In fact, that is my question: How does it feel to be white? How does it feel to move through the world without being accused, for instance, of “shopping while black”? How does it feel to know police officers are there to help you rather than surveil you? How does it feel to have the full range of your experiences represented on the big and small screen? How does it feel to be the dominant race in the U.S. Congress, the U.S. Supreme Court, almost all 50 governorships, every state legislature in the country and most cities and local governments too? I imagine that that feels good. Safe. I’m not asking for a perverse descent into white guilt here. I am asking white people to recognize that that goodness and innate comfort that you feel in your own skin, that uncompromised sense of your own humanity is exactly how you are supposed to feel. I am asking you to recognize that black people and brown and native people are supposed to feel any way other than that. When you grapple with how it feels to be white, you will be much closer to understanding how it feels to be black. There may be no redemption for these foolish racists who clearly have no moral compass. Caitlin Cimeno is no innocent bystander herself. On her Facebook page, she mocked a picture of a little black girl in a T-shirt that said, “Black Girls Rock.” Caitlin intimated that if she “told the truth” using the converse logic that “white girls rock” she’d be called racist. I won’t spend time explaining that any more than I spend time explaining why we don’t have white entertainment television and white history month. White people are not that obtuse. And the ones who are are willfully ignorant. Ain’t nobody got time for that. Instead, for those folks who consider themselves enlightened, I will simply say that one of the easiest ways to not be racist this Halloween season is to say no to blackface and tell your less enlightened friends to say no, too. Black America and the diasporic black world thank you. ~Brittney Cooper
Posted on: Tue, 29 Oct 2013 12:52:42 +0000
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