a more tolerant, open, progressive society. And yet, we’re having this conversation because [Obama] is biracial. He spent nine months in the womb of a white woman. He was raised…by his white grandparents…He got out of school and went to Harvard, and all of a sudden he’s “uppity” and there’s something wrong with him? What is wrong with us?…You can vote against him, but don’t ever put me in the back of the bus. I’m not going to the back of the bus! I’m not going to be afraid! My black skin does not make me inferior! And may I add: being a female does not make me dumb!

Kai Wright at The Root announces: Breaking News: It's Racism:

Americans have notoriously short memories, so it's often assumed that the critical clamor journalists hear from both left and right is new. It actually began with Southern segregationists brow beating Northern news organizations covering the Civil Rights Movement. Both sides of the Jim Crow battle knew the news media would shape how the country viewed them, so segregationists did all they could to make reporters part of the story. The liberal-media trope was their brainchild, and they used it to provoke the sort of false moral equivalencies that today's political reporters too often draw.

When a member of the crowd at a Republican rally yelled, "bomb Obama" Rachel Maddow put it in perspective when she wondered if the woman meant bomb like the four little girls who were bombed in a church in 1963.

Peter Beinart at Time magazine gives some historical perspective to the racial attacks on Obama and shares a picture that illustrates why attacks on Obama frighten many - his need for protection


Obama with supporters, and a bodyguard, in Waterford, Mich.

Congressman John Lewis, a civil rights leader who was beaten by police during the Selma to Montgomery marches, hears echoes of that time in McCain and Palin's rhetoric:

As one who was a victim of violence and hate during the height of the Civil Rights Movement, I am deeply disturbed by the negative tone of the McCain-Palin campaign. What I am seeing reminds me too much of another destructive period in American history. Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are sowing the seeds of hatred and division, and there is no need for this hostility in our political discourse.

Gary Kamiya at Salon.com writes The GOP goes back to its ugly roots:

McCain is resurrecting the GOP’s oldest tactic: Smearing Obama as a scary black terrorist sympathizer. But he may meet the same fate as Barry Goldwater.

Frank Rich, writing at the New York Times, notes:

From the start, there have always been two separate but equal questions about race in this election. Is there still enough racism in America to prevent a black man from being elected president no matter what? And, will Republicans play the race card? The jury is out on the first question until Nov. 4. But we now have the unambiguous answer to the second: Yes.

To the second question there are signs of backlash within his own party:

Christopher Buckley, son of conservative hero, William F. Buckley, endorses Obama (and not at conservative publication The National Review where he has a regular column because colleague Kathleen Parker "has to date received 12,000 (quite literally) foam-at-the-mouth hate-emails" for speaking out against the selection of Sarah Palin). Carla Marinucchi at the San Francisco Chronicle writes that McCain-Palin's hot rhetoric risks GOP backlash.

To the first question, although fears of the Bradley Effect have been widely noted, other observers believe that race plays out in voting through a number of different mechanisms and not only do not believe that there will not be a Bradley Effect but that Obama may reshape intersections of racial attitudes and voting in a way that will lead us to speak of the Obama Effect in the future. Despite the painful revival of our history of race and racism, the conversations that we are having might be shaping a new and brighter future.

But what if Obama loses some ask? Two writers come to similar conclusions - that even though there will be inevitable feelings that racism will have played a role if Obama is defeated, ultimately the national conversations around race that Obama is prompting are positive for our country.

But, if Obama does win, perhaps it will signal as Nicholas Kristof describes in his excellent article, "Racism Without Racists" (which points out how unconscious discrimination functions):

One lesson from this research is that racial biases are deeply embedded within us, more so than many whites believe. But another lesson, a historical one, is that we can overcome unconscious bias. That’s what happened with the decline in prejudice against Catholics after the candidacy of John F. Kennedy in 1960.

It just might happen again, this time with race.

Cross Posted at BlogHer.

Gwen Ifill is a Rock Star!

So the proposed scenario here is that Gwen Ifill has secretly plotted to write a book about race and the political process, shockingly talk about Obama in it and then throw the VP debate, behave partisanly as she never has for decades, somehow single handedly take down Sarah Palin, the American people then for the first time in history vote based on the VP debate and nothing else, decide based on the heaping egg Ifill has slung on Palin's face to elect Obama and drive sales of a book that is not about revealing embarrassing personal details (the promise of which drove sales of both Clinton memoirs and is what earned them millions of dollars and Obama has already received a million dollars for spilling his own secrets) and that she will make a fortune from royalties not from an already paid advance?

I used to work in the music business.  The only artists who made the bulk (or any, frankly) money from sales royalties vs. advances were limited to multi-platinum sellers - less than 1 percent of all the recordings made and sold.  I'm guessing the book business isn't terribly different.  The book authors I know never made a cent beyond the advance.

I'm impressed that folks think that a black woman who hosts a 1/2 hour wonky news show on PBS is so awesomely powerful and that race and politics is the hot book subject of next year.  There might be hope for me getting a book deal and not starving yet!