For the past year or so we've seen a lot of angry faces, haven't we? Huffin' AND puffin'! Lots of signs being held up with ugly words on them, lots of harsh words and surly, furrowed brows...lots of fear...lots of hate. We've seen swelling movements of the majority culture in this country watching the status quo slip away, again...and like every time before, we've been watching them frantically grasp and clutch and flail about in their same sad way, desperate to maintain it (hopefully this time around they'll keep the white-sheet terrorism and the firehose and the noose and the bombs and the guns and all that viciousness in the dead hearts of the their rotting grandfathers, where all of that crap belongs...). I recently saw a picture of a man holding up a sign that read: "Obama's Plan = White Slavery"...
Wow.
But I gotta say, I'm tired of disparaging a fearful white majority culture in USA, Inc...let's talk about something else. Something better...
I was watching an NBA game the other night, and despite being a Phoenix Suns fan, I was admiring Carmelo Anthony's extraordinary talent. What an amazing athlete! His prowess on the court, his game IQ, his toughness...his awareness of everything around him and his uncanny, unhesitating ability to execute...fantastic! Except when playing against my beloved Suns, man! do I love me some 'Melo!
The whole thing got me thinkin'...
I am not color blind, nor do I try to be. Every one of us has developed in and are part of a culture and an identity here in USA, Inc, much of which, for good or ill, is the result of what color we are. Is this circumstance necessary, or even desirable? No, not really...but it's the way that it is due to unavoidable socially and historically influenced circumstances.
That's not to say I would judge a man by the color of his skin. Not at all. What it means is that I recognize that because I am a white male I've had more opportunities, fewer hardships and a social free pass in a myriad of instances and circumstances throughout my life than have many of my fellow minority citizens.
I also recognize that I do not understand what it feels like to see a man cross to the other side of the street as I approach him. I don't pretend that I understand what it's like to be a perpetual suspect, or to watch a mother pull her children closer to her as she sees me walk into a grocery store. I don't pretend that I relate to what it feels like to hear jokes being told about the color of skin I was born with, or to be expected by default by many to be an agent of servitude in this country, nor do I know what it feels like to open a history book or turn on the television and see that nearly every hero presented is a man that does not look anything like me.
Above all, I recognize that I have no idea what it must feel like to know that my entire existence in this country is the result of a terrible thievery...that my being, who and where I am today, is indeed a living, breathing legacy of centuries of the worst crime against humanity short of total genocide...chattel slavery. I also do not relate to the sense of pride and honor that must come from knowing that my forefathers overcame and attained liberty from such a persistent and long-lasting tragedy.
So to you, Angry White Guy, shaking your "Obama's Plan = White Slavery" sign in our faces...allow me to remind you that no matter what your prejudices are, no matter how badly it burns you up, no matter how insipid, shallow and insulting it is to carry such a sign, allow me to remind you to what extent this country is black... remind you what the African American means to this nation, to what degree that Black culture and history is America's backbone, to what extent the heart and soul of this country would be empty and hollow without the African American, and remind you of a REAL American Dream...one realized from the very depths of an oppression the likes of which should make you as ashamed of that sign you're waving as you justly should be...
How would America sound without the the sweet, smooth voice of Billie Holiday singing Strange Fruit? It would seem to me to be a nation without a voice. The way she could wail out with those closed eyes and that tortured heart...Lady Day in a smoky club, New York City, 1936, being that song...When I hear that magnificent voice singing that song today, I can hear it shining like a beacon, in harmony with the cries and the struggles of millions through centuries of a horrible darkness.
The words of Fredrick Douglass are written on the face of America. He wrote many wonderful things, but my favorite is his impassioned autobiographical account of the humiliation of slavery, his struggle, escape and eventual passage to freedom. It's a read that should not be lost on the millions of Americans today, many of which have grown in a world of privilege and comfort while decrying some fictional loss of their own "freedom". For those that make this claim it would do them well to visit this heroic and true adventure of refusing to live the life of an animal, possessing the true will of humanity and emerging triumphantly from the dark catacombs of a life unimaginable and into the light of liberty.
What would America look like without the art of Aaron Douglas? What masterful hands created the masterpiece Building More Stately Mansions...those hard-edged images, the African launching the towers in which history's fat Lords rest their backsides, raising the palaces up from their backs, boldly reminding the world just who it was that built so much of it...
Would America have the heart it has today were it not for Langston Hughes' beautiful poetry? Consider his words from Freedom's Plow:
Some were slave hands
Guarding in their hearts the seed of freedom
But the word was there always:
Freedom
Again, those words say a lot about to what extent the African American truly understands the term, "freedom" and holds it close to her heart, and cherishes it completely.
I can't imagine this country without men such as the good Sgt. "A", a soldier I knew while stationed in Baghdad. He was a man that would risk his life for mine (and did so), without hesitation and without question. Through the longest hours and most maddening terror, he was my friend. When the only thing in the world I needed was to smile, he made me laugh, and when the only thing in the world I needed was to cry, he offered his shoulder.
Black is beat, the cool jazz and genius of Miles Davis blowin' on that horn from the bottom of his guts...it's the smell of the sawdust in the air of shanties throughout the deep South where music and dancing pressed away the poverty and the hunger, even for just a few hours...it's the complete reinvention of the guitar many times over, given birth to by the Great Robert Johnson and perfected by the hands of Jimi Hendrix and at best, only duplicated by those that followed...it's the timing of Dave Chappel's punchline, the deep insight and bitter satire of Aaron McGruder's Peabody Award Winning the Boondocks...it's the friendly charm of the wonderful man outside of University of Phoenix Stadium after the Cards took a trouncing to the Colts last Fall, and let my 6 year old daughter sit on his lap and play his bongo drums to her absolute delight...
But most of all, it is the tightly woven threads of beauty, honor, strength, perseverence and liberty as expressed through the art, literature, poetry, music, comedy and content of character of the African American that make up so much of the beautiful tapestry that is this country. It would be a lessor place without it.
Thanks for joining me, fireside...
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