Road Sassy

Right Truth March 3rd, 2008 at 9:20 pm

Obama, all the questions that are off limits…

The term ‘teflon’ is quickly sticking to Barack Obama. All the details of the dirty Chicago politics that are finally coming to light, don’t seem to peak the interest of the MSM — yet, but they will. Will the Saudi…

zee March 3rd, 2008 at 9:53 pm

rightruth

I am hoping against hope that the Obama phenomena will have no more substance than the Howard Dean hysteria. That it won’t translate into reality when the rubber hits the road.

We do have a while yet, certainly his supporters can’t maintain this incessant zeal. Surely as the dust settles a bit the truth will emerge…and pigs will fly and Soros will give it up and Putin will see the error of his ways…..oh dear……to tell you the truth, all I am feeling is dread….

zee March 4th, 2008 at 1:53 am

aaron
I appreciate and welcome your thoughts and will indeed respond to them tomorrow, but I have found this too late in the eve to give it the consideration it is due.

The First Domino March 4th, 2008 at 6:53 am

I wish I knew a way to respond to what you have said, but I’m coming up short. By your own admission, you say that your revelation as to race (the black race in particular) is relatively new, and you appear to be pretty damn sure of the conclusions you have reached.

I’m not sure if there’s much I can say to you about those conclusions. I know that to your mind they speak to what you’re feeling, and thinking, but from my perspective they characterize a person who appears to be unhappy, angry, and disillusioned.

I’ve learned that any attack is a cry for help. I hear your pain. But what I don’t hear is your compassion, empathy, or, for that matter, understanding.

You appear to be a thoughtful person. What about the black race has caused you such pain? I’m afraid that you’ll deny what is obviously lurking behind your words.

As you’ve pointed out, blacks are the ones who are playing the victimhood card, using extortion, and disunity to further racial advantage. You say that “It’s about vengeance and pay back.”

My dear Zee, if it were about payback, you would see al-Qaeda style terrorist attacks in this country on a daily basis. Your premise nor your conclusions are born out by reality.

You’ve had a privileged upbringing. I don’t envy you that. You’ve never had to undergo the indignity of sitting at the back of the bus, or not being able to live and eat where your money would permit, nor a thousand other such indignities.

Do I call myself a victim. No. Those who did those things to me are the real victims: they’re victims of their own hatred, their smug sense of their own superiority, and their unabashed debasement of their fellowman. These things, and other things like them, have victimized them to a greater extent than they could have ever victimize me.

Do I regret my experience? Once I did, when I was growing up and was bombarded with racism each and every day. It was an unrelenting reality. It was more insulting, and painful than you’d ever know.

But now I don’t regret it. I don’t think that you could understand why, but let me try.

The most important thing to me is my soul. Not as the church, or religions define it, but as I have come to know and understanding it over my lifetime.

Because of the horrible experience of racism, my soul has been tested, and I have not come up wanting.

I’m neither bitter, nor angry, nor do I feel a need to attack you for the stance, as misguided as I believe it to be, that you have taken.

I suspect there are a good number of blacks that feel the same as I feel. Otherwise, the streets would continuously run red with blood, and you’d find no rest in your home, or security in your neighborhood.

I wish for your soul enlightenment, wisdom, and, most of all, the joy and fulfillment of knowing that God is smiling down upon you and saying, “Well done good and faithful servant.”

Ron March 4th, 2008 at 10:04 am

To The First Domino,

Very few blacks today have had to deal with what you describe. And most of those still alive who have are not bitter, they are thrilled that we’ve come so far. But the race hustlers, like Sharpton, Jackson, et. al., have a vested interest in keeping the flames burning and work very hard to do so.

There are faw to many white people who have endured sorry work from blacks who hollered racism at the slightest hint of discipline. Certainly there are plenty of while people doing sorry work but they tend to get fired. They don’t have the race card to play. And constantly playing the race card when race has nothing to do with it breeds a lot of discontent from all others, white or not.

Yes, this country had a very sordid history when it comes to blacks. BUt the notion that we should spend forever paying for it serves no one. And it appears to me that more and more blacks are reaching the same conclusion. The black middle class is growing and those people are rejecting the “black culture” of the inner city. They are embracing strong values and a work ethic. ANd for their trouble they are labeled Uncle Tom and accussed of trying to be white when all they want is what everyone wants. They want to work hard and be rewarded for it.

zackattack March 4th, 2008 at 10:18 am

Hi Zee. I agree with you, and then I don’t. It’s one of those gray areas in life. I’ll be brief. I’m an oxymoron. You can visit my blog and find out more on my February 26 post.

But I’m an inner city black male from Chicago who defied the stereotype. I’m an MBA student, yet I have no job, still live at home, and no real potential. For one reason, it is due to Obama’s laziness as my senator. He can’t do it all, but by the same token he should do something.

However, please realize that I am proof that even having an education can’t shield one from racism. I have a great resume, but once employers look up my zip code- it’s over. Chicago is a racially classified city. Zip codes tell everything.

While I disagree with your sentiments, I can not assume what it feels like to be you. So, you didn’t anger me as much as you enlightened me. The worst thing to be is ignorant of others’ opinion. So, you and I both need to learn about each other’s racial experiences. I invite you to be a guest contributor on my blog.

zee March 4th, 2008 at 12:06 pm

Aaron says:

You talk about “real” racist behavior and what I suspect that means for you and those who think like you is that you will recognize racism only in its most egregious forms, as though Jim Crow practices or lynchings are the only sort of racism that is real. You will ignore or fail to appreciate the fact that racism comes in both gross and heavily nuanced forms.

You are assuming incorrectly. To apply that measurement, you would likely imagine that I would judge sexual abuse is such only when it involves rape, or child molestation is inconsequential until it is at it’s most heinous. There are nuances to all prejudices and I (not speaking for anyone but myself) can distinguish between housing or job discrimination and a lynch mob. If we are going to dwell on nuances or fling accusations of “Self-righteousness”, than perhaps you can take your nuanced condescension into account.

Aaron says:

Your post gives all this background on your upbringing in order to establish your non racist bona fides.

No. it ought to be obvious that I offer but a casual glimpse of my upbringing. How could one blog post be any other than rudimentary. But it is not my intent to “establish my non racist bona fides” because the charge of racism is meaningless to me. I am simply ruminating on aspects of my own upbringing, looking for any evidence that racial prejudice was so rife in my home that I had no choice but to become a blathering callous racist, as some blacks seem to suggest that all whites inevitably become.
Aaron says:

My momma used to remark about really rich people that “folk with real big money don’t have to talk about being rich, they just are”.

And she’d be right, if indeed it were my intention to brag or if I somehow found merit in having been a spoiled rich girl. But again, you are assuming that a brief post is some how my total autobiography.

I’m proud of my father’s achievements, given the odds he overcame. But, alas, his daughter made no such inroads. In fact, his daughter succumbed to what I have come to see as a type of victimhood that seems to afflict those who have enough money to spend decades studying their belly button in narcissistic pursuit of “finding themselves”. As I said in one comment above:

Just like the sixties desecrated the values we hold dear, the black culture was desecrated by an entitlement/victimhood message that poisoned their kids just as surely as the social engineering elites wrecked generations of all America’s youth with their antipathy towards tradition, values, family and America.

I betrayed my father’s hard labor by not honoring his endeavors with my own hard work. Upon his death at 15,I succumbed to the call of victimhood as well, only my victimhood was that of neurosis and the self-obsessed pursuit of “answers” and “meaning”. The useless angst of one who prefers to nurse ones wounds instead of being healed. Such useless self-indulgence resulted in sixteen years of drug abuse that certainly reversed all my father’s efforts to pass the American dream down to his daughter.

Anyone of any race can choose the shelter of victimhood. It seems to me that crutches and excuses have been sold to all of us who needed a reason to avoid accepting personal responsibility for personal failures. My pet theory is that a good portion of middle and upper middle class Americans were sold a bill of goods when the field of psychology offered us poor frustrated housewives,overwrought businessmen, and restless unsatisfied teens an entire inventory of neurosis and psychosis to subscribe to as a reason to continue wincing through lives in some misbegotten, profound mission of self-discovery.
None of us were done any favors by this touchy-feelie, introspective culture that catered to our weakest impulses instead of eliciting honesty, courage and fortitude.

Aaron says:

A similar thought applies here to my mind, which is that people who truly operate from prejudice free principles don’t have to talk about it, they just live it.

Actually, I am re-introducing the topic to this blog because I am damn disgusted that the possibility looms that two totally unacceptable presidential candidates should be immune to any criticism by hiding behind the cover of gender or race. I am not a white person that gives a damn about the charge of racism, but one who is tired of hearing it continue to go on unchallenged.

Aaron says:

This talk about how your father hired blacks and treated them real well, and managed to talk to them as though they were human beings. Wow, what an accomplishment. Do you even hear how patronizing that sounds?

Your ears hear insult when none was rendered. Did I say it was an accomplishment? Given that blacks seem to caricature whites as seething haters who can barely manage a civil tongue to blacks, I am simply stating that, contrary to that image, I didn’t observe anything different in the manner my parents treated black contractors than white. I’m not in the least suggesting that such behavior was meritorious. Why should simple civility need recognition?

You, perhaps, should quit trying to insinuate the idea that it was painful for white folks to treat blacks with civility. He didn’t “treat blacks real well”. He treated them as he did everyone else. He didn’t “manage to talk to them as though they were human beings”. He treated them as human beings because they are. Yet, you obviously assume normal interactions between them involved some strenuous exercise in humanity for my dad.

Aaron says:

But you play the victim yourself. In fact, this is a whine that many white people are indulging in, this idea that you have been victimized by political correctness gone amuck and you dare not criticize blacks for fear of being branded racist. Ha!. You accuse blacks of not taking responsibility, but look at how you duck your own and try to blame others.

Well, I have no clue what responsibility that you imagine I am trying to duck.This is not a whine, but part of a series of posts that I am doing wherein I state why I am not buying into race card political dramas. And you’d have to be quite blind to ignore the fact that Obama’s camp is throwing the race card, (as is Hillary’s camp throwing the gender card) at every conceivable juncture. I don’t want to fend off charges of racism when I attack Obama’s Kumbyah socialism.

Aaron says:

If indeed PC prevents you from speaking frankly (it does not) you have none to blame but yourselves. Because most of the time, a charge of race or bias would not manage to stick to a criticism where its not warranted but for the fact that those making the comment back down….. Don’t blame that on the PC environment, that you are so afraid of a bogus charge of racism you won’t stand up for a principle. Thats nobody’s fault but yours.

Well, in case you haven’t noticed, I’m not particularly concerned with political correctness, but am quite concerned that it holds such powerful sway that the scenario you describe - of whites moving from principle to accommodation - is often true. It does not apply here. And actually such charges thrown about carelessly and maliciously, as in the Duke University case, manage to stick long enough to cause incredible damage before proven to be bogus.
Aaron says:

The Detroit mayoral scandal is a wonderful case in point… Do you acknowledge any racism in that scenario? I see where it plays a role. Do you?

Knowing no more about it than what you describe, I see typical old greed at play. In case you haven’t noticed corporate America is thumbing it’s nose at all Americans, forfeiting principle, traditions, and our national sovereignty in pursuit of the buck.
Aaron says:

Lastly, racism is real, its not a make believe deal. And that is true whether or not you can recognize it in anything but its most blatant form.I subscribe to the view that racism will not fade away

.

I didn’t state that racism wasn’t real. The point being that all of the false charges of racism serve only to undermine efforts to uproot the real thing when it shows it’s face.

Aaron says:

Since you perhaps feel that blacks find racism around every corner where none exists, let me simply point you at something that demonstrates that just underneath the surface of this American generation you say is so full of people who fight real racism, there exists a parallel reality filled with people who I believe would kill every black man, woman and child in America, and enslave any they left alive.

Again, I didn’t say that none exists. But I do say that prejudice is a human condition, not one that owes its existence to the corrupt nature of a white man’s heart.
Nor did I state that my generation was “full of people who fight real racism”, I simply stated that there is a generation of whites who never bought into “keeping the black man down”.

As far as parallel realities, the one you describe is occupied by the Muslims who hold to a belief system where all men must be enslaved to Allah and surrender to sharia law. That parallel universe concerns me far more than what remains to be done in America to fight racial prejudice. That battle will continue it’s incremental progress as long as freedom remains for all of us to make those types of choices.
Aaron says:

The bigger point is not that white people are racist or the country is racist, but racism exists and it exists in forms you and I can readily agree on, like the site above. But it also manifests in other ways that are embedded in our institutions, our politics and our culture that are not always obvious. But its no less real. You want to have a real conversation about race. Start by accepting that it is reality, just not the most important one.

Again, I didn’t state that racism isn’t real but that the accusation best hold water, otherwise it is just a freaking distraction from far more serious matters that ought to concern this nation.

Our every freedom is under threat from the insidious effects of PC and multiculturalism that manifest as ludicrous hate and speech laws. Our national sovereignty is slowly being traded away (and mostly by white folks from what I can tell) and sold, our families of all colors are being intruded upon by an ever more invasive government and an entire generation of every race is being sold the notion that sucking on the government teat is preferable to standing on ones own two feet.
But then, I am one of those Americans who believe that we are in a war that promises to devastate all that America is and dreams to be if the enemy isn’t recognized and defeated. And were there no threat from mad muslims seeking to resurrect the caliphate, there is the crippling spiritual malaise evident in a society that no longer celebrates their human condition but succumbs to the nihilistic madness of moral equivalency and self-loathing.
Real racism, yeah, it exists, but it really isn’t on my list of priorities given all that America presently faces.

zee March 4th, 2008 at 1:26 pm

The First Domino said

I wish I knew a way to respond to what you have said, but I’m coming up short. By your own admission, you say that your revelation as to race (the black race in particular) is relatively new, and you appear to be pretty damn sure of the conclusions you have reached.

Well, I’m sure of what I have thus far concluded, but certainly not beyond being corrected if a credible counter argument is offered.
The First Domino said

I’m not sure if there’s much I can say to you about those conclusions. I know that to your mind they speak to what you’re feeling, and thinking, but from my perspective they characterize a person who appears to be unhappy, angry, and disillusioned.

Yup, I am angry, but much of the anger is self-directed. I am angry about what I personally took for granted as an American who threw her every opportunity away. I am angry at myself for having contributed to my country’s slide into self-immolation by my years of narcissistic belly gazing and drug use. Maybe because I personally played at being a victim most of my life that I am now trying to get to the origin of such self-indulgence because, as I have said elsewhere, I think our current culture gives all of us far too many excuses to be a victim.
The First Domino said

I’ve learned that any attack is a cry for help. I hear your pain. But what I don’t hear is your compassion, empathy, or, for that matter, understanding.

Well, to tell you the truth, my personal psychology at this point in life doesn’t seem to have much in the way of ready compassion or empathy,so, in that, you are correct. That does not mean, however, that I am incapable of it, it just is no longer my first impulse.
The First Domino said

You appear to be a thoughtful person. What about the black race has caused you such pain? I’m afraid that you’ll deny what is obviously lurking behind your words.

Actually, discovering that blacks seem to despise whites so much was an eye opener. During the riots I was a limo driver and one passenger was an activist that flew in to support the boycott. She was such a beautiful woman, so articulate and poised. She was everything I’d expect from black America. But she obviously believed that folks like me think she is dirt. She unexpectedly asked me what I thought of the boycott. And I, quite out of character, began to cry. When she asked why, I could only say that I felt I had lost an entire race of people. Perhaps it is what black children feel when they innocently want to play with a group of white kids and are rebuffed. Maybe it’s a pain some feel I ought to experience. Maybe you can explain my grief at my awakening to the racial divide since you allude to “what is obviously lurking behind your words” as something I might deny. Try me? I still do not know why it causes me sorrow to know of the antipathy that exists between whites and blacks. I swear to god, up until then, I thought we were kind of all in the same boat.
The First Domino said

You say that “It’s about vengeance and pay back.”

My dear Zee, if it were about payback, you would see al-Qaeda style terrorist attacks in this country on a daily basis. Your premise nor your conclusions are born out by reality.

I reach my conclusion based on what seems to be the tenor in many black conversations around the net that evoke a sense that now whitey is going to pay. There is still sufficient rule of law extant in America where terrorist attacks will not fly. But calls for reparations and demands for apology fro slavery as well as punitive quotas and affirmative action gone berserk seem more like calls for retribution than they resemble any attempts at balance.
The First Domino said

You’ve had a privileged upbringing. I don’t envy you that. You’ve never had to undergo the indignity of sitting at the back of the bus, or not being able to live and eat where your money would permit, nor a thousand other such indignities.

My upbringing wasn’t priveleged, it was brought to me courtesy of my father’s hard work.Had he been languishing in inherited wealth, you might have a point. I have suffered the many indignities that drug addiction allocates, but that was my own doing. I pay to this day for my weak character. And I realize that as low as I sunk as an addict, my experience isn’t comparable to someone who is born in a ghetto and hadn’t the ready opportunities that I wasted.

My point is that soul wrenching pain, for whatever reason, is humanity’s common plight. I didn’t have skin color to blame for the hell my life became, but I did allow my father’s death and the subsequent losses as a crutch I used to excuse my plight. As mentioned elsewhere, victimhood is handed out to any who wish not to take responsibility. and the gurus of psychology have managed to produce millions of folks who can’t seem to get through life without a Prozac.
The First Domino said

Do I call myself a victim. No. Those who did those things to me are the real victims: they’re victims of their own hatred, their smug sense of their own superiority, and their unabashed debasement of their fellow man.

But what you need to understand is that I am not, nor are millions of Americans, culpable of such behavior. Maybe I didn’t have an opportunity to exercise my hidden racist tendencies. There were no more than three black kids in my school and nary a black person in my entire community. My experience with blacks range from the Black Panthers I bought heroin from to the black professionals to whom I sold homes as a Realtor to the remarkable black women who tried to turn me into a mentor in a youth program I volunteered for. I am not going to apologize that my life didn’t involve more black people or that it was acceptable that I never had any black neighbors. I didn’t set that up. But when I think of blacks, it isn’t the black panthers that I use as a yardstick anymore than I use the KKK as a measurement by which to judge whites.

The First Domino said

Because of the horrible experience of racism, my soul has been tested, and I have not come up wanting.

In the archives I am restoring is an exchange with a black woman who proclaims:
We have to work with what we do have. And when the majority of us do finally figure it out, watch out America! “
To which I replied to in a similar vein as your statement:

You know what I say to that? Hallelujah!!! I have been spending a great deal of time attempting to examine my real attitudes about race. I am so angered by some who post here, my resulting posts could be easily construed as racist. And, trust me, I ask myself if indeed I am. Yet, even yet, I would state I am not.

I have watched your race from afar all of my life . I have long admired the African American woman and I had always imagined how formidable you as a people would become simply because you have been through the fire. As trials carve the character and heart of an individual human being, I imagined so would they carve the character and heart of a race. I have speculated the ‘white’ race had better watch it’s behind as it seemed our souls didn’t burn with any particular fire and that we seem rather tepid and hollow in comparison. I still think that.

Now, when an individual weathers the storm, they can come through their trials with bitterness and ill will, or, resolute and gracious in spirit and character. We all know those who have grown from their trials, and those who have grown simply bitter. For my own private purposes of rumination, so I imagine the same processes occur in a race of people. And I guess that those are the many voices I hear in this forum. All I am attempting to say is, I damn well do hope you “figure it out”, I truly do. But may the gracious and wise amongst you be those who do so, and please, let THAT voice be loudest…

The First Domino said

I’m neither bitter, nor angry, nor do I feel a need to attack you for the stance, as misguided as I believe it to be, that you have taken.

The stance that I have taken is simply one of protest against the incessant charges of racism that obscure the truth and divert from matters far more critical to this nation. I actually really believe, had the convulsions of the sixties and the resulting moral decay we as a nation now suffer from hadn’t been so enervating that our racial divide would have continued healing. The multicultural “tools” that purportedly served to abet that healing have only served to divide.
The First Domino said

I wish for your soul enlightenment, wisdom, and, most of all, the joy and fulfillment of knowing that God is smiling down upon you and saying, “Well done good and faithful servant.”

Actually, I doubt god wants to have much to do with me , but I will take your wishes as sincere and thank you for your good will.

re. March 4th, 2008 at 2:04 pm

the problem with white supremacy is that white people feel as though they can tell black people (or people of color in general) how to feel and respond to the oppression handed down to them by white peope. there was something very interesting in your post; you said that your dad saw a name on a billboad that became his, and from there he began his life in the u.s. which lead to wealth and prosperity. well zee, there is no billboard that can change one’s color. unfortunately in america black skin has historically meant and still means for some people (both white and black) ‘inferior’. on a broad scale, the descendants of america’s slaves have not been afforded the same opportunities in the u.s. as people migrating from places across the atlantic or pacific. people in america who are not of african descent act so dumbfounded at our bitterness toward this government when the fact of the matter is, the butality of slave labor built the wealth of america. however, there has been no atonement for the system because even after slavery was abolished many black americans were (and still are) treated as second class citizens. but for (white) people like yourself, it seems that because you don’t have to experience this in life, it must not be real. that zee, is a symptom of white supremacy; and it is white supremacy that fuels the continued frustration of black people in america.

zee March 4th, 2008 at 3:44 pm

zackattack
Your February post I do not quite understand. It seems that you are being intimidated by those who have flashier grades and resumes than you. Well, you are someone that would likely intimidate me because I never took my sorry ass through college. Now, at 55 I am competing with kids of all colors who can out-diploma me to hell and back. I have, in turn, a resume that reflects my desultory path through life, for which I can blame no one but myself. Trust me, I don’t even begin to have the academics or education to compete on your level.

The stigma attached to affirmative action,from my limited experience, is one I guess I am guilty of. Because one can’t help but wonder if the minority standing in front of you is there on their own steam or simply fulfilling a quota. Simultaneously I realize that is unfair and know that the measurement of one’s capacity to execute their jobs can’t be judged by how they acquired their education anymore than assumptions can be made because of their skin.

So, you and I both need to learn about each other’s racial experiences. I invite you to be a guest contributor on my blog.

I have never once thought that I know what it is like to live in another’s shoes and welcome your gracious invitation to carry on the conversation, though I am sure I’d be eaten up and spit out alive by your readers.

But I would like to hear of what is viewed as “institutionalized” racism and the slights that are said to befall a racial minority at every turn. Perhaps I will discover that I am not as innocent as I believe, and that I am willing to be convinced of if true, but I don’t think I will ever buy into the guilt I am expected to feel for actions or attitudes that I don’t own.

Jamel March 4th, 2008 at 4:36 pm

White Supremacy!

Field and Zee « Chamblee54 March 4th, 2008 at 7:17 pm

[...] had a quote today from a blogger that he disagrees with. It seems as though a (young) lady in Cincinnati named Zee had a few comments on herself and race in America. (Field spells that A-Merry-Ca). Zee is [...]

Sheri March 4th, 2008 at 9:21 pm

I found the post written an interesting one, particularly about the part where your father Americanized his name upon coming into the country. I find it sad that he had to do that to become more accepted in the society. I often find it interesting of those who complain about victimization, and wonder how often it weighs heavily on their minds. I think you have more in common with black people than you realize. It must have been difficult for your father to move into a neighborhood during the 50s who did not complete accept him because of his social status and classism can be sometimes more insidious and vicious than racism or sexism.

I am explain to you this, you have no idea about black cultural because you only concentrate on the negative aspects, and let’s face it there are positives and negatives to every ethnic group. A person mentioned the word empathy and always believe it was very good word and skill to have. I think it is good to relate to others and understand their perspectives. There are people around this country who are in pain for a variety of reasons, and from what I can read from your blog it seems you are some pain as well. You feel wronged and need something to blame. And you choose how what you believe that blacks pay the race card too often much classing themselves as the victims. This country has not had an honest conversation about race and gender bias in this country. I think the average person in this country want to live their lives happy and healthy including most black people and only ask for fairness. The idea is so simple and yet so complex.

I have never been big on the blame game because it is counter-productive and does not resolve anything. However, I would like to ask how you could part of the solution and not the problem?

The First Domino March 5th, 2008 at 2:36 am

You said:

“Actually, discovering that blacks seem to despise whites so much was an eye opener.”

Zee, I chose not to counter your arguments or your conclusions, not because I couldn’t have, but because I felt it would have been a poor investment of time. I felt that I couldn’t say anything here to change your perspective.

Perspective, I’m told, creates perception and perception our experiences. Your perspective, I felt, left no room for a meaningful debate. I felt that your anger had hardened your position.

Your quoted statement above seems naively one sided. Many blacks never got to discover to what extent whites “despised” them. It was a reality they were forced to accept almost from their birth.

Let me ask you this: When did you discover that whites seem to despise black so much?

Were you equally appalled to discover it? Or have you? You seem to suggest that whites in overwhelming numbers are embracing blacks as equals, and are not seeing them through the prism of racism, that blacks are fighting a boogeyman that doesn’t even exist.

It’s only been a few years since your realization that blacks “despise” whites. But what surprises me more is that your first reaction was one of anger, as if somehow you had been the one who had been deceived, that in all those intervening years you believed that black and white togetherness was a foregone conclusion, and now you blame blacks for bringing you to another reality.

Have I characterized your position accurately?

You said:

“She was everything I’d expect from black America. But she obviously believed that folks like me think she is dirt.”

You spent a very short time with her and you came to the above conclusion? Why do you think that she believes you saw her as “dirt?” Did she curse you? Did she blame you for what was going on in the city?

You said:

“Maybe you can explain my grief at my awakening to the racial divide since you allude to “what is obviously lurking behind your words” as something I might deny.”

I would say, very delicately, that you’re still grieving. You’re grieving for the illusion you once held of this country and now suddenly realize wasn’t real. This grief has now become anger and is as self-destructive as the drugs you took to ease your pain earlier. For me, the country has come a long way. For you, you think it has taken a big step backwards.

Now which perception is right? I’d say that they both are.

Zee, you’re not angry with blacks, you’re angry with yourself, and your white brothers and sisters who have created for you the illusion that all is well with the world, especially in America.

It is they who have let you down. The world that they helped you fashion during the years before and after womanhood was shattered by an unfortunate occurrence. Regrettably for you, it wasn’t a real world to begin with.

You have been living in the “matrix,” not the real world. The real world is ugly, and self-destructive, where our investment in race, ethnicity, tribalism, nationalism, sexism, religion, and politics keeps us separate and apart by insisting that one race is better than another, one sex is better than the other, one tribe or ethnicity is better than another, one political party is better than another, one religion or belief system is better than another.

It’s our addiction to “better than” that is destroying our world at the micro and macro levels.

Yet, blacks owe you nothing. And I dare say, you owe us nothing. It’s not about owing, it about opportunity. But somehow it seems you think that blacks do owe you, that we owe you the illusion that you have constructed, an illusion that pretends that everything between whites and blacks is hunky-dory.

That somehow, if blacks deviate from that construct then we have, in some fashion, let you down, bamboozled you; that it is somehow our doing that your world is torn asunder, and it is our responsibility to keep it the way you imagine it should be.

For most blacks, racism is not as dead as you’d like to imagine that it is. We’re under no such delusion that we’ve seen the last of it.

You said:

“I still do not know why it causes me sorrow to know of the antipathy that exists between whites and blacks. I swear to god, up until then, I thought we were kind of all in the same boat.”

We are all in the same boat. It’s called the human boat of survival. It’s a life boat. We left the luxury liner years ago, if one ever existed at all.

Our very survival as a human race comes down to all of us letting our illusions about the other be jettisoned into that vast ocean of human understanding and human oneness. If we neglect that call, then we’re all doomed.

You said:

“The stance that I have taken is simply one of protest against the incessant charges of racism that obscure the truth and divert from matters far more critical to this nation.”

When is the last time a black called you a racist to your face? Tell me who is making these “incessant charges of racism.” If it is “racism” it would be disingenuous of the person making the charge to pretend that it’s something else, and for you to be angry because the naming of a thing is accurately stated. You can’t be so sensitive as to insist that we can’t call a thing racist when it’s perceived as such.

I can’t turn on my TV without hearing someone speak derisively of “political correctness” as though it’s the devils own vestment, and the demon child of blacks.

You’re wishing to divert your attention from what is at the heart of what is wrong with America and the world. You’re pretending that we’re somehow separate from each other. That we can be angry with the other, and call them “ungrateful” blacks, or angry with al-Queda, and call them radical Muslims without realizing that we are them and they are us.

That concept may be a little hard to accept. But that is the problem on all sides. Because we can’t see who we truly are, we continue with the killing and the call to arms.

I tell you that its the notion of “better than” that is ripping the fabric of this nation and oiling the hatred leveled at us from abroad.

To put it bluntly: it’s “separation thinking” that is destroying our world. The truth is: We Are All One. Heal the separation thinking here in this country, and you can heal it anywhere.

I don’t fear al-Queda as much as you do. I fear the “separation thinking” that brought them into existence in the first place, thinking that I’ve had to contend with most of my life. Until we can destroy what is at the heart of their hatred for us and the west, then we will never understand who and what the enemy is.

You said:

“I have watched your race from afar all of my life.”

As the songs says, “I need you closer.”

You can’t know a people from a distance, let alone an individual. It’s time to get closer. I challenge you to let your anger abate long enough to get to know blacks on a personal, and individual level. I believe that if you’ll do that, you’ll find that, although a “divide” actually exists, it’s doesn’t have to be an insurmountably hurdle to get over.

And for God sake, don’t do what many whites have asserted, after learning that we have more in common than you’d at first blush expect: “You’re not like other blacks.”

It will insult and anger.

As I have already suggested, anger is a useless indulgence, although you seem to believe in it so vehemently. It’s counter-productive and leads to violence in its extreme form.

You said:

“I am not going to apologize that my life didn’t involve more black people or that it was acceptable that I never had any black neighbors. I didn’t set that up. But when I think of blacks, it isn’t the black panthers that I use as a yardstick anymore than I use the KKK as a measurement by which to judge whites.”

Perhaps you didn’t “set that up”, but here you are decrying its existence without attempting to fix it. In this life we don’t have obligations to each other, we have opportunities to celebrate our oneness.

Here’s an opportunity for you to restore those years that the locust have eaten, not with anger, not with being unhappy with your country, not with attempts to cast blacks as whiners, exploiters, or as users of the “race card.”

Rush Limbaugh, Shawn Hanniety, and others on the right have done as much damage as you think Jessie Jackson and Al Sharpton have done on the left. And the former have more air time in which to do it. All are vested in keeping us separate and apart. At least see that, and if you must be angry, be an equal-opportunity angry person.

You said:

“All I am attempting to say is, I damn well do hope you “figure it out”, I truly do. But may the gracious and wise amongst you be those who do so, and please, let THAT voice be loudest…”

I hope that we both “figure it out.” It’s not the battle of blacks alone. Let’s hope that the “gracious and wise” amongst us be the ones that do so, and let ALL our voices “be loudest”. This seems to be a flaw in your thinking. It’s not us against you. We didn’t create the problem. But it’s going to take people of goodwill on ALL sides to realize that we’re ALL on the same side, before we can all move forward as one people.

Martin Luther King knew this!

You said:

“My point is that soul wrenching pain, for whatever reason, is humanity’s common plight.”

It doesn’t have to be that way. We do these things to ourselves and to others because of our beliefs, our values, and our insistence that we’re separate and apart from each other, and sometimes even from ourselves. Change that idea (and it is a mistaken one) and we can change our world almost over night.

You want to make a difference. Use your space here to help bring that about–Oneness in place of “separation thinking.”
(Not a command, just a request.)

You said:

“But what you need to understand is that I am not, nor are millions of Americans, culpable of such behavior.”

I pray that you’re right, that you can speak for all those millions. I see it daily, on television, not every station, but enough. I hear it on the radio, not every station, but enough.

I saw it in the white salesperson who sold me my home, and when she was invited to dinner afterwards, told me that she didn’t eat innards. I saw it when she snatched papers from my hand because she believed that I had information about the house from a source of which she disapproved.

I could have easily written it off as stupidity, ignorance, or just insensitivity. But for the life of me, I don’t believe that she would have done it to a white client. I could go on, but what’s the use. We’re about healing here, and about changing our perspective.

You said:

“My upbringing wasn’t priveleged, it was brought to me courtesy of my father’s hard work. Had he been languishing in inherited wealth, you might have a point.”

I won’t quibble here with you over semantics. You father’s wealth brought you privileges that would have been the envy of those born poor, white or black. I would say that wealth bestows a “special advantage” over the less fortunate, whether garnered as a result of old wealth or new wealth.

Wealth also brings with it an uncommon opportunity, the opportunity to show, in a visible way, our oneness with the rest of humankind by using that wealth as influence to bring an end to suffering everywhere.

Bono is doing that!

You can only live for yourself, and not for others. But it would be salutary for others and for the Self to make sure that it extends beyond the boundary of your own soul, your own life, and your own personhood. You’ll make a difference by living your life differently, as one who is one with ALL others, and not just united with the rest of humanity, but as one who is the ALL of humanity.

There is a difference, and it’s not a subtle one. Live your life as though you are every man and every woman on the planet. (Just a suggestion not a command.)

You said:

“Actually, I doubt god wants to have much to do with me…”

Saul, who became Paul, could have said the same, given his years of persecuting Christians. I’d say, on the contrary, God is incredibly interested in you, no matter what you think you may have done. And whether you can believe it at this stage, He’s never forsaken or abandoned you, although you may certainly choose to believe that he has.

Believe as you wish, He’s with you always.

And again, I reiterate: I wish for your soul enlightenment, wisdom, and, most of all, the joy and fulfillment of knowing that God is smiling down upon you and saying, “Well done good and faithful servant.”

Anonymous March 5th, 2008 at 9:38 am

With all respect, Zee, your thoughts on the subject of racism do not seem well informed and offer a view that is ignorant of the reality that many people face.

I notice that you are “dedicated to the fight agianst Islam.” This statement in itself belies your prejudices. I suspect that you mean you are in a fight agianst fundamental, radical Islam, as that is the group that has and is committing the anti-West terrorists actions that we see so much of today and not Islam as a whole. The fact that you just use the term Islam shows me that you either don’t know that many Muslims do not subscribe to radical beliefs, or that you are indeed judgmental and racist.

I would like to suggest that you read Thomas Friedman’s collection of essays, “Longitude and Latitude.” His assertion in this work apply both to radical Islam and to what you view as black entitlement and hatred of whites. In any society, when a group of young men lacks real economic opportunity and feels opressed by a larger power, be it whites or Western society or whatever, those young men turn to anger and rage as a way of expressing their feelings of helplessness and emasculation. It is this anger and rage that drive terrorist attacks as well some African Americans’ vocal dislike of white society.

Molly March 5th, 2008 at 11:36 am

Gosh, I am an incompetent commentor this morning. The Friedman book is titled “Longitudes and Attitudes.” My brain and fingers don’t seem to be connected today.

zee March 5th, 2008 at 3:55 pm

Hathor

My father didn’t grow up in Romania, he was born shortly after arrival in America and a few months after his birth his father deserted the family to return to Romania where he later died in a Nazi camp. His mother never learned to read and write and kept a roof over their heads as a school cook. My dad dropped out at the beginning of sixth grade to go to work.

He went on to work as a machinist, met my mother (slavic) who had fled an orphanage and ended up as a governess of some sort to a rich family. She learned proper English, correct grammar, proper dress and manners and after they were married, she began grooming my father accordingly. He had a passion for cars and used to buy and fix them and sell them in the front yard. Recognizing his sales skills, my mother encouraged him to pursue car sales. From there he went on ultimately to own his own dealership before he finally succumbed to lukemia, one of the few obstacles he failed to overcome. My father eschewed his Romanian countrymen in America because they felt he had some sort of an obligation to share his wealth. Guess communism sort of rubbed off on them

The man would have spat at anyone who would have suggested that he was a victim. Are you suggesting that his Slavic accent and features, sixth grade education, zero support from family, church or government were negligible problems because he had white skin? That his determination and will to overcome is somehow a trait that only whites possess? That the addition of black skin would have been all that was needed to qualify as a victim?

A black writer whom you no doubt would deem an uncle tom says it better than I….

You will never hear me say that racism per se doesn’t exist. My purpose is to encourage blacks to understand what they’re capable of despite racism. Racism, in whatever form, is not “holding us back.” At this point in history, it is a sad reminder of how it held back many, and its residual effects will live on. Racism and bigotry are not “white” traits, however. They’re human traits. The next time you call a white person a “racist bigot,” stop and examine yourself. Someone somewhere can truthfully say the same about you.

Molly March 5th, 2008 at 8:21 pm

Wow, you sure are filled with hate.

ligneus1 March 5th, 2008 at 8:56 pm

Kalabro, I seem to remember Roots being exposed as fake.

Hathor March 6th, 2008 at 12:49 am

Zee,

“I have never felt need to make claim to my Romanian-Serbian roots nor lament the plight of my gypsy kin in Transylvania. My daddy grabbed his American name from a billboard and proceeded to move himself steadily up the economic ladder.”

This statement led me to believe that your father was born in Romania; my apologies.

I was making the comparison to living under a totalitarian system to living under Jim Crow. To describe a way you might possibly understand that black people are real victims and not in the way that you imply.

I wonder what you assume about me. Even if my politics lean to the left, what makes you think I or my family or other blacks are not capable? We have to be more than capable to attain certain heights. I would bet that Dr. Rice has more credentials than the last six Secretaries of State.

I am going to use your father again as an example. From what I’ve read I think you are only slightly younger than I, so I am going to assume that when your father went into business it would have been the same time in history as when my father was in business. There are different reasons why businesses fail, but one that did in my dad was that he was not able to obtain capital when his business needed to adapt. I do know that a car dealership depends on short term loans. Just being able to get a loan might have made a difference to my dad. In this instance the color of his skin was important. If you say that was then, I’ll say; then why are you comparing black folk to your father?

When my dad’s business failed we didn’t starve, because he had two other jobs to sustain us. He was more than capable; he had a skill like your father, plus a college degree. We were and are not a unique black family.

What racism does now is create that glass ceiling, which some blacks by luck and effort manage to break. There has always been the excuse that there are not enough blacks to do this or that, but white folk in power never seem to look hard enough in the real world. You pick out your few that share your views and make them the ascendant Negroes, allowing them to only have value. What is weird, is that black CEO’s seem to never be quoted by conservatives, only the literary and academic hustlers; Steele, Williams, Sowell, et al.

I will have probably wasted my time with this response, since my previous comment was lost on your sensibilities.

zee March 11th, 2008 at 1:15 am

Some disgruntled commenter, “Virginia” , emailed me to say I deleted her comment. Playing the victim appears to be habitual, but anyway, to close this out, here is her complaint followed by my response.
It is rather useless because, well, victimhood is an addiction and it seemed that mostly addicts responded to this post. They can’t see beyond their list of grievances and I am, quite frankly, uninterested in disabusing them, just in derailing their pernicious entitlement train.

Virginia says:

I see you have deleted my last comments. Interesting that you could not find a response and rather than look like you do, you want to appear that you have gotten the last word. And you say you are a defender of WHAT? Certainly not the the first admendment. If you had wanted a private blog you should have set it up as such. Then you could have had your clones sing your song and praises. Luck to you in this world where there is still people of color.

Virginia

I respond with…

Actually I haven’t deleted anything. My site had a script problem and was down until the the Host found the script that crashed it. I lost a couple of posts and I never checked for loss of comments. Also had a minor blizzard in my region that resulted in loss of power for most of Saturday so I wasn’t online most of the week-end.

But, typical of you standard position, you assumed that you are a victim of censorship. See how that victim impulse can lead you to the wrong conclusions? And sweetheart, I haven’t any blogger clones. Two other people participated minimally in that thread, but, typical of the victim mindset, you apparently felt you were ganged up upon or why even refer to such an absurdity as my position being supported by clones. That is called projection, honey, where you project to your opposition your own methods and mind set, and lord knows, your religion of pain and oppression has millions of “clones” singing the same chorus of discordant tunes.

This country is at war. If you’d get your narcissistic nose out of your race obsessed ass for awhile, you’ll notice that all Americans are under threat from both islam and a renegade government intent on destroying America’s sovereignty and liberties. You are either an American fighting for this country or you are one of the many rats on the ship. Given how your loyalties seem to extend primarily to your “ancestry” instead of this nation, you fall in the latter category in my book.

Put whatever comments you want, and I’ll not delete them but I actually have no obligation to answer them, especially since they keep repeating the same tired lines. Where racism exists, there are sufficient laws on the books to cover it and the only thing institutionalized in this country is the blame game, the incessant caterwauling of the eternally deprived.

Yeah, “people of color” is about the only cliche you have left, isn’t it, because you certainly are no longer a people of pride nor integrity. As far as I’m concerned , your ob